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April 13, 2008
Bogdan, Bransk, and the Borowicz family tree
I slowly rub my hand up and down my bare face. It seems so unnatural, so unreal, and yet so rejuvenating, so clean. I was clean-shaven for the first time in 2008.
It started sort of accidentally, really. But day by day the stubble grows and tasks come up and “your going to Poland?” questions all over the place, and suddenly you have some ugly chinstrap accumulating, and you are forced to ask yourself: what if? And then someone asked “are you growing your beard for Poland?” and of course that seemed to make sense so then I was and I did. It got excessive at time, unruly and wild, but Ari and Jonah forced me to trim my first night in Florence, and my situation improved.
I was assaulted with queries from all around: when would the madness end? Finally, I came to a conclusion, a pulled from thin air scenario that gave me a purpose and an exit, a sort of war manifesto, if you will. And it all started with a tiny little town tucked into the Northeast corridor of Poland over a century ago. It all started with Bransk.
I have mentioned Bransk on these pages before. While researching my family history, I was able to discover that Abraham Borowicz (my last name’s pre-Ellis Island spelling) left Bransk around 1904 to settle in America. I soon become obsessed with this small little town that I knew absolutely nothing about. It was the epitome of my romanticism, the fruition of my dreams of a Foer-esque moment of enlightenment. Would my naivety overcome my reality? Was I hoping for some answers that might never come? I wasn’t sure, but I had to go to Bransk to find out.
Bogdan Radomski, who is the Resident Director of the CIEE Warsaw program for the 16 American students braving the Polish winter, heartily agreed. When I informed him of the existence of such a town, he was possibly more excited than I was. What particularly struck me was the first few words that came out of his mouth: “we must go.” Suddenly and imperceptibly, this became a journey that was no longer simply about answers to my own questions. I was about to learn something, that much was sure. But what was the lesson and who would be teaching it?
Bogdan might have one of the most interesting life stories I have ever heard in my life. In our very first conversation, at lunch my first day in Warsaw, Bogdan was very excited to hear I was Jewish. He began telling me everything he knew about Polish Jewry today, although he admitted it was quite little. He also performed a ten -minute soliloquy as to the meaning of my last name. Last names, he informed me, were scarcely used in Poland until the country was partitioned at the end of the 18th century. Those people who lived in areas falling under Russian and Austrian control were forced to take on a surname for tax purposes. Borowicz, he told me, could come from one of two sources, either from forestry, as it relates to the word for a woodsman, or from the famed Polish vodka, Borowka. Unfortunately, members of the Borovitz family have tended to have more of a connection to alcoholism than to nature, but I kept my footnotes to myself.
The longer I knew Bogdan, the more he began to open up to me about his life. Although he was not alive in World War II, his parents had actually hid Jews in the attic of their house. At one point, however, a neighbor tipped them off that they were about to be searched by the Gestapo, and they were forced to send the family away. By some good graces, the majority of this family survived the War and immigrated to the United States. About 30 years ago, they re-contacted Bogdan. The family had done very well for themselves in the Philadelphia area, and offered to give Bogdan some money in return for his parents’ kindness. Bogdan, however, politely refused; accepting any money would be an insult to his parents’ memories.
Polite refusal seems to be a staple of Bogdan’s life. He might be the only Polish man I know who simply does not drink, not due to a bout with alcoholism but due to the simple logic of he does not like the taste of alcohol, does not like how alcohol makes him feel, and feels queasy when drinking. Only on special occasions will he, perhaps, allow himself a bottle of wine. While such an individual may not raise many eyebrows in America, in Poland, as well as the rest of Eastern Europe, such an attitude is beyond taboo. Once, during a visit by a Polish delegation to the Ukrainian Finance Minister (for information on Ukrainian drinking habits, see my blog on the subject) the Minister revealed to Bogdan beforehand a bottle of very expensive Vodka he was going to share with the group. Bogdan warned that the man that while he appreciated the gesture, he did not drink, and would not drink the vodka. The minister prodded a bit but finally relented, perplexed beyond belief. At the reception later on, the Minister made a point of showing off the vodka, then pouring Bogdan his very own tall glass. Bogdan stood up, rose the glass in the Minister’s direction, gave his apologies to the group, and simply walked out. Relations between the two countries have not been the same since. On another occasion, while in Chicago (mini-Warsaw), a man challenged Bogdan to a fight because he would not have a drink with him.
