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Speaker 1: And Amanda jam Nation survivors could never speak about their experiences.

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Speaker 1: It was a different story for Australian author Heather Morris,

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Speaker 1: who formed a friendship with Holocaust survivor Larlay. His story

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Speaker 1: turned her novel The Tattoist of Auschwitz into a number

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Speaker 1: one international best seller. Was an extraordinary story and now

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Speaker 1: Stan have turned it into a series. Heather Morris, Hello.

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Speaker 2: Hello, good morning.

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Speaker 3: Congratulations on the book, Heather. It was such a great reader.

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Speaker 3: I couldn't put it down.

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Speaker 1: It was extraordinary, Heather. And for those who haven't read

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Speaker 1: The tattoost of als Schwitz, tell us a little about

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Speaker 1: Larlay's story.

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Speaker 2: Lanie Phokolov was a charming eighty seven year old man

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Speaker 2: I left back in two thousands and three. Yeah, a

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Speaker 2: few years ago. Don't anyone ever tell you about overnight successes,

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Speaker 2: by the way, And he told me the story of

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Speaker 2: this girl whose arm he held while he stabbed numbers

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Speaker 2: into it. She was dressed in rags and a head

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Speaker 2: shaven an unbathed. And he's telling me, some sixty years

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Speaker 2: later that he knew in that second he could never

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Speaker 2: love a mother. The self confessed playboy from Bratislava had

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Speaker 2: fallen in love with this beautiful young girl in Bercanal

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Speaker 2: concentration camp.

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Speaker 1: So he was Jewish, but to survive there he was

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Speaker 1: given a job. And his job was to be the tattooist,

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Speaker 1: to tattoo those numbers on arms.

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Speaker 2: Yes, absolutely, he called it numbering, by the way, not tattooing.

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Speaker 2: I made the numbers, he said. But yes, that was

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Speaker 2: his job every day to be stabbing numbers into the

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Speaker 2: arms of he called the lucky ones, by the way,

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Speaker 2: because if you got numbered, you got to live another day.

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Speaker 2: It might only be another day that it might be two,

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Speaker 2: it might be a week, it might be a month.

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Speaker 2: At that point you sort of chance to survive.

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Speaker 1: And his tale was extraordinary. He fell in love, as

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Speaker 1: you say when he and it wasn't an easy release

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Speaker 1: for him, was it. He sort of went from one

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Speaker 1: fire to another.

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Speaker 2: Really, look, absolutely, no one can imagine the horrors of

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Speaker 2: the people who survived the Holocaust in any of the camps.

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Speaker 2: We can't. All we can do is listen to them

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Speaker 2: and hopefully learn from them. Sabbe, I don't know that's

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Speaker 2: happening or not, But for lovely, this is the matter.

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Speaker 2: He wanted to live and so many other survivors I've met,

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Speaker 2: and they said, we had this desire to live, and yes,

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Speaker 2: and I think you hear Harvey saying those words. They

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Speaker 2: made us into someone that we weren't. So these people

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Speaker 2: went into that camp, and these who survived, they came

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Speaker 2: out different people.

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Speaker 1: This wasn't an easy story for him to tell. And

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Speaker 1: he waited for his wife to pass away before he did,

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Speaker 1: because he became the numbering man, as you say, but

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Speaker 1: he was fearful that that would make him sound like

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Speaker 1: a collaborator.

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Speaker 2: Well, many people who did work. Really everybody in that

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Speaker 2: camp worked for the Nazis. I think that's the thing

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Speaker 2: that he never got in his head, and a lot

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Speaker 2: of others didn't. To survive, you had to work who

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Speaker 2: are you working for? You were in with the Nazis.

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Speaker 2: But he had a very specific role, or one of

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Speaker 2: the men several who had this very specific role. There

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Speaker 2: were other people too who had defined roles in that

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Speaker 2: camp which made them stand out, and so to some

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Speaker 2: of the other prisoners, because yes, you could say they

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Speaker 2: were a privileged prisoner, that we're prisoner after we're privileged.

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Speaker 2: Because he got extra rations and he was he feared

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Speaker 2: that am I a collaborator, and I went in as

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Speaker 2: much as every other person. That was errors, that's all.

