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Eva Bluestein "At the age of 8, in 1933, I was torn from a secure middle-class life in Berlin to years of upheaval. I learned, however, to adapt to different situations and make new friends, having changed schools each year on average. "Hitler caught up with us in Paris in the Summer of 1940, when we were out on the roads at the time of 'L'Exode'. Back in the Paris area we continued as enemy aliens and Jews to boot, coupled with financial worries. "I managed in 1941 to travel legally to Lyon, in the then Unoccupied Zone, where my dad and maternal uncles had relocated after being released from French detention (camps or Foreign Legion). Until the rest of my family was smuggled to join us, we acquired fake 'cartes d'identite' and names, and lived underground. This included a short while in a convent with my mother and totally blind maternal grandma (my paternal grandmother having died in Theresienstadt in 1942). "I was emissary and liaison for various relatives and had trained myself not to respond, even instinctively, to my real name. I succeeded in obtaining my Baccalaureates in between 'raffles' (raids by the police). I also learned to use every scrap of food, a habit I preserved throughout life. "We were liberated by the Allied Troops in September '44, after the German forces blew up all the bridges connecting the various parts of the city of Lyon, which had been a population center since Roman times. "Returning once more to Paris, I worked for the Jewish organization ORT and witnessed how the survivors of camps, of all ages, were rehabilitated and trained to be reintegrated into society with a marketable skill. From originally planning to become a scientist, I changed to a different career to help humanity. "When I emigrated to the U.S. in 1946, I completed a B.A. from UCLA in sociology. Then I held a job at Jewish Employment & Counseling Service where I was also a translator for the survivors to be gainfully employed in a new land. That is where I met my husband, a colleague and American social worker. When we had two children, I continued to be very active and a leader in Women's American ORT and other social causes, plus being a teacher of French in the public schools. "Still today I am an activist, trying to improve the fate not only of Jews, but of humanity here, in Israel and to some extent worldwide." |
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