WEBVTT - The Mysterious Boot Club 0:00:00.160 --> 0:00:11.480 Family Secrets is a production of I Heart Radio. There 0:00:11.560 --> 0:00:14.280 is a question mark almost lost in a sea of 0:00:14.360 --> 0:00:17.080 names on the walls of an old synagogue in Prague. 0:00:18.400 --> 0:00:21.680 Visitors hushed children as they passed through each chamber of 0:00:21.760 --> 0:00:25.640 the Pincus Memorial. It is hard not to be overwhelmed 0:00:25.640 --> 0:00:29.720 by the dizzying display of black and red letters. They 0:00:29.760 --> 0:00:34.159 memorialize seventy seven thousand, two hundred and ninety seven individuals. 0:00:35.000 --> 0:00:37.560 Each was a resident of the Czech districts of Bohemia 0:00:37.600 --> 0:00:41.559 and Moravia during the war. All were victims of the Nazis. 0:00:43.320 --> 0:00:45.840 Next to every name is stenciled the date of birth, 0:00:46.640 --> 0:00:49.720 and next to each state of birth neatly sits the 0:00:49.800 --> 0:00:53.479 date of death. One entry bears the name of my father, 0:00:54.280 --> 0:01:01.080 Hannas Stanislav Norman, born on February nine one. It is different, 0:01:01.760 --> 0:01:04.320 unlike the others on the wall, it has no date 0:01:04.360 --> 0:01:10.240 of death. Instead, carefully calligraphed, there's an incongruous and bald 0:01:10.480 --> 0:01:15.920 black question mark. I visited the memorial in nineteen ninety 0:01:16.000 --> 0:01:19.800 seven as a tourist, unaware of any link with the synagogue. 0:01:20.959 --> 0:01:23.200 Scanning across the top all to my right as I 0:01:23.240 --> 0:01:26.920 descended the steps into the first chamber. I was astounded 0:01:27.040 --> 0:01:30.880 to see my father's name. He was then very much alive, 0:01:31.400 --> 0:01:36.200 settled and working in Cadakas, and yet the bold question 0:01:36.240 --> 0:01:41.520 mark was there, both jarring an oddly opposite. This was 0:01:41.560 --> 0:01:43.880 the first time and I had seen the query inked 0:01:43.920 --> 0:01:47.160 on the wall. But questions about my father had emerged 0:01:47.240 --> 0:01:50.960 long before my quest for answer started, when I was 0:01:51.000 --> 0:01:54.160 just a little girl, living across an ocean and a 0:01:54.280 --> 0:02:00.080 sea in a very different world. That's Ariana noym It, 0:02:00.600 --> 0:02:03.840 a writer and mother of three who currently lives with 0:02:03.880 --> 0:02:09.640 her family in London. Arianna's first book, When Time Stopped, 0:02:09.840 --> 0:02:13.440 a memoir of my father's war and What Remains is 0:02:13.520 --> 0:02:18.040 just out, and it centers on an extraordinary secret held 0:02:18.200 --> 0:02:22.240 tightly at the very core of her father's life, one 0:02:22.360 --> 0:02:26.680 he never spoke of while he was living. Ariana, as 0:02:26.720 --> 0:02:30.919 the sole heir to a vanished world, painstakingly brings an 0:02:31.080 --> 0:02:42.720 entire lost family to life. I'm Danny Shapiro, and this 0:02:42.840 --> 0:02:45.840 is family secrets, the secrets that are kept from us, 0:02:46.160 --> 0:02:49.120 the secrets we keep from others, and the secrets we 0:02:49.240 --> 0:02:55.040 keep from ourselves. So I grew up in the Venezuela 0:02:55.280 --> 0:02:59.200 of the seventies, and which is completely disintu course than 0:02:59.240 --> 0:03:02.840 the Venezuelage day. It was then at place billed with 0:03:03.800 --> 0:03:11.440 promise and with light. There were theaters being built, museums, schools, airports, roads. 0:03:11.800 --> 0:03:15.120 It was really a place of potential. It was seen 0:03:15.160 --> 0:03:19.160 as the capital of South America, really bustling and vibrates, 0:03:19.800 --> 0:03:23.600 and of course the nature there is absolutely useful and 0:03:23.639 --> 0:03:26.920 in this at least wonderful surroundings in this wonderful country. 0:03:27.840 --> 0:03:32.480 Was my father, and she was involved in everything. He 0:03:32.600 --> 0:03:36.360 had industries, he had newspapers, he was involved in museums, 0:03:36.480 --> 0:03:39.680 he was setting up schools and had set up as 0:03:39.760 --> 0:03:43.720 design institution at a university to study business. He was 0:03:43.760 --> 0:03:48.440 involved in charity. So he was really vibrant, engaged person. 