by Carol Matas
January 10
Walt Disney has made a Mickey Mouse gas mask. Am I the only one who thinks that’s a bit odd?
January 11
I made up a parcel especially for Sarah today. I shopped for it yesterday at Woolworth’s after ballet and then lugged it all home on the streetcar. I bought her a scarf and a blouse and a little charm bracelet. I know they aren’t useful but I’m hoping they will cheer her up. I also bought bubble gum and lemon drops. I’m wrapping each item in this really pretty paper and then putting it all in a box and addressing it just to her. I hope it helps just a little. Mommy said she would mail it tomorrow when she mails Adam’s package — she mails him one once a week like clockwork. I bought Adam his favourite Juicy Fruit gum and those huge gumballs he loves as well. (Mommy mails the packages to Sarah’s family to an address in Spain and then someone manages to get it to the family. At least we hope it gets through, and that it isn’t too dangerous!)
January 15
I’m sorry I haven’t written the last few days but I’ve been so busy every night. Either I’m sat by the radio listening to our favourite shows and knitting squares for school, or me and the girls are out skating on the new rink the city flooded right over near Elm Street and Robert H. Smith School. It’s a fabulous rink and we’ve been there almost every night. There’s a shack to change your boots in and everything. Oh, here’s a funny story. Paul was skating there two nights ago and someone took his boots. Well, he has new skates, just like me, and he didn’t want to ruin them by wearing them home, so he ran all the way in his stocking feet!
At supper tonight Mommy and Daddy were very upset. They have good friends in Vancouver, the Mishimas, and today it was announced that all Japanese are going to be sent out of the city!
“They are just as Canadian as we are,” Mommy said. “It’s so unfair! They’re going to forbid them cameras and radios.” She sighed. “No one could love this country more than they do.”
January 17
Marcie and I met downtown this afternoon after my ballet class and went to see the new movie, Sergeant York. I hated it! All the papers say it is great, but Marcie and I thought it was really boring. It’s all about this hick and how he’s a great shot, and then he gets hit by lightning and gets religion and becomes a conscientious objector, and gets called up and serves anyway even though he doesn’t believe in killing. It’s the First World War and single-handed he captures a whole bunch of Germans. Well, I liked that part — that part was very amazing because it’s from a true story. But the rest was too long and boring. And I ate way too much popcorn and had a stomach ache all night!
Mommy took the train to Toronto. She’s involved with a national group that will help organize for the men in Hong Kong. They had their first meeting tonight. When she gets home she’ll organize a Winnipeg chapter. They have registered with the Red Cross and are arranging food baskets and such. But still no news of the fate of the men who were captured. Mommy has been much better though since she got busy with this. And I’ve been extra busy looking after Daddy, although Martha has been staying later than usual whenever she comes to clean, and making dinner for us both. But I make his tea every night.
And in the paper today were the first pictures from the battle of Hong Kong. I look at them and wonder if Morris was right there.
Oh, and the last thing I need to report — Carole Lombard was killed in a plane crash! Along with her mother! She’d been on a trip to help sell defence bonds. Here’s the part of the story that really bothers me. She was travelling with Clark Gable’s publicist, who wanted to take the train. Carole wanted to fly. They tossed a coin and Carole won. They flew, and they died. What does that mean? Was it just chance that the coin fell the way it did? Is that how little our lives mean? Or was God behind it and was she meant to die that way? Or as Daddy says, is it somehow a combination of both things?
I know one thing — I don’t understand it. Will Adam’s survival, or Morris’s, depend on something little like that? Like a toss of a coin? It makes me feel like everything must be terribly important, even the toss of a coin, or nothing is important, and we may as well not care about anything.
January 21
It’s spring! It was 35 degrees today and the rinks got all slushy! So after dinner we listened to The Thin Man, then The Shadow, then The Lone Ranger and then The Green Hornet. A whole night of adventure! Of course, since I’ve been out skating every night I lost track of the stories and Daddy had to fill me in, although he only listens to The Thin Man, so we were a little behind but soon figured it all out.