At first, it seems strange that a man as innocent looking as Bogdan (he reminds me of a cross between a teddy bear and a grandfather from a 50’s TV show) could have such a strong sense of will power. That is before you know about his life. Bogdan’s father was imprisoned in a Soviet prison for ten of the first 12 years of Bogdan’s life. Bogdan and his family had no idea if he was alive or dead, the Soviets divulging no information as to his condition or whereabouts. His father’s only crime was speaking out for what he believed in, promoting freedom for a land that hadn’t known it for centuries. Bogdan grew up as the man of his house; responsibility and ethics were qualities that were learned not from growth but out of necessity. His father was finally released when Bogdan was 12, but because of injuries sustained in prison he lived only another four years. Bogdan keeps a picture of his father on prominent display in his office, and the pride with which he still discusses the man he hardly knew makes it evident where his true moral compass lies.
It is hard to discuss one’s self when around Bogdan. He has too much too say, too much to teach, and the best thing to do is to ask and listen. When I asked Bogdan about the communist purge of Jews in 1968, he had yet another personal anecdote to tell. One of his closest friends, Vicky, was forced to leave the country because her parents were out of work. When I ask Bogdan about Solidarity, the trade organization that spelled the beginning of the end of Communist Poland, he tells me that he was not only a member, but he assisted in the negotiations with the communist government. When I ask him about the shift to democracy in 1989, he tells me that he was initially working on the creation of the Polish currency. When they offered him a ministerial post, however, he refused. Bogdan simply wanted to teach.
The most interesting story by far, however, that Bogdan told me involved him and his wife. Bogdan’s wife is an academic, except their fields of study could not be more different. “My wife teaches either Biology or Botany,” he tells me, “except I can never remember which because it switches so often.” He expounds upon his hours of listening to his wife discuss DNA and pollination, cloning and plants, never understanding a thing but listening all the same. In the late 1970’s and early 1980’s, Bogdan and his wife were both working in the United States, teaching and researching. After the Solidarity movement arose, Bogdan returned to Poland, yet his wife stayed abroad. When General Jaruzelski proclaimed Martial Law on Poland in 1981, all Polish academics working abroad were forced to sign a letter of support of Martial Law. Bogdan’s wife did not. Her passport was revoked, communication to the U.S. was cut, and for over five year Bogdan and his wife had no contact. The only reason he even knew she was alive was through a letter passed through multiple contacts throughout the U.S. and Great Britain that finally reached Bogdan months after it had been written. When I asked him how he felt when he couldn’t reach his wife, he responded in what I would like to call true Bogdan fashion: “I thought maybe she found someone better.”
Humility and curiosity in tow, Bogdan and I set off in our Hertz rent-a-car toward some town neither of us really knew anything out. I was going because my family was from there. Bogdan was going to act as a translator, and, basically, because he’s Bogdan. And so I was regaled with stories of communism and democracy, of Polish history and personal history. Underneath all these stories lay a word on the tip of our tongues, this mysterious Bransk, always driving closer but never quite seeming real. The entire time, however, the same questions kept running through my head: What exactly was I doing? What did this all mean?
On the way to Bransk, Bogdan insisted that we stop at Treblinka, the Nazi death camp that was the final destination for 800,000 Jews and probably 80,000 Poles, although exact numbers are hard to determine. Bogdan had never been, and I think the stop over was more for his sake than for mine. What should be known about the Treblinka death camp is that almost none of it is still standing. Partially burned during an uprising by inmates in August, 1943, and partially bombed by the allies later in the war, what remains for the observer is massive fields enraptured by trees, an enclave of death and destruction hidden from the human eye yet well within reach of true civilization. Close enough that people knew what was happening and far enough away to turn a blind eye when the nose could not. The Treblinka train tracks have been removed, yet their wooden base remain, a reminder of that final ride for close to a million people, that last stop on the murder express where they lost first their dignity and their right to life.
