Dr. Edith Eger, Dr. Marianne Engle, and Audrey Eger Thompson

Dr. Edith Eger is a Holocaust survivor, therapist, and author of multiple books including, "The Gift: 14 Lessons to Save Your Life." She joins Kate and Oliver along with her daughters, Dr. Marianne Engle and Audrey Eger Thompson. They share her incredible story, and discuss grief, trauma, and the importance of finding humor.

Executive Producers: Kate Hudson and Oliver Hudson

Produced by Allison Bresnick

Edited by Josh Windisch

Music by Mark Hudson

This show is powered by Simplecast.

This episode is sponsored by:

Sakara (sakara.com/sibling)

Coors Light (coorslight.com/hudson)

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hi, I am Kate Hudson and my name is Oliver Hudson.

Speaker 2 (00:08):
We wanted to do something that highlighted our.

Speaker 3 (00:11):
Relationship and what it's like to be siblings.

Speaker 1 (00:19):
We are a sibling, railvalr No, no, sibling.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
You don't do that with your mouth.

Speaker 4 (00:31):
Revely, that's good.

Speaker 1 (00:39):
This episode, this human We were about to listen to
this doctor Edith Eager and her daughters, but specifically Edith.
What an amazing conversation, What an incredible woman. This is
definitely in my top five episodes that we've done out
of the hundred.

Speaker 2 (00:56):
It was by far, yeah, most powerful.

Speaker 1 (00:59):
It was very powerful and incredible. She is a Holocaust survivor,
she's a psychologist, she's an author. Her daughters were incredible.
She invited me over to eat coogel, which I wish
that I could have gone, and I kind of still
want to go.

Speaker 5 (01:16):
You know, where is she again?

Speaker 1 (01:18):
She's in San Diego right here. I think we should
take her up on this because she's she's a fucking legend.

Speaker 3 (01:26):
She's incredible.

Speaker 1 (01:27):
She's like in her nineties and just on point right there.
Her daughter is Marianne Engel and Audrey Thompson.

Speaker 6 (01:36):
Yeah, and she shared with us, you know, about her
time in the concentration camp and how she was able
to get through it, and then what it was like
on the other side, even after most of her family
was gone.

Speaker 1 (01:50):
It's it's unbelievable. And then she talks about sort of
part of her book too, is how grief and trauma
can just be passed down through these generations. And you know,
I understand that obviously not capacity that she has been
through in her family, but that shit does get passed down,
you know what I mean, we have to break the cycles,
and how she's sort of found humor in these horrible situations,

(02:15):
and it was an incredible conversation.

Speaker 3 (02:17):
She's she's like famous.

Speaker 1 (02:18):
By the way, my bodie was talking about her the
other day because they're learning about her at school, and
I was like, oh really, yeah, I was like, dude,
she was on my podcast, Like what And then I
turned on kse ET, which is sort of a public
station here, and there's a whole documentary on her, and
she's talking about her time in the concentration camps and

(02:41):
how she was dancing for the Angel of Death.

Speaker 3 (02:44):
You know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (02:44):
Like, she has the craziest fucking stories and she's so
crazy incredible.

Speaker 3 (02:48):
It's it's it's you guys.

Speaker 6 (02:50):
Are going to be unbelievable. It's really you're going to
enjoy this conversation. It's such a beautiful one. And here
is doctor Edith Eager and her daughters.

Speaker 7 (03:04):
Hello, Hello, Hello.

Speaker 2 (03:07):
Hi, this is so wonderful.

Speaker 6 (03:08):
So, Marianne, you're in terms of all of the children,
how many kids are there?

Speaker 5 (03:14):
My mother has? My mother has three children.

Speaker 2 (03:18):
Okay, I'm the one who was born in Europe right when.

Speaker 5 (03:22):
She was very rich, and my father and then they
were forced out by the Communists. We came to Baltimore,
and I wished I kept telling my parents I wanted
a baby's sister. So they finally gave me one. That's
all three. And then we moved to Outpassa, Texas, and

(03:43):
we had they had a son who is our brother,
John John.

Speaker 6 (03:48):
Okay, great, so we're we got lucky Oliver. Because Audrey
is visiting.

Speaker 3 (03:51):
Oh Edith, oh wow?

Speaker 6 (03:54):
And yeah, and so she's there and I thought that's
really interesting because we're gonna well, I mean, we'll get
into all of this. But Audrey was sort of saying
second generation, you know, from a Holocaust survivor and everything
that you know has come with that is fascinating.

Speaker 1 (04:12):
Oh god, I know, I read the Atlantic article and
there's so much to get into and talk about.

Speaker 3 (04:18):
But just the resilience and sort of.

Speaker 1 (04:20):
How that that the psychology that you use to just
live your life. It's just so poignant and just incredible.
I mean it's inspiring.

Speaker 6 (04:33):
Really yeah, I mean really, it's such a such a
powerful story. And you know, we usually do siblings, so
it's really nice to have the mother daughter trio.

Speaker 2 (04:47):
Let's start with your story.

Speaker 6 (04:50):
I mean, you know, without getting into too much detail,
where you were born.

Speaker 8 (04:55):
Nine twenty seven in Czechoslovakia, and Aya, I know that
my parents were expecting a son after two girls.

Speaker 7 (05:09):
So I did feel somehow that.

Speaker 8 (05:15):
I came and they didn't get what had they were
looking for, my mother, and that I remembered very quickly.
To let you know that, my mother told me I
was about nine years old and she said, I'm so
glad you have brains, because you have no looks. And

(05:35):
so I had two very beautiful sisters, and I always
felt that I just I just never be attractive or
even any boys look at me.

Speaker 7 (05:51):
So I became a scholar.

Speaker 8 (05:53):
I did what my mother told me to study, to study,
to go to school.

Speaker 7 (05:58):
And I attended very very good.

Speaker 8 (06:02):
School only for girls, and you had to pass attest
when you were ten years old. And I did make
the grade, and I was in a girls' school. But
then the Wolds were started, you know, and I was
home studying, and I met the boyfriend and the two

(06:26):
of us became very Zionist and we wanted to go
to Palestine and fight. We were not so peaceful at all. Unfortunately,
he was killed a day before liberation, so I never
never saw him when I came back. I think I

(06:48):
like to tell you that especially with children of immigrants,
are parentized, that they become the parents to their parents.
Because I didn't know anything about peanut butter or tuna
fish or anything that you know American children ate. So

(07:10):
Marie Anne made me buy peanut butter and Jiffy. I
remember looking for Jiffy peanut butter. But Mariean became the family.
When we had a problem, we always went to Madian
because she was the American child.

Speaker 7 (07:29):
When you have everything right, she was more.

Speaker 6 (07:33):
More understood kind of American culture because how old were
how old were you when you came to America Marianne.

Speaker 5 (07:41):
A man I knew, so if I can just still
in my another story also, she's she's not telling you
that she was both the dancer and a ballerina, and
that she was on an Olympic qualified team, and that

(08:03):
that was all taken away from her when the Communists,
when the sorry the wrong ones, the not of the knights,
and but it turned out to be actually the thing
that saved her when she got to Ashba. How so,
so basically, when she and her family got taken in Mangoleent,

(08:30):
my mother wanted to go with her mother, and Mangolett asked,
my mother, is this your mother or your sister? My mother?
And see my mother so young looking. Her mother was
also very young looking, and she was in early forties,
and my mother didn't know what to say, so she
finally said, it's my mother, and he put her on

(08:51):
the left line and my mother went to be with her,
and Mangolant took my mother and said no, you'll see
her soon and put her in the right line. And
then that night, after they were taken in, he came
to the cabin where they kept her group and said,

(09:12):
I want to be entertained. We've been entertained with and
my mother's one of my mother's teachers was there also,
she'd also been taken, and she and all the girls
pointed to my mother and said, she'll entertain me, she'll entertaining.
So my mother then danced for Menga. And I don't

(09:34):
know if you ever saw the movie Playing for Time.
It's actually a wonderful movie. Anyway, it's about the orchestra
that was in Auschwitz, and so you know, they they
don't know sure playing My mother did her dance, and
he then gave her some food that she shared with

(09:55):
the other girls, and so she was known for that,
and who knows that's what kept her alive so long.