Still no word from Hong Kong.
January 26
Mommy is back from her trip.
Today we had a letter from Auntie Aimée. She sounds low, and who can blame her? She pleads for Mommy and Daddy to help. Mommy got angry at the prime minister all over again and paced up and down, and ranted about how horrible the government is and how they are condemning our families to death! Daddy said she was exaggerating, and she said he’d heard what was going on there, and I asked what and she said never mind, but I asked again and she said that the Germans were taking people to camps and killing them. And Daddy said that was probably just a rumour and Mommy said that Auntie Aimée didn’t think so and there was no use hiding it from me. And I agreed with her because I want to know the truth. And Sarah mentioned rumours but didn’t say what they were. Surely they couldn’t be killing Jews? Whole families? That couldn’t be. Could it?
January 28
Am reading Sad Cypress at night, trying to take my mind off what Mommy told me is happening in France. There is a passage in the book where Poirot says that life is not reasonable. He’s right, isn’t he? He says life doesn’t let you arrange and order. That’s true too. If only we could demand some sort of, I don’t know, reason or logic or something so things could make sense. Everything seems so out of order. And such bad things are happening. Does God want them to happen? Does He make them happen? Or does He just watch and feel sad? Why did He have to make a world where sad and cruel things happen all the time? Still, I must remember that there are so many good people, I mustn’t let the bad ones ruin my life. But it’s hard.
February 1942
February 3
A strange and bizarre thing has happened. I was walking home from school, when a young kid threw what I assumed was a snowball at my back. I yelled at him and thought nothing of it until Elizabeth gasped in horror as I turned to go into my house. “Your coat!” she shouted at me. “Take it off.”
We hurried into the house and I took it off and turned it around so I could see the back of it. There was a swastika on it! Really. I screamed, dropping it to the floor. Mommy came running in from the kitchen. I pointed to the coat. She picked it up, looked at it closely and said, “Where did that come from?” in a very quiet voice.
Elizabeth said that a boy hit me with something.
“But he couldn’t have drawn this,” I said. “He just hit me with a snowball and ran.”
Mommy had bought me the coat at a factory on Main Street, only a couple of months ago. She looked inside and there it was — a swastika in red dye. She said that the snow or damp must have brought it out, but I didn’t understand.
“Someone at that factory is a Nazi,” she said. “Or is playing a terrible joke on the customers. I’m phoning Mr. Berdinsky right now.”
We heard her angry conversation and his obvious apology. She got off the phone and said, “He wants to get to the bottom of this.” He’s bringing a new coat over himself tonight and picking this one up.
February 4
Mr. Berdinsky called to say that he had discovered the culprit, a nasty fellow who hated Jews. He’d got the job at the factory just to make trouble — he wanted to display the swastika and if a Jew bought the coat, even better. Well, now the police are dealing with him.
It’s one thing to think about Nazis in Europe — it’s another to realize they are right here.
February 7
Still no
news from Hong Kong. No letters from Adam. No letters from Sarah even though I’ve written her twice since I sent the package. Still, I suppose we have no way to know what gets through to Sarah. We can only hope she gets our letters and parcels. I write Adam every week too. I know he gets those.
The weather finally got cold again so I’ve been skating and knitting my squares, and listening to the radio and going to movies. The usual. I guess you could say I’ve been a little blue too. After Mommy told me about the Jews being killed, and then with the coat incident, I started to have nightmares about the Nazis coming to the house and breaking down the door and dragging me off and sending me away from Mommy and Daddy. I wake up screaming and Mommy or Daddy has to run in and calm me down. Hot chocolate in the kitchen seems to work well.
A very sad story in the paper today — Clark Gable might retire because he’s so heartbroken since Carole Lombard died.