The memorial that exists today at Treblinka consists of what seems like hundreds of stones, possibly thousands, spread about the landscape that was the last stand for so many. Stones that have the names of famous of famous victims, like Janus Korzcak, the head of the Warsaw Ghetto Orphanage who bravely led his children to their deaths. Stones that have the names of towns and cities, places that lost all their Jews and places that simply became lost. As I entered the memorial field, the very first stone I laid my eyes on was all too familiar. Bransk. It seemed to be looking at me more than I was looking at it, so unimposing and yet so meaningful and coincidental and serendipitous. Bransk. It was waiting there, waiting to be seen, the memories of its inhabitants yearning to be remembered.
On the way out of the camp, Bogdan and I encountered an Israeli school group, finishing a weeklong trek throughout Poland of Holocaust remembrance sites. I had a brief conversation with some of the students, discussing with them how their week had gone. “It’s been hard,” one of the students replied, “but it’s important.”
Back in the car, back on the road, through towns with names I could barely pronounce but places, Bogdan assured me, which had stones in Treblinka all the same. Chestechova, Bielsk Podlaski, large communities once gone, houses with Mezuzahs ripped off their doorpost and cast aside with no thoughts of anything.
We were driving forever when finally we saw it. Bransk. Unimposing at it had been in my imagination, Bransk is the stereotypical Polish village. One street comprises the main drag of the city, filled with drugstores and supermarkets and the major small town necessities. I tried to close my eyes for a moment, to travel back in time 100 years and imagine what it had been, what sort of reality had existed for my ancestors and beyond. Perhaps as I have gotten older my ability to imagine has waned, perhaps years ago I could have seen in my mind what I so desperately wished I could still see with my eyes. But that was gone, and my thoughts seemed to betray what my hopes would not.
All Bogdan and I had to go one was a name and an address. Zbigniew Romaniuk. House number 16, Sieniewicza Street, Bransk. The door to the address held a sign above it: Apteka. Drugstore. This was our destination? We walked inside, and Bogdan asked for Mr. Romaniuk. Whispering. Chattering. A woman runs upstairs, then comes back down. One moment, she tells us with her hands and her eyes. Suddenly we are whisked upstairs, through a staircase in the back of the store up to an apartment that seems in its own right some secret annex of information. It was there that I first met Zbigniew.
An inherent warmth and kindness imbued the entire small apartment, not to mention Zbigniew himself. He welcomed in us strangers like he would have an old friend, making us feel at home, wanting us to be comfortable and at ease. Zbigniew does not beat around the bush. He knows why we are here, why I am here, even if I do not.
Zbigniew begins where I begin, with a simple sheet of paper that he removes from a folder, and meticulously begins to read off a list of names, some of which I have known from the here-say of memories and some of which were forgotten by ancestors long ago.
Abraham Borowicz. My great-grandfather. A tailor. Left Bransk between 1903-1905, born in 1882. His father, Isaac Abraham Borowicz, also a tailor. His brother, David. His brother Beryl. His sister Bracha. His family, some of whom soon followed him and some of whom he forever left behind.
Zbigniew then showed me the death record of Jakov Borowicz, who was 39 in 1942 when he was sent off to Treblinka. Named after the grandfather, or perhaps great grandfather, of Abraham Borowicz. At the same time that this Jakov (pronounced Yakov) Borowicz, a Jerry Borovitz, Hebrew name Yakov, was working in army planes in the South Pacific. Two cousins, worlds apart, who may never known of the bond they shared, and of the fate they did not. I am named after my grandfather Jerry. But a part of me is named after this other Yakov, too. I carry within me his legacy, as well, because there may be no one else to do it. There is also a Zev Borowitcz, also killed at Treblinka, possibly the son of Yakov, yet a fact that may be lost in the books of time.
Judel Borowicz, the father of Yakov, has his name appear in a property registry of the town from 1914. His father was Wolf, the translation of Zev. Perhaps Yakov was trying to help the name of his ancestor live forever. The Nazis extinguished that flame. Zbigniew would later show me this house, number 14 Cerkiewnej Street, that Judel (pronounced Yudel) once owned. The original house was destroyed in the war, and the one that stands in its place is much more modern, much more new. There’s no place like home, but this wasn’t it.