Speaker 6 (10:05):
But then how old was Edith? How old were you
at the time when you when you were taken? Sixteen
and you were in Hungary? Correct, yes, she was so
born in Churchleslovakia.

Speaker 3 (10:20):
Well it's now I think it's Hungry and became Hungary.

Speaker 5 (10:24):
There had been Hungary, it became with it went into Czechoslovamkia,
and then it went back to being Carbary.

Speaker 2 (10:30):
Okay, got it. A little history lesson for me.

Speaker 5 (10:34):
And then she so she met my father after the war.
He was engaged to another woman. He fell in love
with her. He is from one of the richest families
and most politically powerful families, and they wanted my mother.
They wanted my father to be a minister of agriculture,

(10:55):
but he had to become a Communist and he said
he wouldn't. So then they tried to kill him and
they escaped.

Speaker 2 (11:02):
Oh my gosh, Okay, wait, this is going too bad.
This is going wait now start what an amazing star? Well,
let's I want to start.

Speaker 6 (11:10):
I want to start with something because you know, is
this how difficult? I know you've been so open about it, uh,
you know, and that both of you, the family, Edith,
but how how difficult is it for you to alwait
to talk about your time during the Holocaust? And in
your story there's a story where you know a soldier

(11:32):
and American soldier saw you and gave you Emine ms.

Speaker 2 (11:34):
I would think.

Speaker 6 (11:35):
That that every time you'd see eminems, it would just
bring all of that back, Like is this something that
is with you every day of your life? Is this
something that's hard or difficult to talk about?

Speaker 8 (11:47):
I didn't talk about almost twenty years I went under
grand I won't do that today. I think I owe
it to my parents that they didn't die in vain
in It is my duty.

Speaker 7 (12:02):
It's not that I like it or not.

Speaker 8 (12:05):
I owe it to my mother, especially because in the
cattle car she told me things that I could today
when I go to school, and she asked me to
come and sit with her, and then she said, we
don't know where we're going. We don't know what's going

(12:25):
to happen. Just remember no one can take away from
you what you put in your own mind. I'm sure
your mother told you the same thing correct, And that's
what I remember for me to forgive myself that I said,
it's my mother and not my sister was hunting me.

(12:49):
Years after years after years, I'm getting better. When I
graduated with honors the University in Texas, I did not
show up for my graduation because I didn't think I
deserved it. I had tremendous survivor's guiled. I don't know

(13:09):
if there is anything that touches you in terms of
survivor's girared. I don't know any of you or your
brother has anything similar.

Speaker 1 (13:23):
I don't know what was the turning point for you
after the twenty years of just trying to sort of
keep quiet and maybe pushing it under the rug. What
was the moment where you finally said okay.

Speaker 8 (13:35):
I became very interested in PTSD, and I began to
work with bettered wives. The husband, you know, beats her up,
she leaves, and then she comes back because she calls
her I miss you, I love you, you know, but

(13:56):
he also brainwashes her that she's nothing without him.

Speaker 7 (14:00):
You know.

Speaker 8 (14:01):
You get these double messages because she has no profession,
she doesn't know, so she goes back. And so anyway,
I was invited to the university and the professor said
that I am also a survivor. And and by the way,

(14:21):
I'm not a survivor of Outswitz. I'm a human being
who went through and experience. It's not my identity. Anyway,
he said, how many of you know about Auschwitz? And
maybe before hands went up of one hundreds some people,

(14:41):
and I decided, I don't have to like it. It's
my duty. And and what happened. One night at the
university someone had handed me a book called Mansearch for Meaning.

Speaker 7 (14:58):
I went home, I opened the book.

Speaker 8 (15:01):
I read every page of it and I could and
I wrote a letter to Victor Franco and he told
me to meet him in San Diego. He was a
professor at the University and International University, and he became
my mentor. And I think also for many years people

(15:25):
asked me to write a book, write a book, and
I would say automatically, I have nothing to say. I
have nothing to say. But Phillips Timbardo called me one
morning and said, you know, Edi, the people who survived
and famous are all man. Victor Frank called Earlibizellen, and

(15:45):
we need a female voice. So the choice is a
female voice of Victor Franco. And I became a logo
therapist and logo means meaning in life existention.

Speaker 3 (16:02):
Wow.

Speaker 1 (16:02):
So I actually following up on that, I just have
a question about the psychology of the human being and
when you are put into a situation like this where
you don't know what's happening and then you realize the
horrors of where you're going, do we as humans just
have a survival aspect to us because someone like myself

(16:26):
or Kate can't imagine being in a situation like this,
Does something take over in the human brain to where
now we just have to survive and do anything we can?
And did you see some people who were much stronger
than others, Some who just wilted and said I can't
deal with it, and others who stood up and actually

(16:47):
became real survivors.

Speaker 8 (16:50):
I had a girl with me and she loved her country, Yugoslavia,
and I love my country Hungary. And she told maybe
going to be liberated by Christmas. And she waited and
waited for Christmas, and Christmas came and went and she died.

(17:13):
So that kind of a mentality was not very healthy.
You had to be flexible, not rigid. And I think
it's very important today for people to also acknowledge that
it's your attitude that you take. And I know I
was told every day that the only way I will

(17:35):
get out of it as a corpse. And I said
to myself, that's what you say. I know this is temporary.
I don't like it, and I'm going to survive it.
And and I today took about being for something rather
than being against something, because if I were still fight

(17:57):
and hate, I would still be a prisoner. There's one
thing we kind of change in the past. Mm hmmm,
mm hmmm.

Speaker 7 (18:06):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (18:06):
You know, Oliver and I are actually Hungarian Jew. Our
mom is Hungarian Jew. So my my grandmother came from Hungry.

Speaker 7 (18:14):
Hungary. Heavy men are not smart. I you had a
very wise Yes, yeah.

Speaker 3 (18:21):
I agree.

Speaker 8 (18:24):
I don't just jump into that water and they're gonna
test everything out. They're gonna go to a store and
they want to know what is this made of? Are
you gonna have it for sale? I drive a salesperson, Nuddy.

Speaker 2 (18:41):
It's actually not wrong. And that's so funny.

Speaker 6 (18:43):
It's actually really amazing to talk to you about this
because I've never spoken to anyone directly in our family
that was, you know, in the in the war. And
my first question is is when you were taken? I mean,
what is the process of Like, how did this happen
for you? Was it just one day you were pulled

(19:04):
from your house or what actually happened?