0:03:48.680 --> 0:03:52.280 And I lived in this beautiful house in the center 0:03:52.320 --> 0:03:56.800 of practice, with stunning gardens, and it was just a 0:03:56.920 --> 0:04:00.560 plaise built with colors and joys, and you know, garms 0:04:00.600 --> 0:04:03.760 were lush, and they were parents and slots, and it 0:04:03.840 --> 0:04:08.400 was really a pretty magical place. Tell me more about 0:04:09.160 --> 0:04:12.440 life with your parents, Maybe describe your mother a little 0:04:12.440 --> 0:04:16.080 bit to me as well. She was quite an old father. 0:04:16.200 --> 0:04:20.680 My mother was twenty years younger, and she was just 0:04:20.960 --> 0:04:25.159 stunningly beautiful um and she was also involved in the arts, 0:04:25.279 --> 0:04:28.159 and as I grew up, she was involved in anitary 0:04:28.200 --> 0:04:32.120 of culture and started a ballet company. So, you know, 0:04:32.200 --> 0:04:36.800 my house was filled with interesting people, bill with politicians, 0:04:36.839 --> 0:04:40.560 with artists, with ballet dancers, and there was a constant 0:04:40.800 --> 0:04:45.440 flock of you know, people of ideas. You just felt 0:04:45.920 --> 0:04:48.720 that you were in the center of it all. And 0:04:48.800 --> 0:04:52.440 my parents were very much in love with each other, 0:04:52.960 --> 0:04:55.200 thanking people seemed to be just in love with them. 0:04:55.560 --> 0:04:59.160 People were just flowing into this house and surrounding them 0:04:59.200 --> 0:05:03.240 all the time. My parents were quite social. They weren't 0:05:03.360 --> 0:05:05.920 super involved in my upbringing in the ways that we're 0:05:05.920 --> 0:05:08.360 involved and children stop bringing now, so they want to 0:05:08.360 --> 0:05:10.599 sort of checking on my homework and taking me to 0:05:10.600 --> 0:05:12.960 school and things like that. But I was very much 0:05:13.040 --> 0:05:15.640 part of their world and part of their you know, 0:05:15.720 --> 0:05:18.680 I just milled about these gardens and sat around with 0:05:18.720 --> 0:05:22.359 these people and attended the sort of brings parties that 0:05:22.400 --> 0:05:25.039 they gave, and you know, whatever they were in meetings, 0:05:25.040 --> 0:05:28.200 I just tapped there are my mother's lap and was 0:05:28.279 --> 0:05:34.760 part of it. Really. Ariana was unfazed by her unusual 0:05:34.880 --> 0:05:38.600 and in many ways magical childhood. What she really wanted, 0:05:38.839 --> 0:05:41.719 what was most interesting to her, was to have a 0:05:41.839 --> 0:05:45.960 mystery to solve. She sort of took over the family's kennel. 0:05:46.560 --> 0:05:50.240 The Neuman's had really larger dogs, Great Danes and Rottweiler's, 0:05:50.560 --> 0:05:53.400 so it was a big kennel and Arianna would sit 0:05:53.440 --> 0:05:55.920 in it on a crate, and she turned it into 0:05:55.920 --> 0:06:00.760 a library of sorts. A favorite, unsurprisingly was Nancy Drew. 0:06:02.680 --> 0:06:05.960 Arianna was an only child, quite isolated in many ways. 0:06:06.600 --> 0:06:09.920 I so relate to this, the dreamy only child who 0:06:09.960 --> 0:06:13.919 spends a lot of time reading and solving mysteries. She 0:06:14.040 --> 0:06:17.400 even starts a detective club with a cousin and some friends, 0:06:17.760 --> 0:06:22.440 called the Mysterious Boot Club. Arianna, what do you think 0:06:22.520 --> 0:06:25.240 that was about? I was so taken by that in 0:06:25.320 --> 0:06:28.320 your book, the idea that you wanted to be a 0:06:28.360 --> 0:06:31.760 detective as a child, and that you created this mysterious 0:06:31.760 --> 0:06:36.440 boot club. And of course hindsight is twenty twenty, but 0:06:36.720 --> 0:06:39.080 what was the sense you had that there were mysteries 0:06:39.480 --> 0:06:44.080 to be solved? I just thought, why wouldn't everyone want 0:06:44.120 --> 0:06:47.479 to solve mysteries? And what I realized now is that 0:06:47.520 --> 0:06:50.960 I obviously spent that there was a mystery there that 0:06:51.240 --> 0:06:55.719 there were things that we're obviously not being told to me, 0:06:56.279 --> 0:06:59.279 and my father really was at the center of this mystery. 