Zbigniew then began to tell me a little bit about the Jewish community of Bransk. The first mention of Jews in Bransk dates back to the 16th century, but the community really began to take off in the early 19th century. By the start of World War II, the community had at least five functioning synagogues, including one for the rich, one for the poor, one for Hassidic Jews and one for tailors, the latter of which may very well have been attended by my Great Grandfather. At one point in the early 20th century, Jews comprised 58% of the town of Bransk. Jews held a variety of professions, although, as was common in most small towns, many of them were merchants, trading and peddling their goods in the town market square.
Zbigniew insists that, historically, relations between the Jews and non-Jews of Bransk were good overall. During the War, however, the relationship becomes a bit cloudier. When the Nazis first invaded Poland, for some reason that may never be known, they decided to bomb the town of Bransk. Coincidentally, the Jewish quarter was hit the hardest, and many of the town’s synagogues were partially or entirely destroyed. Since Bransk was in Eastern Poland, it was initially placed under the control of the Soviets as a part of Hitler and Stalin’s backdoor bargaining. Many of the towns Jews welcomed these invaders, either due to their socialist ideology or their fear of the Nazis, whom they knew would treat the Jews a lot worse than Poles or Soviets ever did. Some of the Poles of Bransk were obviously upset by Jewish collaboration with the Soviets, setting an ugly stage for what was yet to come.
When the Nazis took over Bransk in 1941, they immediately ghettoized the Jews, and a little more than a year later, on November 2, 1942, the entire ghetto was liquidated, its inhabitants sent off to Treblinka with no more than a large stone to remember they were ever there. Many native Poles, even some with anti-Jewish bias, hid Jews in their homes. In fact, Bransk has ten individuals who have been rewarded as righteous gentiles by Yad Vashem, the Holocaust museum in Israel, a high number for a town so small. Yet there are also many other instances of people betraying Jewish hiding places and, in a few instances, of people murdering Jews themselves. Such is the story of the end of the Jews of Bransk, and the end of the Jews in hundreds of other towns and Shtetls, where often times even memories such as these are non existent.
I found myself absolutely amazed at what I was hearing, not so much because of the story but because of the storyteller. Who was this Zbigniew Romaniuk, and what exactly was he doing? It all seemed so unreal, so dream like, the chances of everything coming together so infinitely small. How many students come to Poland? How many students come searching for their roots? And of these, how many find a man like Zbigniew, a man who seems so devoted to a subject that everyone seems to ignore, a man who seems to live for visits like these, relishing the opportunity to tell me all he can, disappointed he cant tell me more.
Through Bogdan, who was acting as my translator, I asked him the question that was pressing on my mind. “Why are you doing this?” Zbigniew’s answer was simpler than I had imagined. He told us that he is a historian, a lover of history, and that when he set out to study his town’s history, he realized he could not do it without studying the history of the town’s Jews. He even spent a half year in Israel, learning Hebrew and about Jewish rituals and customs, in order to better understand what it was he was seeing, studying, and teaching. I asked him if he had ever met resistance in the town to what it was he was doing. He became shifty at this point, unsure if it was safe to say exactly what it is he wanted to say. Apparently convinced that a 20 year old American and a 62 year old Economics teacher weren’t going to start gossiping with the natives, he confided that 12 years ago, he had been Deputy Mayor of Bransk, next in line to become Mayor. Then, a movie, entitled “Shtetl,” came out detailing the Jews of Bransk. He was interviewed at length in the film, and he was subsequently fired from his post. After bouts with unemployment, he was finally able to find work as a teacher and eventually made it back to the town’s municipal ranks. Currently serving as City Council President, he again is next in line to become Mayor. The Mayor himself has promised his backing, on the condition that he “drop the Jew stuff.” Zbigniew, however, promises he won’t. The work is too important.