Speaker 8 (19:10):
What actually happened? That it was in March nineteen forty
four and we had passed over dinner and my father
got up after and kissed us on the head, and
then we went to sleep, and a couple hours later
the rother banging on the door and they took us

(19:32):
to a factory. And my tan was called Kasha. Now
it's called course it's as part of the slogo Republic
and and we never knew about our Schwitz at all
and never heard about it. But when we arrived, I

(19:54):
saw the sign our white mark fry work makes you free.
And my father said, it's not so bad, it's just
gonna work, and then we go home. That's not what happened,
because they separated us. Everybody over forty under fourteen, every
young mother with a child, they had to be separated

(20:16):
in a place. And that's how I ended up with
Magda and my mother in the mirror. The way I
found out that Clara was alive and well when we
came home on the top of a train from Vienna
to Prague. So we got off the train and I

(20:40):
saw advertisement of my sister that she's giving a concert.
Her professor smuggled her out she was already in her
camp and took her home, and that's how she survived.
I must ask you to really think about also, the

(21:03):
people that we call righteous gentiles. There was a woman
in Germany dying and they asked her how come that
she reached her life saving Jewish lives, and her answer was,
my father told me that that's the right thing to do.
So don't think that all Germans were Nazis. That's not

(21:27):
true at all. The twelve years of what the Nazis,
it's something that it's not in every German person.

Speaker 6 (21:38):
So you're both all three sisters survived and you lost
both of your parents.

Speaker 8 (21:44):
So Magda Magdan I survived, and we had one pair
of shoes, and so if somebody went out, the two
of us stayed in bed. My aunt sent us packages
Chrisco and we didn't know what to do with this thing,

(22:04):
this white thing, and we had we had a tea
and we made maybe one hundred teas.

Speaker 7 (22:12):
Out of one bag.

Speaker 8 (22:14):
And so those were the days. I became quiet here
and I went from hospital to hospital, and Clara became
my mother. She decided that she's gonna take care of
me and introduced me to other people, my little one.

(22:34):
So when we went to the airport and I wanted
to talk to the agent, she pushed me aside.

Speaker 6 (22:43):
Okay, I want you little clarification on. This is Clara,
your older sister, younger sister. Okay, so and you and
you're the old you're the youngest, your oldest after the
war whenever, when you guys all met, so you found
your sister out.

Speaker 8 (23:01):
I discovered that she's alive in Prague. The way I
found my sister was on a billboard in Prague that
she's giving a concert.

Speaker 2 (23:11):
Wow, oh my god.

Speaker 8 (23:13):
She waited for us in our hometown, and she was
the breadwinner. She played the violin for the radio and
wherever she became really my mom. And she took me
to the hospitals.

Speaker 3 (23:30):
And how long had it been since you had seen
each other?

Speaker 8 (23:37):
Probably about the year that year Magdaze, my sister magdays alive.
She was one hundred in January, and she tells you
that she's ninety nine.

Speaker 2 (23:50):
That was like our grandma. She lied about She lied
about her age all the time.

Speaker 1 (23:56):
Yeah, we think we thought she was eighty. Who knows
what age she actually was. I have a question just
about when you were in line and you're about to
sort of get on these trains. Were you separated from
your parents at that moment? And was that the last
time that you saw them?

Speaker 5 (24:16):
They separated the men and the women first, right, and
then they separated all the women into Chibridge, the ones
they were going to keep and the ones they were
going to kill. Okay, and and then we don't know
about because she never saw her father again.

Speaker 1 (24:33):
So once that separation was happening, did you have did
you have hope that you would see your parents again,
because obviously you didn't know what was going on, or
did you or did you? Were you resigned to the
fact that, oh, this is it. I'm never going to
see my parents again.

Speaker 8 (24:49):
I followed my mother when I unfortunately said that she's
my mother and not my sister, and Mangela came after me.
I never never forget those eyes, and he said to me,
you're gonna see your mother very soon.

Speaker 7 (25:05):
She's just gonna take her shower.

Speaker 8 (25:08):
So when I was at the other side, I asked
the woman who interviewed me, when will I see my mother?
She pointed at the chimney.

Speaker 9 (25:20):
Oh my god, and she.

Speaker 8 (25:22):
Said, your mother is burning there. You better talk about
her in past tense. I never forget that. But Magda
came and hured me, and she said the spirit never dies.

Speaker 7 (25:38):
That was so helpful. That's how I entered our streets.

Speaker 3 (25:43):
Oh my god, wow wow.

Speaker 8 (25:47):
So Magda let me continue because that's funny. Magda was
always the beautiful one in the family. So we were
completely naked, and she asked me a good Hungarian question,
how do I look and so I had a choice then,

(26:08):
as you have a choice now, whether I would concentrate
on what she lost or so I looked at her
and I said, Magda, you have such beautiful eyes. And
I did see it when you had your hair all
over the place. So today I tell people, if you
want to say anything, ask yourself whether it is important,

(26:32):
whether it is necessary, But most of all, is it kind?
And if it's not kind, don't say it? And it's working.
People really think about their thinking before they say anything
because criticism not helping anyone. So they get rid of

(26:54):
the yes, but and like change it yes And.

Speaker 3 (27:03):
Oh gosh, cours light.

Speaker 2 (27:05):
Oh.

Speaker 6 (27:05):
I was just having this moment Oliver today about when
we're gonna tap the Rockies.

Speaker 3 (27:11):
Growing up in Colorado, I was tapping the Rockies. I've
been tapping.

Speaker 1 (27:15):
I've been tapping the Rockies for over twenty years. Let's
just say that work. I'm actually headed to Colorado here
pretty soon. It's my favorite time to drink my cores light.
Not that I don't drink it in Los Angeles, but
in Colorado it's the fishing, it's the mountain biking.

Speaker 3 (27:30):
You know, you keep a cooler in the back of
your truck.

Speaker 1 (27:32):
You go on an amazing ride, and you come back
and then you sit on your tailgate and then you
crack open your ice cold course light. Once those mountains
get blue, you know it's for you. You know what
I'm saying.

Speaker 6 (27:43):
It does really embody that Colorado spirit of like there.

Speaker 2 (27:46):
Is time to just chill and like have fun, chill out.

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That's course light the mountains on the bottles and the cans.
Of course, as we know, they turn blue. You get
excited when they turn blue. That's what you always know
when it's actually time to chill. Crack open that Corese light.
It's mountain cold refreshment made to chill. It's called filtered
cold Logger cold Package. It's just cold. It's cold everything

(28:12):
it's made to chill. As I said, it's crisp refreshing
and it's from Colorado Rockies.

Speaker 3 (28:18):
It's from the Colorado Rockies. That alone just sounds amazing.

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kind of a this is I just feel like was
there when you were there? Was there a game to

(30:40):
be played? Meaning did you have to be manipulative in
the sense of fighting for survival as far as with
the guards, you know, being cunning, being manipulative, making a
friendship maybe when you don't really want to. Was that
part of survival?

Speaker 7 (30:59):
Night Blood?

Speaker 8 (31:01):
Regularly they took our blood and I asked, why are you.

Speaker 7 (31:06):
Taking my blood?

Speaker 8 (31:08):
By the way, I love your tone of voice. You're
such a man's man voice.

Speaker 7 (31:15):
I love it.

Speaker 3 (31:15):
Thank you.

Speaker 8 (31:16):
Anyway, Ah, that's taking.

Speaker 2 (31:24):
Were you talking about Oliver?

Speaker 3 (31:25):
Yes?

Speaker 10 (31:27):
Oh, so he said to me, I'm taking your blood
to aid the German soldiers so.

Speaker 8 (31:37):
We can we can win the war and take over
the world, especially America.

Speaker 7 (31:45):
Okay, I couldn't yank my arm.

Speaker 8 (31:46):
Maybe maybe I wouldn't be here telling you, but I
said to myself, you're stupid, idiot, You're gonna win the war.

