watch their progress in silence, until they are fully out of sight. Nathan orders a second cup of coffee, stirs in three, perhaps four teaspoons of sugar, and remarks with a touch of defiance: âAs far as Iâm concerned Reb Greenbaum is the only kosher Jew left in Warsaw. The rest are battlers and shnorrers. They live in the past and can barely deal with the present. But Greenbaum I can guarantee you. A pious man. There were tens of thousands like him, before the Annihilation. Now there is just Greenbaum. But him I can guarantee. A true Tzaddik. The genuine article. One hundred per cent!â
Marszalkowska Avenue winds for many miles through central Warsaw. It is so bloated that the opposite sides seem lost to each other. But in some sections it narrows to a more intimate scale, enclosed by buildings whose shadows touch in the early mornings and evenings. In pre-war times the display windows of department stores lining the avenue drew thousands of passers-by. Among them there wandered my father during one of his rare visits to Warsaw. Marszalkowska was a thoroughfare of the future, an avenue of dreams that challenged the provincial outlook of a man from the flatlands of White Russia. Dummies clothed in the latest fashions from the West glittered reflections of legendary cities: Paris, London, Berlin, Rome.
Warsaw overwhelmed father. He preferred the moderate scale and familiarity of his native Bialystok. Yet he was irresistibly drawn to wander the streets of the city which had become, by the 1920s, the vibrant centre of Polish Jewry. He would lose himself in its maze of courtyards and neighbourhoods, its self-contained kingdoms of stone-clad tenements teeming with feverish activity. Within the courtyards grandmothers sold potato latkes, hawkers peddled a wide array of household needs, artisans sat in cramped workshops to ply their trades; while mothers tended their hordes of children, who seemed to split the seams of their crammed apartments and spill out into the passageways, into the open air, like plants reaching desperately for light.
Street musicians and jesters would spread their blankets and make their frantic bid for a living. Crowds quickly surrounded them, while from the upper reaches faces peered down from windows and balconies where drying clothes fluttered in the breeze. The cries of newborn babies mingled with the relentless clatter and chatter of commerce, as the performers strained to be heard above the din. And, on days when their coffers were empty, they would mutter, âYou may as well go beat your head against the wallâ.
Father recalls sprawling markets where life was endlessly recycled until there was hardly a thread left on a garment or barely a leg for a table to stand on. There were goods for sale that nowadays you would find only in rubbish dumps. Father is at pains not to romanticise Warsaw, yet his growing excitement in describing it betrays his efforts. Images tumble out in a rush: of side-streets where yeshiva boys and talmudic scholars swayed in houses of worship; of homes which were merely a room in a garret or basement; of makeshift timber shacks that had somehow found a place between the brick and mortar. Every square centimetre of space was used by the devout or profane â for business or prayer, scriptural studies or a game of cards.
But the Vistula River, that was a different matter altogether. Here, fatherâs voice slows down, and his hands stroke the air gently. The Vistula was a retreat from the tumult, a comfort, full of stillness, such a contrast to what was happening in the bowels of the city. Ferries and barges steamed by, and the vast expanse of water hinted at broad estuaries that meandered into oceans he would one day cross to gain access to a new life.
From the river banks the streets climb as steeply today as they did then, when father trudged back towards the boulevards, the beckoning display-windows, the avenues crowded with trolleys, horse-drawn
Marszalkowska Avenue winds for many miles through central Warsaw. It is so bloated that the opposite sides seem lost to each other. But in some sections it narrows to a more intimate scale, enclosed by buildings whose shadows touch in the early mornings and evenings. In pre-war times the display windows of department stores lining the avenue drew thousands of passers-by. Among them there wandered my father during one of his rare visits to Warsaw. Marszalkowska was a thoroughfare of the future, an avenue of dreams that challenged the provincial outlook of a man from the flatlands of White Russia. Dummies clothed in the latest fashions from the West glittered reflections of legendary cities: Paris, London, Berlin, Rome.
Warsaw overwhelmed father. He preferred the moderate scale and familiarity of his native Bialystok. Yet he was irresistibly drawn to wander the streets of the city which had become, by the 1920s, the vibrant centre of Polish Jewry. He would lose himself in its maze of courtyards and neighbourhoods, its self-contained kingdoms of stone-clad tenements teeming with feverish activity. Within the courtyards grandmothers sold potato latkes, hawkers peddled a wide array of household needs, artisans sat in cramped workshops to ply their trades; while mothers tended their hordes of children, who seemed to split the seams of their crammed apartments and spill out into the passageways, into the open air, like plants reaching desperately for light.
Street musicians and jesters would spread their blankets and make their frantic bid for a living. Crowds quickly surrounded them, while from the upper reaches faces peered down from windows and balconies where drying clothes fluttered in the breeze. The cries of newborn babies mingled with the relentless clatter and chatter of commerce, as the performers strained to be heard above the din. And, on days when their coffers were empty, they would mutter, âYou may as well go beat your head against the wallâ.
Father recalls sprawling markets where life was endlessly recycled until there was hardly a thread left on a garment or barely a leg for a table to stand on. There were goods for sale that nowadays you would find only in rubbish dumps. Father is at pains not to romanticise Warsaw, yet his growing excitement in describing it betrays his efforts. Images tumble out in a rush: of side-streets where yeshiva boys and talmudic scholars swayed in houses of worship; of homes which were merely a room in a garret or basement; of makeshift timber shacks that had somehow found a place between the brick and mortar. Every square centimetre of space was used by the devout or profane â for business or prayer, scriptural studies or a game of cards.
But the Vistula River, that was a different matter altogether. Here, fatherâs voice slows down, and his hands stroke the air gently. The Vistula was a retreat from the tumult, a comfort, full of stillness, such a contrast to what was happening in the bowels of the city. Ferries and barges steamed by, and the vast expanse of water hinted at broad estuaries that meandered into oceans he would one day cross to gain access to a new life.
From the river banks the streets climb as steeply today as they did then, when father trudged back towards the boulevards, the beckoning display-windows, the avenues crowded with trolleys, horse-drawn
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