February 13
We celebrated Valentine’s Day at school today and everyone loved the valentines I made — I cut them to look like Spitfires and they said, Here’s a valentine speeding right for you! Elizabeth’s were the best though — she pasted them on lacy paper doilies she cut out herself. Mrs. Davis gave each of us candy. Definitely took our minds off Friday the thirteenth!
February 14
Saw Mickey Rooney and Judy Garland in Babes on Broadway. What a swell movie. Judy is the best singer and dancer in the whole world. I know I’ve thought about being a singer or a dancer but maybe I’d be better off being a doctor — I’ll never be able to sing like her. Girls can be doctors now, just like Daddy being the first Jewish dentist in Winnipeg. There are still quotas in the universities for Jews, but maybe by the time the war is over those will be taken away because people here won’t want to be like the Germans and they’ll want Jews to have equal rights. And I’m good at science and I don’t faint at the sight of blood. I bet I could do it! Although I suppose I’ll need to do better at school.
When I think about what I want to be I can’t help thinking about Sarah, and wondering if she’ll ever get a chance to follow her dreams. She won’t if we don’t win, I know that much.
Mordechai sent me a valentine in the mail, and so did Marcie. I also got an anonymous one! And Mommy and Daddy gave me a box of Laura Secord candy. I ate too many at once — of course!
February 16
60,000 British troops were taken prisoner in Singapore. I feel terrible for them.
Today our school took part in the new Victory Loan Campaign. We had a jumble sale and a bake sale — I baked oatmeal cookies with almost no sugar — and we raised $100! At the legislature the guns fired twice, telling the city that the province had passed the $2,000,000 worth of war bonds so far.
February 18
A short note finally from Sarah!
Chère Devorah,
Your package was simply wonderful! I loved the clothes and wear the scarf every day. It makes me feel so special. And you remembered that blue is my favourite colour. Of course you would! The sweets were also perfectly delicious and this time Maman let me keep them — she didn’t barter them away — and I shared them with Rachel. We have been eating a few every day and it makes the day seem so special. Just between you and me, if you send small amounts like that Maman doesn’t seem to think they will really be useful to barter so I get to enjoy them. Your mother’s packages go straight to the black market.
It is cold here but some days I smell spring in the air. Maybe with spring and flowers and sunshine the Germans will start to lose. That’s what I imagine, that they will all wither in the light of the sun.
Hope you are well.
Your loving cousin,
Sarah
I want to send her packages as often as possible, but Mommy says that I can’t. Every time we send a package someone puts himself in danger to deliver it. The packages are helping the family stay alive right now, so it’s worth the risk, and Mommy says Uncle Nathaniel pays well for them, but it all has to be organized by Mommy from now on. Tomorrow there’s going to be an “If Day.” The province will act as if it’s being invaded by the Nazis.
February 19
Because we’re in grade six we were walked over to Robert H. Smith to take part in the If Day activities with the junior-high students. We were prepared for what would happen by Mrs. Davis, but I can tell you it was scary! We joined the rest of the students in the gym. The “Nazis” came in dressed in real uniforms, which Mrs. Davis said they rented from Hollywood. They arrested Mr. Bruce because he’s the principal there, right in front of us all, and then announced that only the “truth” would be taught from now on. One of them called a kid up and measured his head. He said the student’s head was the wrong measurement, which must mean he was a Jew and would have to leave the school.
Then they asked all other Jews to stand up, but we didn’t! I was ashamed and afraid and I just sat there and so did the others. Except Jonathan Chechensky from grade nine and he got up and screamed, “I’m Jewish and I’m not afraid of you!” And then he was led out. And then we were instructed that we must all swear loyalty to the Führer or be arrested. And we must all be spies — if anyone was not loyal we needed to turn them in. And all the books would be burned that the Germans didn’t like, which would happen at a big bonfire. And we could only read what they approved of. Then the assembly was dismissed.