Speaker 7 (31:54):
With my blood. I'm a ballerina.

Speaker 8 (31:57):
Anyway, I I and I learned how helpless I was
to change the outer environment. I had to change my
attitude and never ever give up hope. And so I
think it was very important to make a decision that

(32:21):
no matter what, this is temporary and I'm going to survive.

Speaker 3 (32:26):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 8 (32:29):
Wow.

Speaker 1 (32:29):
And and one I got one more sort of odd question.
How did humor? Did humor play in to your world?

Speaker 7 (32:38):
Oh?

Speaker 1 (32:39):
Yeah, okay, because I'd love to talk about that, because
I even.

Speaker 8 (32:42):
Had a hoop contest. Guess who won?

Speaker 4 (32:46):
Who?

Speaker 1 (32:47):
You explain that for a second. No, But but you know,
talk about the.

Speaker 3 (33:01):
Power of humor.

Speaker 1 (33:02):
I mean, it's a very it can be a very
sort of it can be a medicine in a sense.

Speaker 3 (33:09):
I mean, yes, but you.

Speaker 8 (33:13):
Have to have cynicism and sarcasm and philosophical humor was better.
But I know that we talked about how Hitler is
going to die, and I think we had each other.
So we had to have cooperation, not competition or domination,

(33:36):
because all we had was each other then and all
we have is each other now. I live in a present.
I can only touch you now. I want you to
know that there were three sisters. The middle one either
chose the old one and they ended up doing things

(33:57):
with me, or the middle one choose me against the
oldest one.

Speaker 7 (34:03):
There were two against one all the time. Yeah, well
tell them about how you.

Speaker 5 (34:11):
Very much.

Speaker 8 (34:14):
That we were always cooking. We were always cooking in
a camp, and we were fighting how much paprica I
put in my Hungarian goulash. And we were constantly looking
about nothing but food, nothing but food, and of course
the Hungarian chicken paprika at the strudal. Hungarian food comes

(34:41):
from Austria, and so food food we talked about all
the time. We were always hungry for affection, attention, and
I think it was very important for us to cooperate
and for a human family.

Speaker 3 (35:02):
So it was food apartment. Food was part of the experience.

Speaker 1 (35:06):
You were able to have ingredients to actually, you know,
make your food.

Speaker 6 (35:11):
No, no, they would talk about it. They're saying, no,
not at all. They were saying that that just talking
about food. And how remembering kind of laughing about how
much paprika she put it on the wash was like
also probably brings when you look back on that time,
that food is such a huge part of how we

(35:32):
connect as a family and and what brings us together.

Speaker 5 (35:37):
My mother has two books, and the second book is
The Gift, and there's a new version of it, and
we put two new chapters in that one is Living
through COVID and the other one is A Bad Food
and Love and which I wrote, And so we have

(35:57):
seventeen recipes in there. And also the discussion about when
they were so hungry, what these women talked about at
night was they were arguing about how they would make
food if they could. I don't know how many of
them became good cooks, but my mother certainly has become

(36:18):
a wonderful cook. And her mother never let her cook,
and my father's cook didn't let her. Book, so it
wasn't in America that she learned how to call.

Speaker 3 (36:30):
When did you? When were Mary? And when were you aware?
When did you find out about about Mom's past? How
old were you? So?

Speaker 5 (36:38):
I was about twelve, and I was I was a
reader and I'd read all books in the children's library whatever,
and my parents were readers. And so one day I
went into one of the places where there were books,
and there was a book in the back and I thought, well,

(37:00):
maybe it's about sex, right, pull it out, and instead
there are these horrible, disgusting pictures that did people. And
I took it to my father and I said, what
is this? And he said this is this is Auschwitz?
And I said, was Mom there? And he said yes.

Speaker 3 (37:21):
Why did you ask that question?

Speaker 5 (37:24):
Because I you know, my father was very protective with
my mother, and we all loved her so much, but
you didn't want to hurt her. And you could see
that there were some things that brightened her, like police party,
oasis and so. And we grew up with our grand here,

(37:45):
so we knew that the parents were dead.

Speaker 2 (37:50):
And so.

Speaker 5 (37:53):
I don't know, I think I just started started putting
it together. And I have to say that now that
we've lived so we did in New York a lot
of the year, and then we go back to California
for summer and stuff like that. And being in New
York there are there are a lot of children of
call Puss about it, and the stories that I hear

(38:14):
from them are that their lives were full of hall
past time. It was about what they lost and what
would have happened there. And I didn't have to carry
that with me from childhood, really, and I saw I'm
grateful that I didn't know, but I didn't not tell them.

Speaker 8 (38:34):
I want to tell you that when Marianne was about
six years old, she would say to us, everybody has
a sister. I want a sister. So when the two
of us made sixty dollars a week, we decided, I'm
going to get pregnant.

Speaker 7 (38:51):
And then shoot enough.

Speaker 8 (38:54):
My husband is working for a CPA who was a
dog and didn't allow my husband to come and help
me to go to the hospital. So I drove myself
to the hospital in nineteen fifty four in a Lutheran hospital,
and they put me in a crab, you know, And
then the next thing I knew, I woke up in

(39:16):
a room and the nurse came in and I said,
how long do I need to suffer? I thought you
have to suffer anyway. They knocked me out soon enough,
but she said you had a little girl four hours ago.
And I said that's America, you know, because in Europe

(39:38):
they don't give you anything. And Marianne was born at
home because my late husband inherited the family business, so
we were very wealthy, which we lost everything when the
Communists came and we fled. So that's where, oddly came

(39:59):
the little girl. Marianne became the little mother, so she
had two mothers.

Speaker 6 (40:05):
What's your age difference? Audrey Marion seven years? Seven years amazing?
And then John is the baby two and a half years.

Speaker 8 (40:18):
But John was born with cerebral policy. He was a
child with special needs.

Speaker 7 (40:26):
And my.

Speaker 8 (40:28):
Son John is a child with special needs. And he
does go to Washington and fights for the people who
have difficulties. He has difficulties with his eyes. He's kind
of blind and there's a stick when he goes out,

(40:51):
and he's very committed to make the city available for
people who have special needs. So he's for something. He's
fighting for the disabled. He's married to Lord, who is

(41:11):
a wonderful, wonderful, and she wants to learn how to
cook Hungarian food so.

Speaker 2 (41:19):
Perfect.

Speaker 6 (41:19):
Well, according to your daughters, you're obviously very good at
cooking Hungarian mom rocks some Hungarian dishes.

Speaker 1 (41:28):
Ali, Yeah, well, well that's paprika. I mean just alone, chicken.

Speaker 2 (41:33):
Che put it in everything.

Speaker 1 (41:35):
Yeah, I mean literally, we have paprika and cake and cereals.

Speaker 3 (41:38):
It's just everywhere.

Speaker 2 (41:41):
Like little Paprika.

Speaker 8 (41:46):
I want to tell something about your mom and the
movies that she was in.

Speaker 7 (41:52):
I remember when she was in the military, Private bad Benjamin.

Speaker 8 (42:01):
Yes, that's fun. Yeah, I think the first time that
I saw her, she's quite a wonderful renaissance woman.

Speaker 5 (42:11):
Right.

Speaker 7 (42:12):
Yeah. Love is not what you feel, is what you do.

Speaker 8 (42:18):
And I think that's important that you are and your
mother doing many many things improving the relationship in a family.

Speaker 2 (42:30):
M H, thank you. I love it. You know, it's
funny that my mom says that all the time.