0:06:59.640 --> 0:07:03.479 The Aldren Slash detectives, who were members of the Mysterious 0:07:03.520 --> 0:07:07.640 Boot Club kept an eye on Ariana's father. He never 0:07:07.680 --> 0:07:11.320 ever spoke about feelings. He was always talking about ideas 0:07:11.400 --> 0:07:15.040 and concept and you know, sort of the puzzled or 0:07:15.880 --> 0:07:20.160 he was repairing watches. He was absolutely obsessed by this 0:07:20.320 --> 0:07:23.520 watch connection that he had. And it wasn't the normal 0:07:23.960 --> 0:07:27.840 sort of obsession with some triality and time that you know, 0:07:27.920 --> 0:07:31.360 a successful man would have because he wants to maximize 0:07:31.800 --> 0:07:35.280 his time in order to be more efficient. It was 0:07:35.320 --> 0:07:38.120 a real obsession and at the same time, I think 0:07:38.120 --> 0:07:40.440 he found fullest there. I think there was a therapy 0:07:40.520 --> 0:07:43.880 to it. But whenever he was with his watches, he 0:07:43.920 --> 0:07:47.160 would lock himself in a room and a room that 0:07:47.240 --> 0:07:50.000 no one else had keys to and that was completely 0:07:50.120 --> 0:07:53.560 dark and windowless, and he would just spend hours there, 0:07:53.560 --> 0:07:57.560 as far as I could tell, just observing mechanisms and 0:07:57.680 --> 0:08:03.040 making sure that these watches worked. He was absolutely mystordical 0:08:03.680 --> 0:08:06.160 and obsessed with orders. So if he looked at his 0:08:06.200 --> 0:08:10.320 record collection, you know, it was all aligned by category 0:08:10.320 --> 0:08:13.760 of music by composers. They all had different little colors, 0:08:13.800 --> 0:08:16.520 and they all had to be absolutely perfect. He had 0:08:16.520 --> 0:08:20.480 always quirks and all these obsessions. And then one of 0:08:20.480 --> 0:08:24.320 these afternoons, one of my cousins reported that he had 0:08:24.360 --> 0:08:26.600 seen my father moved a books, and that my father 0:08:26.640 --> 0:08:30.480 had moved a book from that room at the back 0:08:30.520 --> 0:08:33.960 of the house where he kept his watchers and when 0:08:34.000 --> 0:08:36.760 he repaired his watches, and that he had moved the 0:08:37.000 --> 0:08:39.600 box and then slightly all the manner. There was something 0:08:39.640 --> 0:08:41.719 peculiar about the way he carried the books, and he 0:08:41.840 --> 0:08:44.240 carried it into this room, which was sort of the 0:08:44.320 --> 0:08:47.200 library in our house. And my cousin reported that, you know, 0:08:47.240 --> 0:08:49.680 there was obviously something precious in the books, and must 0:08:49.679 --> 0:08:53.320 be maybe it was the jeweled watches or something. I 0:08:53.440 --> 0:08:56.600 waited for everyone to go, and I went and I 0:08:56.679 --> 0:08:59.520 found this book, and when I opened it, I was 0:08:59.600 --> 0:09:02.880 quite a delusion. There was actually no treature, no to 0:09:03.000 --> 0:09:06.000 old watching, which is some old papers. And one of 0:09:06.040 --> 0:09:09.920 the old papers I found was terrifying because it was 0:09:09.960 --> 0:09:12.160 the photograph of my father as a young man, and 0:09:12.200 --> 0:09:17.200 I recognized it had be very distinct. I um so 0:09:17.320 --> 0:09:21.000 I knew it was him, But right underneath this picture 0:09:21.040 --> 0:09:24.280 of my father was the stamp of HIT there. And 0:09:24.360 --> 0:09:28.280 I was pretty young, but old enough to know that 0:09:28.760 --> 0:09:32.520 he was obviously not a good guy. And then it 0:09:32.720 --> 0:09:38.080 was stated ninety three, It said er Lynn, and that 0:09:38.200 --> 0:09:41.240 made no sense because I knew my father actually was 0:09:41.240 --> 0:09:43.160 a check immigrant and I knew that he had come 0:09:43.240 --> 0:09:46.439 from Proud And then the name was someone else's name. 0:09:47.160 --> 0:09:52.560 It wasn't Harns Moylan. That's obviously completely threw me. And 0:09:52.920 --> 0:09:55.200 what I did that afternoon is I ran to my 0:09:55.240 --> 0:09:58.280 mother and