Hitler Made Me a Jew Read Online Free PDF Page B

the villages nearby and sound convincing. “Where are you going?” and also “What‘s in your basket?” She was amazed at her quick wit during these inquiries. They always said the right thing. When the German police questioned her she could say she was French because they couldn’t tell she had a foreign accent. With the French police she would let her friend answer or she had to have a new story, other lies they made up: “I am the new nurse of Madame Cartier”—a name they had picked up from the locals. She said she was made more afraid by the French police than the Germans in these encounters.
    When she arrived in Marseille, she couldn’t believe she was safe and reunited with her family. It took her some time to regain her strength. She had no luggage and had to get all new clothes: A red silk blouse with long sleeves, a navy pleated skirt and a white tailored cotton jacket. It was the fashion then to wear blue, white and red, the colors of the French flag. Women were also wearing elevated wooden shoes because leather was rare. My mother looked tall and glamorous with her curly hair that she dyed blond. I loved seeing her so chic.
    My father’s apartment was too small for the three of us, so we moved to the house of the friends of my parents. It was a large villa on a street called “La rue des Flots Bleus” (The Street of the Blue Waves) near the Corniche, the famous road that followed the Mediterranean Sea. I loved the villa with an enclosed garden where we dozed, caressed by the breeze that carried the fragrances of the sea as the waves broke on shore. The two families who had lived in the house had left for Casablanca. As many Jews as could were leaving Marseille. All my parents’ friends were going, and soon it seemed as if we were the only ones left.
    I registered at the Lycee Longchamps, a serious school that I felt proud to attend. My first friend was Jacqueline, short like me, who wore her hair braided and crisscrossed on top of her head Russian-style. She was frail, and her eyes went in different directions—one was immobile and could at times create a disturbing asymmetry. Because of her sharp wit, she was the favorite of the young teachers while her classmates thought she was a snob.
    I was not all that smart, and I wanted to be popular. I worked on it conscientiously. I had read a story about the lion that was lucky to have a mouse as a friend in his hour of need, and I wanted to be on the side of the underdog. I kept thinking of the Revolution. I had no doubt that the French Revolution was the greatest achievement in the history of mankind. If there was abuse by those in power, I was on the side of the victims. Jacqueline’s alliance with the teachers made me uncomfortable, even though I also liked them. I couldn’t forget my peers, but I worked it out through my friendship with Jacqueline: I remained one of the girls, but I was close enough to the teachers. Even though I was new, I quickly made myself the class student representative. Jacqueline was the top student in all subjects, but one summer, my only summer in Marseille, I studied and researched the Greek myths, and I became the expert. I could differentiate between the Roman and Greek stories and I knew all the obscure demigods and mortal heroes and their relationships to the Gods. I even considered making them my religion.
    I liked to make people laugh, and when I had to be Vercingetorix in a play at my new lycee, I was such a buffoon and people laughed so hard that after that just the sight of me would make them laugh and I loved it. Vercingetorix was the first King of Gaul and he was thought to be good-natured but primitive, crude and slightly stupid. So I could enjoy showing off all his frailties and yet I managed to make him also lovable. I was a ham and the French love hams on the stage.
    I made friends with another girl also called Jacqueline. She was reserved and Protestant.