Speaker 6 (42:35):
You know, you have a different twist on it. Love
is not what you feel, it's what you do. Is
That's what my mom My mom says about yourself. You know,
you're not you aren't what you do. You're what you
give and how you give.

Speaker 3 (42:51):
You know.

Speaker 1 (42:52):
I also I also love just what your mother said
to you in the cattle car, which is a universal
psychological sort of thought that you need to go through
to have a happy life for the rest of your life,
which is basically, you know, they can take they can
they can take everything away from you, but they can't
take away that you perceive things they can't take away.

Speaker 8 (43:15):
My mother would have made it if she would have
been let come to the other side, because my teacher
from the Jewish school was the first one to get up.

Speaker 7 (43:25):
She was exercising.

Speaker 8 (43:26):
She you know, she made it. She made it because
there was no other way. She was an amazing role
model to us not to wait for anything to come.
There was nothing from the outside, nothing but the gas
chamber four o'clock.

Speaker 7 (43:44):
In the morning. We didn't know if you're going to
end up there.

Speaker 8 (43:48):
When we took a shower, we didn't know whether vouder
is going to come out or gas. And I think
this is the hardest place to be when you don't
know what's going to happen next.

Speaker 3 (44:00):
M God, no.

Speaker 6 (44:03):
No wonder you know it is when you know you
you then dedicated your life to helping people, I mean
becoming you became a psychologist.

Speaker 2 (44:11):
But when did this?

Speaker 6 (44:14):
You know, you met your ex husband, you moved, you
had a very wealthy life, and then again it hits
you again. You had to then leave this life and
flee communism.

Speaker 2 (44:24):
You came to America? Did you come to America with nothing?

Speaker 8 (44:29):
We came to America and I didn't have six hours
to get off the boat, so the Red Cross gave
it to me, and I ended up working in a factory,
getting seven cents a dozen. So I worked as fast
as I could so I wouldn't have to lose any time.
But finally I had to go to the bathroom. And

(44:51):
when I went to the bathroom in nineteen forty nine
in Baltimore, one of them said Colin, and guess what.
I always went to the colored bathroom. And I realized
that there is prejudice. There is prejudice in America. And
I joined the NCIP. I marched with Martin Luther King.

(45:13):
I wasn't Birmingham. Your mother is right. Love is not
what you feel, is what you do. And in nineteen
sixty two or three, I don't remember, I was in
Baltimore and there was a woman with two men who
the Mamas and the papas, and we were singing we

(45:36):
shall overcome that. You can't remember because you're too young
for that, but maybe your mum would.

Speaker 2 (45:43):
I know it, I know it, we know it.

Speaker 6 (45:47):
Wow, what an incredible life, Oh, my lord Baltimore, So
you did you?

Speaker 7 (45:54):
My husband brother lived there.

Speaker 8 (45:57):
My husband brother was a very famous lawyer in Czechoslovakia,
and one day he lost his glasses and he was
reaching for his glass and somebody hit him and called
him a dirty Jew. So he came to America and

(46:18):
he became a fuller brush man. He was the most
bitter person. And I told him that my husband is
going to go to school. And then I became pregnant,
and he told me how there to even think about
it becoming pregnant. He was so bitter, so bitterre he

(46:40):
died of a heart attack. And so we came to
America and he thought, we're going to bring out.

Speaker 7 (46:48):
The Eager Fortune. Yeah, that was a really big disappointment
to him.

Speaker 8 (46:56):
But I went to work, I went to school, I
sent my house, went to school, and he became a CPA.

Speaker 3 (47:03):
Does the does the Eager Fortune still exist today?

Speaker 8 (47:08):
We went back and they told us that we can
take over the home. The home is a monastery that
covers the whole block. But we had to give up
our American passport and and so we didn't do that.

Speaker 2 (47:26):
Wait, hold on, I want to get that straight.

Speaker 6 (47:29):
So you had to flee communism, and they said, yes,
you can have your fortune back, but you have to
now give up American City citizens, revoke your Americans where
you were able to have a safe haven.

Speaker 2 (47:47):
In order to get that back.

Speaker 7 (47:50):
The story.

Speaker 8 (47:51):
The story is when the Communists came, they wanted to
take over. They were there to take over the business.
And my my husband studied to call them Nazis, and
they threw him in jail. And I am a survivor.
I don't say why me. I'll say what now.

Speaker 7 (48:11):
I took my.

Speaker 8 (48:12):
Big diamond ring, I went to the jail, I gave
it to the warden. I got my husband and we
left overnight and we ended up in Vienna at the
Rothschild Hospital. Well, that was for the people who fled,
and that's how we came to America. And Marian was

(48:38):
a year and a half old. She was so beautiful,
and we were arriving in America in nineteen forty nine,
and she spoke four languages. She went to a wonderful
acre center, and she taught me how to speak English.

(49:00):
She wrote home a book called Chicken Little and then
Ducky Lucky Goosey, Lucy Turkey Lurkey.

Speaker 7 (49:09):
I didn't know one from the other.

Speaker 8 (49:12):
So what I'm telling you that children end up being
maybe we can use the word parentage because one of
my questions I had two questions. One of her question
is when did your childhood end? I don't think Marian
was ever allowed even to be a child. She's the

(49:35):
one who showed me about peanut butter. She is the
one who ended up with an official order. She's the
one who taught me how to speak English, and that
was very very very very.

Speaker 7 (49:52):
Helpful.

Speaker 8 (49:54):
And the second question is which I'd like you to
think about. Would you like to be married to you?

Speaker 3 (50:02):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 6 (50:06):
I'm going to just say yes. I'm gonna go I'm
gonna just be confident.

Speaker 3 (50:11):
Right I might.

Speaker 2 (50:11):
I might marry say yes to Allie to I.

Speaker 1 (50:14):
Might marry Edith, because I can't just it's it's just
an amazing story. Your resilience and just your the way
that you choose to think about things and the way
that you chose to continue on and live your life.

Speaker 3 (50:28):
And we all have that choice. That's the beauty of it.

Speaker 1 (50:31):
Yeah, they can put you somewhere, but we have free will,
our mind. We have the choice to think and believe
the things that we want to believe.

Speaker 3 (50:40):
You know, it's Edith you.

Speaker 6 (50:42):
Said, you said, suffering is universal, but victimhood is optional.
It's amazing, and it's amazing, but it took a long
time to get there, you know. You know when you
say twenty years, you you know, this must have been
something that eventually you really worked towards.

Speaker 2 (51:00):
Understanding about your life experience.

Speaker 8 (51:03):
You know. People, Yeah, I always say what I lived,
but people come to me I believe, I believe, I believe.
I'm not interested in what you believe. I want to
know what kind of life you lead, you know, show me.
You know, everse can be very cheap commodities. And I
went back to Alschwitz actually because that's where the education

(51:28):
I received about the difference between the IQ and the
EQ that I didn't have time to complain and I
don't like it, and no I don't have to like it.
I'm here now and the question is not why me,
The question is what now? And I live in a present.

(51:49):
I can tell you that I have such joy to
being interviewed today.

Speaker 6 (51:58):
I have a question for Marian and Audrey. You know, Mary,
I'll start with you, you know, because you're older, but
I mean we we all have different perceptions of how
these things happen, and what the experience is for you
is different than obviously your mother. So being raised by
a Holocaust survivor, that moment when you saw that book

(52:22):
and realized that your mother was a Holocaust survivor, like
what what?

Speaker 3 (52:26):
What?

Speaker 6 (52:27):
Then became the process of understanding who your mom is,
what her life experience has been, What was that like
for you?