I said, he's an impostor. And I think 0:09:58.440 --> 0:10:00.679 that is also a very telling because I don't think 0:10:00.679 --> 0:10:03.079 that my children found an ID card. When my husband's 0:10:03.240 --> 0:10:06.000 photograph that someone else's name, the reaction would not be 0:10:06.200 --> 0:10:10.280 to say demands an impostor. So I think that speaks 0:10:10.320 --> 0:10:12.640 to the fact that there was obviously some mystery there 0:10:12.679 --> 0:10:14.720 and that I was aware of it, but there was 0:10:14.760 --> 0:10:18.160 something that my father was not telling me, possibly not 0:10:18.280 --> 0:10:22.040 telling others. That was probably the first two. And when 0:10:22.080 --> 0:10:25.120 I saw that all these other moments, what the fund 0:10:25.200 --> 0:10:28.000 became relevant to all these spilences or you know, there 0:10:28.000 --> 0:10:31.640 were whenever he spoke to my father, Um, he was 0:10:31.679 --> 0:10:34.360 incredibly engaged. But if you asked him about the past, 0:10:34.440 --> 0:10:36.440 if you asked him about par because you asked him 0:10:36.440 --> 0:10:40.320 about his family, there would be a time minute talk 0:10:40.360 --> 0:10:43.040 with silence, and then he had moved the conversation swiss 0:10:43.080 --> 0:10:47.959 ly on. He just absolutely was accused to speak about 0:10:48.000 --> 0:10:50.960 the past or about his family. And then there were 0:10:50.960 --> 0:10:54.200 the nightmare So when I was a child, just stept 0:10:54.280 --> 0:10:57.559 down the corridor from my parents, and there were punch 0:10:57.600 --> 0:11:00.680 of nights where I was just woken up by these 0:11:00.800 --> 0:11:04.560 horrific screams, and it was my father and my father 0:11:04.720 --> 0:11:08.640 screaming in a language that I didn't understand, and I 0:11:08.720 --> 0:11:13.640 just remember sort of waking up terrified and finding my 0:11:13.679 --> 0:11:15.960 father covered and sweat and my mother trying to sort 0:11:15.960 --> 0:11:19.760 of call and dace. You know, that was obviously also unusual. 0:11:19.800 --> 0:11:25.000 Why would a man who was so successful, so seemingly happy, 0:11:25.480 --> 0:11:31.400 so carefree, wake up screaming in the night. What did 0:11:31.480 --> 0:11:34.640 your mother say when you first found the contents of 0:11:34.679 --> 0:11:37.560 the box and you found this strange document and said, 0:11:37.640 --> 0:11:41.560 Dad's an impostor? What was her response to that? My mother, 0:11:42.120 --> 0:11:45.880 she's very open and very soothing, and she's basically just said, 0:11:46.040 --> 0:11:48.680 don't worry too much about this. I'm not worried about it. 0:11:48.720 --> 0:11:51.360 You shouldn't worry about it. And that was sort of 0:11:52.040 --> 0:11:56.360 general seeing whenever I asked. Having said that, I could 0:11:56.400 --> 0:11:59.840 have never asked my father outright, because that's very cute 0:12:00.000 --> 0:12:04.480 time that I did. The response was just so overwhelmingly 0:12:04.920 --> 0:12:12.600 emotional and awful that I just couldn't. Ariana tuxs this 0:12:12.760 --> 0:12:17.520 information or non information away in that hidden place where 0:12:17.559 --> 0:12:20.800 we put things we don't yet comprehend. She heads to 0:12:20.840 --> 0:12:24.800 the States for college, and at Tufts University, she has 0:12:24.840 --> 0:12:28.719 approached on the first day of orientation for international students 0:12:28.760 --> 0:12:32.280 by a freshman from Mexico, a guy who actually delivers 0:12:32.320 --> 0:12:35.640 the line, hey, we should meet up because we're both 0:12:35.640 --> 0:12:39.000 good looking, we're both Latin American, and we're both Jewish, 0:12:39.880 --> 0:12:43.600 to which Ariana comes back with the perfect rejoinder, the 0:12:43.679 --> 0:12:45.920 kind of thing you usually think of after the fact. 0:12:46.400 --> 0:12:51.800 She says, listen, you're not good looking and I'm not Jewish, 0:12:52.200 --> 0:12:55.240 but the comment stays with her. It's the first time 0:12:55.280 --> 0:12:58.800 anyone has ever used the word Jewish in reference to Ariana. 