After our discussion, Zbigniew took Bogdan and I back to the only remaining Jewish site in Bransk. A cemetery, hidden in the outskirts of the town, wedged in between a forest and a fence. It is small and uneven, bodies probably buried on top of each other because there was no other room, no other option. After the Nazis liquidated the ghetto, they destroyed all the headstones, placing them throughout the town as parts of walls, parts of walkways, parts of streets. Even today, you can see bits of Hebrew scrawled on the Schoolhouse buildings, individual homages to relatives and friends in bathrooms and bedroom floors. So far, Zbigniew has been able to find about 70 of these headstones and put them back in their (somewhat) rightful place, back in the cemetery. As I walked around the cemetery, I was at a lost for words, which for those who know me know is an extreme rarity. Zbigniew was talking, Bogdan was translating, and I felt more uncomfortable than I had ever felt in my life. Was I treading on my ancestors?
Did Abraham Borowicz ever imagine this? That over 100 years after he left his descendant would come, and walk on the graves of his family and friends, the only remnants of a community lost? Confused and hurt and confused some more, I said the only thing I knew how to say, reciting the Kaddish, the Jewish prayer for mourners. I got lost in the words, the repetitive nature of it all soothing my bursting emotions or lack thereof. I didn’t know how I was feeling, I didn’t know what I was thinking, and saying this prayer was the only thing that stopped this lack of knowledge from truly taking me down.
On the way back to Warsaw, Bogdan and I were both pretty quiet. I wasn’t exactly sure what I was supposed to take from the whole experience. It was interesting, and unique, but besides the awe I held for Mr. Romaniuk, and the affection I felt for Bogdan, what was so special about Bransk? What was so special about me?
The day after Bransk, myself, Bogdan, and the rest of my program set out on a weekend trip to Gdansk, a port city in Northern Poland on the Baltic Sea. Friday night I attended Shabbat Dinner at the local Jewish Community building, if you can call it that. What was once a thriving Jewish community of thousands has now been relegated to less than 80, and on this particular night I am not sure there were a half dozen Jews in the room. What was particularly interesting was that on that particular day, Dr. Mordechai Livneh, along with his mother, aunts, brother and cousins, were there to visit. 58 years ago, Dr. Livneh left Gdansk, along with his family, to immigrate to the land of Israel. His mother had lived and hid in Bransk all her life. This was her first time back since they left.
Dr. Livneh told me how they had driven throughout the city, his mother showing him where she grew up, where she went to school, where she hung out with her friends and where she lived and thrived and grew. He was seeing his own history, a history he did not remember but desired to know, a history that was a part of him that he could never live but only be told. I wasn’t the only one, I realized, concerned about my history. I wasn’t the only one who wanted to know. But what would I do with it? What did it really mean?
On our last day in Gdansk, we visited the neighboring beach town of Sopot. My roommate Sean and I stood at the edge of the Baltic Sea, 45 degree weather chilling our skin, contemplating whether or not we should jump in. I stood there, clean-shaven and historically aware, not sure if one had to do with the other or if I was simply striving for coincidence because coincidence is all that made sense.
I thought of Bogdan and I thought of Zbigniew and I thought of Bransk and Abraham Borowicz and the cemetery and Treblinka and 58% and 6 million. I thought of my past and my history. And then I realized that right now, at this moment, none of that mattered. Because what was the point of Abraham Borowicz leaving Bransk 100 years ago if not for moments like this. Moments where we throw inhibition to the wind and live for the sake of living, act for the sake of action, do for the sake of doing what we may never have the chance to do again. So I ripped off my clothes and I ran into the water, cold as all hell, Sean right behind me following suit. It pierced my skin like hundreds of bees attacking all at once, and the pain didn’t end when I got out.
My past had nothing to do with this. I could have kept the beard and the only difference would have been one more extremity to dry off. I did this because I was there, because I could. I did this because when all of life’s options disappear, when hope is lost and we have no more words left to say, sometimes our only option left is to jump right in.
And as I lay there shivering on the beach, using my friend’s jacket for warmth, I suddenly realized that sometimes you just have to know how cold the water really is. The jump was important, the trip was worthwhile, but its just one moment in a lifetime of experiences, even if gives me glimpses into lifetimes of experiences. I had seen where I came from. Maybe now its time to take the leap, and figure out where I’m going.
Posted by borovitz at April 13, 2008 11:15 AM