Speaker 5 (52:35):
I think that it grows and changes, And I don't
think that my mother could have done the books that
she's done without me and Augret. We sat next to her.
When the lovely man who is the producer of our books,
let's say, he came to San Diego and he found

(53:01):
this wonderful to do the formal writing. And we all
sat in my mother's study and he said to her,
in o Edie, you have a story that you tell
everyone about your experiences, but for this you're going to
have to really tell the real story. And my mother

(53:25):
looked at us, me and Audrey, and she said, do
I have to tell the real story? And I said no,
but then you don't get a book. I said, We're
going to be right here with you, and so she did,
and we heard and the stories in the first book
were stories we had never heard before. And so not

(53:48):
only did she go through the pain of reliving it,
Audrey and I went through the pain of hearing. I mean,
I don't know if you remember the story about how
the Nazis would put children and the trees and then
use them for shooting, and you know, I mean, it's like, seriously,
human beings do these things. But on the other hand,

(54:10):
the more that we make sure that people realize, I mean,
look what's happening now in the world. You know, I
don't know what it is about humans that make us
so cruel, but so anyway, I think the knowing. I
think I made sure for a long time that it

(54:32):
was never part of my story, and then as time
went on, I became more comfortable with it. And now,
of course Audrey and I both feel that this is
a world story that needs to be remembered, and our
children and grandchildren are I mean, my my daughter's two

(54:58):
boys who were uh ten and twelve now and they
make some of my mother's recipes for their class when
when they're supposed to make something and they're you know,
really delicious and and everyone just loves is her name

(55:21):
great gravittsu and you know, and so it just it
continues now. I think in a very positive way. I
still live with some pain of knowing about her pain.
And I feel.

Speaker 7 (55:40):
The young.

Speaker 8 (55:42):
Great grandson that I have calls me. His name is Hale,
and he looks at me and he calls me Gigi baby,
because I'm.

Speaker 7 (55:52):
Sure he's short too, but that doesn't so I'm known
as the Gigi baby. And they like frank food. They
like my Hungarian food.

Speaker 3 (56:03):
Oh.

Speaker 6 (56:04):
One of my best friend's grandmother was a Holocaust survivor.
She's she's past now. She never spoke about it. She wouldn't,
you know. And she kind of would at one, you know,
in moments, and they took everything in. But she really
was different, you know, like you didn't really want to
share her life experience with the Holocaust.

Speaker 8 (56:28):
I think we owe it to their children vision Keith Ticket.
But if I knew then what I know now, I
would have done things very differently. Yeah, my parents s
had tickets to come to America and they never used it.

Speaker 5 (56:45):
Oh wow, Audrey's experience was very different. When Audrey was
born in Baltimore. You know, we were in Baltimore, and
I never knew my parents before, even though I guess
we were living in this starting little place and all this.
But when we went to outcast of Texas, my father

(57:05):
did really well. We had some money, wasn't bore, and
Audrey had neighbors, and so Audrey had a much more
American life I think, and feeling about lifestyle. You know, Audrey,
you should tell them.

Speaker 9 (57:19):
Okay, I do have a voice.

Speaker 11 (57:25):
It's funny that I'm going to kind of go back
to the choice. I wasn't actually going to come for
this three day like amazing experience. It was my son
that said, Mom, you need to go, because I really
was pretty dissociated with the whole This was her story,
not my story anyway. But luckily I had taken a

(57:48):
year of yoga training and the dreamals were very strong. Anyway,
it was quite an experience to sit there for three
days and like her uh dramatizing getting in the box
car talking about her father who we never heard anything

(58:09):
about uh.

Speaker 9 (58:10):
She was saying how he gave up in the box car.

Speaker 11 (58:13):
I mean the detail about our grandparents that I never
asked any questions was just amazing. And I'd say it's difficult,
but I'm so glad I know that, you know, I
know that part of my life and her life that
we could share.

Speaker 9 (58:34):
And and the big.

Speaker 11 (58:37):
Kind of aha moment was when I traveled with her too.
We were in Amsterdam and they did a ballet to
honor her, and.

Speaker 7 (58:49):
We were.

Speaker 8 (58:51):
Got together with a guy and she became me, and
the man became Mangal Mangal, and.

Speaker 11 (58:59):
Even the the movie star that played Mangola came to
me and he goes, do you think she'll want to
meet me because I represent Mangola, And I said, of course,
she'll want to meet you anyway. It was this experience
that I'll never forget because at the end, the prima
ballerina gives and this was May fourth and Amsterdam, they

(59:20):
actually the city shuts down to remember the World War two,
and the ballerina gives my mom the flowers. The spotlight
comes on in the entire opera house just collapsed in tears,

(59:41):
and I'm sitting here going, holy shit, this woman is
healing this audience right here by her vibrancy and her
just being so alive.

Speaker 9 (59:56):
And so I was like, well, my life has just changed.

Speaker 11 (59:59):
And I remember remember calling Mary Anne and maybe is
the middle of the I going, oh my god, you're
not gonna believe that. Well, this is amazing, and then
we Uh. I just became much more open to telling
my story because there are a lot of second generation
people that are kind of struggling to figure out what
their story is. And I've been asked to do like

(01:00:23):
presentations that I've never been asked to do, and so
I've been really digging deeper into her her history, and.

Speaker 2 (01:00:31):
Yeah, we carry it. You know, it's important to carry on. Sorry,
but your guys is you're amazing.

Speaker 7 (01:00:41):
My darling. Thank you.

Speaker 8 (01:00:44):
One of the things you want to remember always that
half of you is your mother and half of you
is your father. So I hope that you're go also
guide people just to make peace with their parents.

Speaker 1 (01:00:57):
Oh that's interesting you said that, you know, just I
mean just because our father was not around, you know,
And I've come to terms with it and we have
somewhat of a relationship. But I've tried to make amends
and heal there and forgive.

Speaker 8 (01:01:16):
Honestly, Yes, it's actually forgiveness has nothing to do for
you forgiving someone else. You don't have godly powers. But
you want to be free. What you're carrying with you,
that's so forgiveness has to do with you free yourself.

Speaker 7 (01:01:38):
Yes, what you carry with you and letting go.

Speaker 8 (01:01:43):
And you're not in the past fighting and still hating. Yeah,
because you hate, you're still a prisoner.

Speaker 1 (01:01:51):
So have you do you have forgiveness for all of
these people, And of course there's.

Speaker 8 (01:01:56):
No question revenge just gives you some and of satisfaction.
But I think it's very temporary. I very much push
for people to be free. Freedom is not without responsibility,
it's it's anarchy. So it's the sooner you can do that,

(01:02:19):
you're freer, you become give your serve a gift.

Speaker 3 (01:02:23):
Yes, it's a gift gift to you.

Speaker 2 (01:02:25):
Yes.

Speaker 3 (01:02:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:02:27):
One of the things, Mom, that you have to say
is that you never forget.

Speaker 8 (01:02:33):
You never forget or overcome. I don't know that overcome.
I remember when we went to have a root steakhouse
here and I remember seeing cobblestones, and immediately I was
taken back when children were spitting at us in Germany

(01:02:54):
as we woke and called us wound the dogs and
this that, and I are feeling so sorry for the
children that they were got how to hear me?

Speaker 9 (01:03:06):
What about the Costco and far wise?

Speaker 8 (01:03:10):
So when I go to Costco and see the worldwire,
I immediately have flashbacks. I don't forget or run from
the past, but I don't set up how so there
and uh, I think it's good to go through the
value of the shadow of that.