0:12:59.240 --> 0:13:02.600 Venezuela was such a melting pot culture back then, that 0:13:02.640 --> 0:13:06.040 the Neumans were surrounded by people of every religion and background, 0:13:06.400 --> 0:13:08.960 but no one was ever categorized in terms of their religion, 0:13:10.040 --> 0:13:13.200 not until Ariana's new friend decided to point it out, 0:13:13.400 --> 0:13:18.120 based simply on her surname, Neuman, a Jewish name. I 0:13:18.240 --> 0:13:21.120 called my father a couple of days later, and I 0:13:21.200 --> 0:13:25.160 called him up and I said that us Mexican kid 0:13:25.240 --> 0:13:26.800 just came up to me and said I was Jewish 0:13:27.679 --> 0:13:32.679 and he just on silent. Understand, man was constantly talking, 0:13:32.760 --> 0:13:36.559 and you know, he was more than animated, and silence 0:13:36.600 --> 0:13:39.840 was an unusual thing unless he was preparing his watches 0:13:39.920 --> 0:13:42.560 of writing or reading. He said, what do you mean 0:13:43.559 --> 0:13:45.640 and I said, well, he said, we have Jewish blood. 0:13:46.600 --> 0:13:50.520 And his voice started to shake and he said, please 0:13:50.640 --> 0:13:54.120 that you ever used that term with me. That is 0:13:54.160 --> 0:13:56.400 what the Nazis said about us. And he just took 0:13:56.400 --> 0:14:00.960 the framed up. In your book, you write, there were 0:14:01.040 --> 0:14:05.480 hints before peppered across my memories, were moments that jarred, 0:14:05.600 --> 0:14:09.640 instances of disquiet. The cracks had been there all along, 0:14:10.559 --> 0:14:14.560 you know. I think with family secrets, when we discover 0:14:14.800 --> 0:14:20.400 something is as important as what we discover when we're 0:14:20.440 --> 0:14:24.840 ready or not ready to discover something can really alter 0:14:24.920 --> 0:14:27.600 and effect the way that we then contend with or 0:14:27.680 --> 0:14:32.000 metabolize it. I think that's absolutely right, and I realized, 0:14:32.080 --> 0:14:34.200 I mean, you have to be ready to do these 0:14:34.200 --> 0:14:38.200 things and to absorb. We'll be back in a moment 0:14:38.240 --> 0:14:50.480 with more family secrets. Ariana's first child, a son, has 0:14:50.560 --> 0:14:53.080 just been born when her father dies after an extended 0:14:53.120 --> 0:14:58.880 illness in September of two. Never does Hans Neuman break 0:14:58.960 --> 0:15:02.560 his silence about his past. There is no laden life 0:15:02.640 --> 0:15:07.120 unburdening to his only daughter. But what does happen is 0:15:07.200 --> 0:15:11.160 even more remarkable than a lifetime of silence. He leaves 0:15:11.280 --> 0:15:16.360 Ariana the box. Yes, the box, the very one she 0:15:16.480 --> 0:15:20.760 snooped through once as founding member of the mysterious Boot Club. 0:15:21.520 --> 0:15:25.600 She hasn't seen it since, and now the box and 0:15:25.640 --> 0:15:30.240 the history it will yield is hers. In death, Hans 0:15:30.360 --> 0:15:35.000 is giving Ariana permission, no more than permission. This is 0:15:35.040 --> 0:15:40.320 an exportation to piece together and investigate their lost family history. 0:15:41.040 --> 0:15:44.360 But she isn't ready. How can she be. She's just 0:15:44.480 --> 0:15:48.440 embarked on the most optimistic adventure of building her own family. 0:15:49.560 --> 0:15:53.280 As you know, when you start a wonderful relationship with 0:15:53.360 --> 0:15:57.200 someone and you decide to children into this world. You 0:15:57.320 --> 0:15:59.520 have to be in a particular frame of mind. You're 0:15:59.560 --> 0:16:02.080 happy with your present who are looking into the future 0:16:02.640 --> 0:16:06.640 with excitement. So to turn around and and delve into 0:16:06.720 --> 0:16:08.960 a path which I then thought was going to be 0:16:09.080 --> 0:16:12.600 just filled with horror and darkness. I just thought I 0:16:12.640 --> 0:16:16.840 couldn't handle. I just couldn't read the letters and then 0:16:16.960 --> 0:16:19.200 go back and you know, read fairy tales for my 0:16:19.280 --> 0:16:21.360 children at night, and do the voices for the very 0:16:21.440 --> 0:16:25.680 hungry chime press. It wasn't compatible. So it