We walked back to our school. Once back in class Mrs. Davis led a discussion about how we felt. I felt mad. I was mad that I hadn’t stood up to them. And it was only pretend! Mrs. Davis explained that it is very hard to fight people like that and what we felt was normal and that we needed to do all we could to help the war effort. But suddenly I wondered if everyone was looking at me differently because I’m Jewish. There are only a few of us in class, unlike at Aberdeen where practically the whole class is Jewish. And for the first time I wished that I was back there. Mrs. Davis was nice and told everyone that we could all be treated like that for various reasons — in Germany if you belonged to the wrong political party you could be arrested, for instance.
Still, I feel ashamed that I didn’t stand up. I didn’t tell Mommy or Daddy about it. It’s my secret.
The papers today printed an edition pretending that the Nazis had taken over. Some of the “orders of the new government” say that no civilian will be permitted on the streets between 9:30 p.m. and daybreak, that all public places are out of bounds to civilians, and not more than eight persons can gather at one time at any place, and that every householder must provide accommodation for at least five soldiers.
The new “rules and regulations” go on and on — the Boy Scouts will be taken over by the Nazis and so will the Girl Guides, and everyone will have ration cards, and death without trial for attempting to organize resistance, or entering or leaving the province without permission, or failure to report all goods possessed, possession of firearms, etc. etc. etc.
Mayor Queen and Premier Bracken and his whole cabinet were “arrested.” Pictures in the paper show them being led away by Nazis. Daddy came home and told me that his bus was stopped and searched. He said it gave him chills, realizing that if it had been real, he would have been taken away just for being a Jew.
Marcie called me and told me what happened at Aberdeen. Apparently Joe decided that they would resist when the Nazis arrived and he organized the entire school into resistance cells. They spent the day planning ways to secretly fight the Germans, how to hide Jews from them, and how to bring the Nazis down from within. They split into small cells of five or six, the way we’ve heard they work in France, and some students were “collaborators” who helped the Nazis. I wish I’d thought of that! Makes me look at Joe in a different way — he always seems so quiet to me. I don’t ever think of him as a fighter. Some of the teachers played the Nazis and they had some of the “Resistance” arrested. Very dramatic and scary.
It was all to raise more money for the Victory Loan. And the newspaper says that Manitoba topped $11,000,000 on If Day.
February 20
I didn’t stand up and I’ll never do that again. So now I know what I need to do. I’m going to personally write a letter to the prime minister and ask him to let Sarah come here.
February 21
I sent a copy to the prime minister. And I copied it to paste it here so he can never say I didn’t write him.
Devorah Bernstein
78 Waverly Street
Winnipeg, Manitoba
Dear Prime Minister,
Many people of the Jewish community have written and asked you to let people from France and Europe into Canada, but you have never said yes. I am writing to ask you again, because we had an “If Day” here in Winnipeg. I’m sure you read about it. It showed what it would be like if the Germans invaded us. My father is a dentist and he is a good citizen. I am a good student. I could be better, and I am trying. Both my brothers are fighting for our country. We are Jewish. My cousin in France is Jewish. Her name is Sarah. She is a very talented pianist and would be a wonderful addition to our country. Please let her come here. Please help her and all the Jewish people in France.
Sincerely yours,
Devorah Bernstein
February 25
The house has gone quiet. Mommy and Daddy don’t talk.
In the paper today the first numbers out of Hong Kong: 296 dead, 1,985 taken prisoner.
February 28
I escaped to Elizabeth’s on Friday and spent the weekend with her. I tried to put everything out of my mind. The talk at dinner was all about the Oscars. What a relief from my house. When they talk it’s war, war, war, and the boys, and who can blame them? Anyway, How Green Was My Valley won the Academy Award. Gary Cooper won for Sergeant York and I guess he was pretty good but I wasn’t hoping for him, I was hoping for Cary Grant. Joan Fontaine won for Suspicion and I never saw that because it was an adult film. And I wish Greer Garson had won because I think she’s just perfect!