Speaker 7 (01:03:31):
Yeah, I don't care.

Speaker 3 (01:03:32):
But is there? But is there?

Speaker 1 (01:03:34):
Is there trauma experiences that the mind just blanks and
shuts out? I mean, do you have do you have
gaps in your memory of things that you have put away?
You seem so sharp and your memory is is I
can't even begin to tell you how impressed I am
with how articulate and how sharp your memory is.

Speaker 3 (01:03:52):
But are there moments where you have just blocked out.

Speaker 8 (01:03:59):
The past in a present? I think the way you
think can change your life. If you pay attention to
your self dialogue. You find out that if you change
your thinking, you can change your your whole life. So
pay attention to your self dialogue. It really is very important.

(01:04:24):
Because it changes your body chemistry.

Speaker 3 (01:04:27):
Yeah, cognitive behavioral therapy.

Speaker 2 (01:04:29):
We aren't our thoughts, they're just thoughts.

Speaker 5 (01:04:32):
I want to tell you. I want to tell you
how littag I was by the way you lost it.
It was really it was. It was incredibly sweet.

Speaker 2 (01:04:43):
But I think I think that we it's.

Speaker 6 (01:04:44):
Our it's our duty to carry our families, you know,
you know, as especially as daughters, right to carry our
mother's stories.

Speaker 2 (01:04:56):
It's really important.

Speaker 9 (01:04:57):
Yeah, I was curious what touched you that.

Speaker 2 (01:05:01):
You know, because because the stories.

Speaker 6 (01:05:05):
Profound stories that can really change, you know, your story,
edith is can be life changing for a person. They
can experience you and your words and it can change
their entire life trajectory of how they see themselves in
the world. Your life experience has seen that people can

(01:05:29):
be so resilient that we can overcome the negative thought
patterns and the trauma.

Speaker 2 (01:05:36):
I mean, you know that we can understand it better.
And I also think World War two is just a
very specifically.

Speaker 6 (01:05:44):
Emotional war for especially for Jewish people, you know, like ourselves,
you know, our grandma. There's not that many of us
in the world, and they want to try to forget
what we've been through and so that is that hits
me a lot.

Speaker 8 (01:06:03):
I like you to get rid of the world, understand,
okay or come that is, I don't. I don't ever
forget what happened. I do not overcome. It's undresult grief
that comes up here, there and everywhere. I come to

(01:06:25):
terms with it. I call it my cherished wound. So
don't run from it or fight it. That is important
because you want to be a good mother to you
and whatever you do, ask yourself, is it empowering me

(01:06:46):
or depleting me? You know, some things may give you
five minutes of pleasure, but then maybe years and years
of pain. I think it's good to think about your thinking.

Speaker 3 (01:07:00):
It M right, it's true.

Speaker 11 (01:07:03):
So I do have a question for you in your circle,
which yeah circle that I but you know, what what
do you think we need to do to bring awareness
or to help others?

Speaker 8 (01:07:19):
I like, I like to say I never asked how
can I help you? I say, how can I be
used for data?

Speaker 1 (01:07:27):
I mean, honestly, it's it's it's just the story, of course,
but it's about the resilience.

Speaker 3 (01:07:35):
It's more than just the story.

Speaker 1 (01:07:37):
It's about how Edith and you as a family have
dealt with it. It's it's just about sort of changing
your mind, making a choice, and that you know, even
someone with a story like yours can make these choices,
you know, And it doesn't have to define us. We

(01:07:57):
define ourselves our thoughts.

Speaker 7 (01:08:00):
You know, I have a story, but I'm not my.

Speaker 3 (01:08:02):
Story right exactly.

Speaker 1 (01:08:05):
You know, I've been dealing with anxiety, and that's sort
of how I deal with it.

Speaker 3 (01:08:09):
I have anxiety. I am not I am not my anxiety.

Speaker 8 (01:08:14):
You know, you're thinking anxiously. There is no such thing
as an anxiety attack. I am not a victim. I've
been victimized. It's not who I am, it's what was
done to me. That is a big, big difference. It's
very important to pay attention what you're paying attention to,

(01:08:37):
because anything that you pay attention to, you're in force
that behavior. So you suppose you want to lose weight
and you tell me, and I tell you what to do.
You know, I'm calories or so on, and then you
tell me, I just cannot give up Hungarian chocolate, And.

Speaker 7 (01:09:00):
You see, I can't.

Speaker 8 (01:09:02):
It is not in my vocabulary. Because when cannibalism broke
out in the place where I was liberated, the movie
is called.

Speaker 7 (01:09:18):
Which is the movie that I'm referring to?

Speaker 2 (01:09:24):
Is it about.

Speaker 7 (01:09:26):
Karate Kid? Is that what you?

Speaker 5 (01:09:28):
No?

Speaker 8 (01:09:28):
No? There, I was actually talking to God what to
do because I didn't want to touch human flesh. The
sound of music is there, and God pointed me to
look down. And even then I had grass to eat,
and I remember choosing one blood of gray against the other.

(01:09:49):
So I can't, it's not in my vocabulary. I go
to a classroom, I run to the blackboard and I
put that I can't, and I take an and erased
the tea and the apostrophe.

Speaker 7 (01:10:03):
I can why because I think I can?

Speaker 8 (01:10:07):
So?

Speaker 2 (01:10:08):
Are you saying that the cannibalism was something?

Speaker 6 (01:10:10):
Because because you were so hungry that started to happen?

Speaker 8 (01:10:15):
People unfortunately resorted to cannibalism in Gundkirhen, Austria, where I
was liberated May fourth, nineteen forty five by the seventy
first Infantry, And one of the members is now my
friend who was who was there when he's the one

(01:10:43):
from the seventy first Infantry.

Speaker 1 (01:10:45):
Wow, were the rumors of liberation or did it just
happen immediately or did you understand that it might be
happening soon.

Speaker 8 (01:10:53):
Yes, we got that can of sardines from the Red
Cross and we were told that Roosevelt died.

Speaker 7 (01:11:03):
So that's when we.

Speaker 8 (01:11:04):
Were very very very hopeful that we're going to be
liberated as well. And thank God, thank God, I call it.
The saints came marching in. It was maybe your grandfather
or great grandfather or great grandmother who may have been

(01:11:26):
a nurse during World War two. I don't know, but
they were women and men equally in uniform.

Speaker 3 (01:11:37):
And that feeling, what was that feeling like?

Speaker 8 (01:11:42):
Ah, the feeling was all I can tell you that
there was no feeling. I was numb, void of feelings.

Speaker 9 (01:11:57):
What condition were you in when you were I was.

Speaker 8 (01:12:00):
A in a among the dead when I felt my
hand was touched, and I looked up and all I
saw was a big leap.

Speaker 7 (01:12:13):
So I am telling this to Oprah and she.

Speaker 8 (01:12:16):
Gets up from her chair and she said he was black,
and shout it have he was black? And I looked
at his eyes and I want to cry, and and
he was crying.

Speaker 7 (01:12:36):
And guess what he gave me?

Speaker 8 (01:12:38):
Eminem So if you come to my house, I give
you Eminem's with my picture on it.

Speaker 3 (01:12:45):
Oh my god, It's amazing, isn't it? Wow? Wow?

Speaker 1 (01:12:51):
Real quick going back as Mary and I wanted to
touch upon this just as a child and having to
be that teacher to your to every to your mother
and you know, English and food and this and the
American culture and lifestyle. Was there anything taken away from
your childhood?

Speaker 3 (01:13:07):
Something?