wasn't until 0:16:25.720 --> 0:16:27.840 they grew up a little bit more, you know, I 0:16:27.880 --> 0:16:30.360 did little by little why it had the letters translated, 0:16:30.720 --> 0:16:33.240 and every so often, you know, when sort of the 0:16:33.400 --> 0:16:36.440 kids were at school and nursery and my husband was 0:16:36.440 --> 0:16:39.240 at work, and I just felt brave, I would dip 0:16:39.320 --> 0:16:43.520 into one of the letters. Arianna keeps the box in 0:16:43.600 --> 0:16:47.600 an antique contraption that looks like three wooden steps, like 0:16:47.640 --> 0:16:51.000 the beginning of a staircase to nowhere. The contraption is 0:16:51.040 --> 0:16:54.360 in her office where she writes, but inside there's a 0:16:54.440 --> 0:16:58.200 hidden compartment. The steps lift and the lid lifts up, 0:16:58.840 --> 0:17:02.280 and no one would ever know. In fact, you yourself 0:17:02.280 --> 0:17:06.760 could forget that anything was hidden away. There. Years go by, 0:17:06.920 --> 0:17:11.000 during which Mariana has two more children. Eventually she feels 0:17:11.040 --> 0:17:14.280 ready to tackle the contents of the box. Inside the steps, 0:17:15.200 --> 0:17:19.320 she begins to research send material for transcription from Check 0:17:19.359 --> 0:17:23.480 into English, and slowly, as she's able to gather more 0:17:23.520 --> 0:17:27.040 and more information, she begins to piece together a portrait 0:17:27.440 --> 0:17:31.080 of the lives of a large extended family in Czechoslovakia 0:17:31.480 --> 0:17:35.280 in the late nineteen thirties. The family owned a paint 0:17:35.320 --> 0:17:39.199 and lacquer business called Montana, with factories in Prague and 0:17:39.240 --> 0:17:45.119 in southeastern Czechoslovakia. They were a middle class Jewish family, assimilated, 0:17:45.440 --> 0:17:52.880 not particularly religious, so discovered to the letters was just huge, vibrant, happy, 0:17:53.080 --> 0:17:56.560 well happy trying to survive in what was a world 0:17:56.640 --> 0:18:01.119 that was becoming more anti Semitic. Baby, there were postcards 0:18:01.200 --> 0:18:04.520 as my grandparents in the trance in nineteen thirty six 0:18:04.640 --> 0:18:09.040 and my grandfather in a bathing so smiling. It's remarkable 0:18:09.320 --> 0:18:11.840 to me that they could still find moments of drawings. 0:18:11.960 --> 0:18:14.719 And it's because in nineteen thirty six, certainly in Prague 0:18:14.760 --> 0:18:18.600 and most definitely in Germany, you know, Jews did not 0:18:18.680 --> 0:18:21.800 feel sick, and a lot of them had already started permegrated. 0:18:22.320 --> 0:18:24.439 They were very much part of the Jewish community, and 0:18:24.480 --> 0:18:27.359 they also have funds who were in Jewish and you know, 0:18:27.400 --> 0:18:32.199 they managed to solder on until It's remarkable to me 0:18:32.320 --> 0:18:36.240 because someone said, why did they not rebel? Why did 0:18:36.280 --> 0:18:39.320 your father not rebel? Why did they not rebel against it? 0:18:39.440 --> 0:18:43.960 And because it's very difficult to rebel against these blue laws, 0:18:44.040 --> 0:18:47.760 which are so minute. It's the aggregation of all of them, 0:18:48.320 --> 0:18:51.680 and it's sort of how bullies and futilitarian regimes work. 0:18:51.800 --> 0:18:55.360 It's just that gradual de humanization. So it's very interesting 0:18:55.440 --> 0:18:59.119 for me to have these letters which span from actually 0:18:59.119 --> 0:19:04.440 the twenties through the thirties up until nineteen two well 0:19:04.480 --> 0:19:07.680 and then the once from the camps until nine, because 0:19:07.720 --> 0:19:12.320 you really see how effectively my family was to humanized. 