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Speaker 1: And I was really moved in the book by the

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Speaker 1: story of Geta. So Geta is the woman. He fell

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Speaker 1: in love with her wife and became his wife. Her

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Speaker 1: a woman that she knew in there. One of the

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Speaker 1: the officers took a liking to her, so for her

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Speaker 1: to survive, she became his mistress. I guess a six slaves.

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Speaker 2: Well that was silka sex flaves. I call it mistress.

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Speaker 2: He raped her for years. And then that beautiful young

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Speaker 2: girl sixteen years of age, who then subsequently spent ten

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Speaker 2: years in a Siberian gulag, but supposedly sleeping with the enemy.

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Speaker 1: Oh heartbreaking.

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Speaker 3: And it makes you wonder what you would do in

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Speaker 3: that situation. And I went to Dachau recently and I

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Speaker 3: was just wandering around there, and to see that up close,

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Speaker 3: to see the ovens, to see all that stuff, you

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Speaker 3: just go, my god, what would you do if that

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Speaker 3: was you? What would you do?

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Speaker 1: Would you survive?

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Speaker 3: What would you do?

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Speaker 2: I have no idea. Look, I met these two sisters

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Speaker 2: in US in Israel. I write another book about them.

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Speaker 2: Three sisters and the youngest one of them. She's still alive.

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Speaker 2: She's ninety eight there. And she said that at fifteen,

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Speaker 2: her memories of being there were of being a zombie,

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Speaker 2: and if she didn't have her older sister there, who

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Speaker 2: was alert and aware of his surroundings every minute of

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Speaker 2: the day and night, she doubts if she would have survived.

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Speaker 2: Because she had many others they went into a zombie stage,

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Speaker 2: which then made them right for the picking and for

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Speaker 2: the choosing. So it was either you were alert and

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Speaker 2: you were aware, and you did everything you could to survive,

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Speaker 2: always coming back to being lucky if we survivor I

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Speaker 2: met this, I was just lucky. Things fell onto a

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Speaker 2: line for me where they didn't for others. She said,

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Speaker 2: I was just a zombie. I existed, and that was

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Speaker 2: all that she had the protection of an older sister.

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Speaker 1: Are you happy with the stand series?

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Speaker 3: Oh?

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Speaker 2: Very very Look initially when they said, yeah, can we

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Speaker 2: kind of redo this a little bit, and because you know,

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Speaker 2: you've read the book and the book does not have

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Speaker 2: me in it, and Lally is an old man, and

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Speaker 2: when they spent a bit of time with the screenwriter

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Speaker 2: Jacqueline Persky, and I think I might have ever shared

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Speaker 2: a bit with her and telling her about about my

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Speaker 2: time with Lovely, and then I got the the requests, well,

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Speaker 2: can we actually incorporate you and another actor playing our

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Speaker 2: older Luly into telling the story and n no, no, no,

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Speaker 2: this is not my story. This is not about me.

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Speaker 2: But when I showed me some of the drafts of

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Speaker 2: these are script and they had worven it and beautifully

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Speaker 2: and it's oh, people are going to get to see

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Speaker 2: Lolly and both fault. Yes, okay, well you can cast me,

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Speaker 2: but yeah, low key, please Loky.

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Speaker 3: And there you are in a giant stole walking onto

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Speaker 3: the seeing that. No, I'm just stirring up, all.

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Speaker 2: Right, listen. Here's the thing though, because people have seen

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Speaker 2: Look my family and friends are you're looking at me now,

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Speaker 2: and people I have talked and they go, yeah, come,

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Speaker 2: I what you're seventy plus, you've got gray hair, you're

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Speaker 2: grazing in the top paddic a bit much, girl. And

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Speaker 2: then you're going to see the story and you've got

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Speaker 2: Melanie Lunsky playing there and you go, yeah, it doesn't

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Speaker 2: look anything like her. But remember this was twenty years ago, folks,

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Speaker 2: and I was younger, dinner and blonde.

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Speaker 3: There there should be a disclaimer on it.

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Speaker 2: Yes you wonder, we love.

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Speaker 3: I love the book and I'm so looking forward to

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Speaker 3: seeing the Stan original series of The Tattooist of ouse Witch.

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Speaker 3: It's out tomorrow only on stand Heather Morris, thank you

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Speaker 3: for joining us.

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Speaker 2: Very welcome for thanks