0:19:12.640 --> 0:19:15.359 Well I say that, and at the same time, I 0:19:15.400 --> 0:19:18.800 don't think that's really accurate, because they weren't humanized and 0:19:18.920 --> 0:19:24.120 yet managed to find humanity in even in the concentration 0:19:24.160 --> 0:19:26.919 camp and moments of joy and moments of happiness and 0:19:27.240 --> 0:19:31.280 moments of just being human. But they were certainly humanized 0:19:31.320 --> 0:19:34.680 in the eyes of the others. So it was basically 0:19:34.960 --> 0:19:39.680 my father, his older brother. My grandfather, and my grandmother 0:19:40.240 --> 0:19:44.040 and my father turned eighteen in nineteen nine, the year 0:19:44.119 --> 0:19:49.359 that had Ger invaded Chechoslovakia, and his older brother was 0:19:49.640 --> 0:19:54.000 three years older. His older brother was married to a 0:19:54.000 --> 0:19:57.040 woman who was a gentile, so she was thought Jewish, 0:19:57.359 --> 0:20:02.399 and that protected him from being transported. My grandparents and 0:20:02.520 --> 0:20:06.080 my father were not protected by anything and um in 0:20:06.200 --> 0:20:10.960 ninety two. In May nineteen forty two, transport letter arived 0:20:11.000 --> 0:20:13.679 saying that they all had to report to put me 0:20:13.680 --> 0:20:17.879 into the transtations and be transported to rising Stuff. My 0:20:17.960 --> 0:20:21.600 grandfather started pulling every possible string that could and trying 0:20:21.600 --> 0:20:23.639 to find every excuse like he could so that they 0:20:23.640 --> 0:20:26.760 wouldn't be transported, and they were successful in as far 0:20:26.800 --> 0:20:30.880 as they managed to stays my grandfather and my father 0:20:31.359 --> 0:20:35.480 from the transport. From that transport, so my grandmother was 0:20:35.560 --> 0:20:38.359 spent alone. She was sent alone with two of her brothers. 0:20:38.680 --> 0:20:43.000 My grandfather is then deported in November forty two. They're 0:20:43.000 --> 0:20:47.719 both spending letters out saying we're okay, don't worry about us, 0:20:47.840 --> 0:20:51.080 but whatever you do, don't get spent here. You know, 0:20:51.160 --> 0:20:54.960 do whatever you can, he says, but don't come here. 0:20:55.560 --> 0:20:58.000 So my father gets a deportation that are in marsh 0:20:58.040 --> 0:21:04.920 Warty three, and by then there's there's no way that 0:21:05.240 --> 0:21:09.359 he's going to save from this. MHM justifies to hide. 0:21:10.800 --> 0:21:13.359 With the help of the manager of the paint factory, 0:21:13.680 --> 0:21:16.640 his brother, and his brother's wife, who is a non Jew, 0:21:17.240 --> 0:21:20.560 Hans is hidden in the paint factory. They build a 0:21:20.600 --> 0:21:24.480 fake wall and create a tiny little room. He's hidden 0:21:24.520 --> 0:21:26.960 there during the day when the paint factory is in business, 0:21:27.680 --> 0:21:32.440 and for two months, Ariana's father remains very still aware 0:21:32.640 --> 0:21:36.840 always that he's in danger. He's on the Gestapo's wanted list, 0:21:37.400 --> 0:21:40.200 and one of the places the Gestapo would undoubtedly come 0:21:40.240 --> 0:21:45.360 looking for him is in his family's factory. Luckily, amazingly, 0:21:45.520 --> 0:21:48.960 the Gestapo don't show up. Hans has just finished a 0:21:49.000 --> 0:21:51.760 degree in chemistry school and he has a best friend 0:21:51.840 --> 0:21:55.560 called Fene Fenek isn't Jewish and he works for the 0:21:55.600 --> 0:22:00.320 Nazis in Berlin at a paint factory. So after has 0:22:00.320 --> 0:22:03.040 been hiding for a couple of months, Fenic comes to 0:22:03.119 --> 0:22:06.159 him one night and says, just in passing, oh, we 0:22:06.240 --> 0:22:09.760 have so much work in Berlin, were so understaffed and 0:22:09.800 --> 0:22:12.120 there's no one capable in Berlin. To do this job, 0:22:12.840 --> 0:22:16.000 and Phoenix says, if only you could be there with me, 0:22:17.840 --> 0:22:20.840 and you know, it's one of those sort of Drinka 0:22:20.960 --> 0:22:25.600 moments where my father just says, that's it, that's what 0:22:25.680 --> 0:22:29.480 I have to do. And I traced senex Son, who 0:22:29.680 --> 0:22:32.960 told me this beautiful story about how they were sitting 0:22:33.000 --> 0:22:36.280 there and you know, with one candle licked in this 0:22:36.320 --> 0:22:38.680 little room because they didn't want to alert the neighbors 0:22:38.680 --> 0:22:41.280 to their presence. And there's a check saying that says 0:22:41.320 --> 0:22:45.640 the darkest shadow, it's just beneath the candle. So if 0:22:45.680 --> 0:22:49.679 you want to hide, you don't hide around the candle 0:22:49.920 --> 0:22:55.000 were the light well piece you off. You hide in 0:22:55.080 --> 0:22:57.200 the center of it all, where no one is going 0:22:57.240 --> 0:22:59.720 to look for you, and where the shadow is the darkness. 0:23:00.040 --> 0:23:02.760 So the darkest shadow, if there's beneath the candles, the 0:23:02.880 --> 0:23:06.080 center of it all, whether shadow is the darkness is Britain. 0:23:06.960 --> 0:23:12.240 So it's completely crazy and probably quite brilliant, but completely insane. 0:23:12.680 --> 0:23:14.440 And I think it's the kind of thing that that 0:23:14.600 --> 0:23:16.919 you wouldn't do. I I certainly wouldn't do if you 0:23:16.960 --> 0:23:19.159 wouldn't do if you had a family, because you know, 0:23:19.200 --> 0:23:22.280 if you're twenty two and you know, the alternative is death, 0:23:22.400 --> 0:23:25.080 and you just figure what do I have to lose? 0:23:26.080 --> 0:23:29.720 They create the spake identity and they get him as 0:23:29.800 --> 0:23:32.520 fake I d um, the doctor is a fake ID. 0:23:33.359 --> 0:23:37.280 And then Extend, incredibly bravely manages and he goes back 0:23:37.320 --> 0:23:40.560 to Berlin, gets permission to come back to Prague and 0:23:40.920 --> 0:23:44.920 my father with Dennis passport and the full s I 0:23:45.000 --> 0:23:47.480 d in then sebast thing, which is the saying that 0:23:47.520 --> 0:23:51.359 they exchanged then Sibster didn't exist. Um it's as you 0:23:51.400 --> 0:23:53.760 get on the midnight train from Pargue to Berlin in 0:23:53.840 --> 0:24:01.000 May and manages two against all olds across the border 0:24:01.520 --> 0:24:06.520 to get into Berlin, and without any proper termits managed 0:24:06.560 --> 0:24:09.280 to find a job at the paint factory that Stenic 0:24:09.400 --> 0:24:13.080 was working in and to live for two years pretending 0:24:13.119 --> 0:24:18.480 to be John Sebastia, just a normal check guy, not Jewish, 0:24:19.080 --> 0:24:21.960 who is a chemist and who's interested in paint, and 0:24:22.119 --> 0:24:26.240 he works for the factory that is developing laquers and 0:24:26.359 --> 0:24:30.199 he does that until That's how he survived the war, 0:24:32.400 --> 0:24:36.440 within the horrors of the Holocaust, the perishing of almost 0:24:36.480 --> 0:24:41.720 an entire family, the decimation of millions. Here is luck. 0:24:42.640 --> 0:24:48.359 Hans is lucky, he cheats, capture and certain deaths. Not once, 0:24:48.720 --> 0:24:53.960 not twice, but multiple times. I find myself thinking of Ariana, 0:24:54.440 --> 0:24:57.560 who would never have been born if Hans's story hadn't 0:24:57.600 --> 0:25:02.359 played out exactly as it did. Everything that never would 0:25:02.359 --> 0:25:07.280 have happened, her father's extraordinary success, and her parents love story, 0:25:08.040 --> 0:25:12.000 and her three children now growing up in London. Her 0:25:12.080 --> 0:25:16.520 children never met her father, the watch repairer, until recently. 0:25:16.840 --> 0:25:19.520 She had never told them of his watches or his 0:25:19.600 --> 0:25:25.159 obsessive timekeeping. And yet what do we inherit? What has 0:25:25.200 --> 0:25:29.600 passed down and how does it shape us? Hans tried 0:25:29.760 --> 0:25:33.560 all his life to box up his traumatic experiences, and 0:25:33.600 --> 0:25:37.320 in certain ways he succeeded, I suppose. But trauma will 0:25:37.359 --> 0:25:40.800 have its way with us eventually. It's like an invisible, 0:25:40.880 --> 0:25:45.960 multi headed mystical hydra, and those heads will appear, perhaps 0:25:46.000 --> 0:25:49.160 not in the secret Keeper's life, but in the generations 0:25:49.200 --> 0:25:54.280 to follow. Ariana's children don't believe this, by the way, 0:25:54.440 --> 0:25:57.520 she and they have heated debates on the subject. They 0:25:57.600 --> 0:26:00.240 believe that we each decide and shape who we are, 0:26:00.480 --> 0:26:03.680 that unspoken trauma and lessons do not leave their trace. 0:26:05.480 --> 0:26:09.200 Marianna does not entirely agree with them. As she writes 0:26:09.240 --> 0:26:13.159