Speaker 4 (01:13:08):
You know what I mean?

Speaker 3 (01:13:09):
Do you have not?

Speaker 1 (01:13:10):
There's no obviously no regrets, but is there that that
thing that you had to sacrifice for your family?

Speaker 5 (01:13:16):
You know? I always feel hurt when my mother talks
about what I gave up to be their child, because
they were really fun parents, and I felt like it
was really fun and we were doing all these different
things and they were so sweet and fine to me.

(01:13:41):
And I don't I wouldn't give up my childhood for anything.
I mean, you know, I didn't really. I mean, if
I realized that I was teaching my mother English, it's
not a conscious thing. And I think that's pretty cool.
You look at all these immigrants out of the US.

Speaker 7 (01:13:57):
I want to tell you. I mean, let me interrupt Anny.

Speaker 8 (01:14:02):
I was invited to Hanukah party and the children got
up and sang, and hostess asked marya Mary, and would
you like to sing a Hanukkah song? She says yes,
she starts in the middle of the room. Jesus loves me. Yes,
I know, because this Jewish guy became a Baptist minister.

Speaker 7 (01:14:27):
So that's what imagine how I felt. I'm sorry, I just.

Speaker 5 (01:14:34):
So I loved to day to read that.

Speaker 2 (01:14:39):
Oh my god, that should like be in a movie.
That's really funny.

Speaker 7 (01:14:44):
Jesus was a Jewish boy, you know.

Speaker 5 (01:14:48):
The only when we moved out Vaso, there was another
family there who were from I think Czech or something,
and they had a son my age, and I kept
thinking to myself, when I grow up, I am I
going to marry somebody like him because we have a
similar history and and and that that was one of

(01:15:12):
the thoughts I had, was that I knew deep inside
that I was different from all these Texans. And even
though I learned to ride horses and play very good
tennis and all that, you know, I was, I mean,
I you know, I had the benefit of being good

(01:15:33):
at a lot of things and being really smart, and
so I think, I'm you know, kids are more concerned
about themselves. And my mother you see her now, and
I'm so proud of her. But when I was growing up,
she was shy. And but my friends, my you know,

(01:15:57):
my ol pass of friends, they just talk about how
I loved it, went to your house.

Speaker 7 (01:16:02):
Your mother was.

Speaker 5 (01:16:02):
Always so sweet, and she always wanted to listen to me,
and they have told me now you know, she listened
to me. Anyway, my parents never.

Speaker 3 (01:16:11):
Listened to me.

Speaker 5 (01:16:13):
So I think for her ability to connect. And my
father was a sweetheart. He was fun He loved to travel,
and he thought about funny. He had a really funny sence.
He were and he was a great dancer, so you know,
dancing and all this stuff. And I'm sorry about the

(01:16:36):
and and so I knew that my family was different
than other families. And when my mother went to Auschwitz
and she came back, she was truly a different person,
and she was a different person. And her story, which
she hasn't told you, was that she, you know, she

(01:16:58):
went and she saw a man walking who had the
uniform line, and she got panicky, like he was one
of the men in uniform that she experienced when she
was there as an inmate. And then suddenly it hit

(01:17:20):
her that he works here, and I can leave, and
I have an American passport in my wallet and she
skipped out whether my father said, she literally skipped out.
And she used to have this kind of sadness in
her eyes always, And it went right wow.

Speaker 6 (01:17:39):
So that that experience really like just shifted. It was
like something happened and it shifted everything.

Speaker 5 (01:17:45):
And and and so I became a psychologist long before
my mother. My mother didn't finish education churches in the fifties,
and I went to graduate school for now when I
was twenty, so you know, there's a difference, and and
and and so she goes to Auschwitz. You know, she's

(01:18:05):
doing her psychology stuff with the veterans from Vietnam, et cetera.
But she goes to Aschwitz and she comes back and
she is like, oh my god, I am fully alive.
It was. It was astonishingly one. It really was.

Speaker 1 (01:18:23):
What were those memories, like Edith going back there, what
would you attribute that to? Is it just a release
realizing that it's over.

Speaker 5 (01:18:30):
I think it was. I think that all of the
painful memories came back to her. But she also realized
that that was then and this is now, and she
had so much that happened since those days. And and
and I mean she and I talked about it multiple times,

(01:18:51):
and but but just just the look on her face
and the way she just kind of handled and the
confident said she had speaking to people were and it
just it just turned everything over, I know, And I
mean it's kind of an incredible thing. So you see,
that's all my experiences and you know, watching that transition

(01:19:16):
with her. But the other thing that comes to mind
is when I was pregnant with her first child, her daughter,
and I was three weeks late, thank goodness. And now
in those days, they let me go the three weeks
weeks late too, is that right? So I was three

(01:19:37):
weeks late for my mother, and so I called my
mother and I said, you're going to be here with
the baked sport right to help me out? She said, well,
you know, I'm working on my PhD and I have
a meeting with my advisors, and well, I'll try to
be there by can. And I'm thinking, what Unfortunately, because
Lindsay was three weeks late, she went and had her

(01:19:58):
meetings and she could come back and beat it. But
that's you know, when she's determined, she's not gonna stop her.

Speaker 6 (01:20:09):
That sounds like our mother, who'd be like it's the
it's the birth of your first grandchild. She's like, I'm
so busy, but I'm gonna I'll see what I can do.

Speaker 5 (01:20:18):
Yeah, exactly exactly. But they always come through, but it's
just in their own way.

Speaker 2 (01:20:23):
How many grands how many great grandkids?

Speaker 8 (01:20:25):
Now I have seven great grandsons. That's my best revenge
to Hitler. I don't have time for anything, but you
and your mom and your brother can come and visit

(01:20:47):
me here.

Speaker 7 (01:20:48):
I hope that will happen.

Speaker 2 (01:20:49):
Oh, I would love where are you're in New York.

Speaker 3 (01:20:55):
I would love to take you up on that.

Speaker 2 (01:20:58):
We will take you.

Speaker 11 (01:20:59):
Up on that our capt tonight and we have Theopaprica perfect.

Speaker 1 (01:21:05):
It's just your story is incredible, and your spirit is amazing,
and your resilience is inspirational. And I have an odd
last question and you don't have to answer it, but
you know, given who you are, and after having this
conversation with you for the last hour or so, were
there did you have happy memories? Were there happy memories

(01:21:29):
of your time in Auschwitz? Memories that you will take
with you.

Speaker 8 (01:21:35):
Many, many happy memories, especially that we learn to care
for each other, because if you were only for the me, me, me,
you didn't make it, And we knew exactly that. I
knew exactly by looking at someone's face whether they going
to make it or not even there and those higher

(01:22:00):
conditions people were practicing and attitude that turned anxiety into excitement.

Speaker 3 (01:22:13):
And what was the excitement, like we're going to get
out of.

Speaker 8 (01:22:17):
Here that I'm here now, I'm here now, I'm still
in a present. And I do the best with what
I have rather than anything else. So I think the
curiosity is what helped me through more than anything else.

(01:22:42):
So when a woman kind of tells me that this
guy left him left her, I'll say the word that
you want to use now next.

Speaker 2 (01:22:59):
I think I say next too often.

Speaker 7 (01:23:02):
Pick an arrow, go follow that arrow next.

Speaker 2 (01:23:08):
I love it.

Speaker 8 (01:23:09):
So when you leave the house, get dressed, you never
know who's gonna pick up the tomato next to you.

Speaker 7 (01:23:18):
And start a conversation.

Speaker 8 (01:23:20):
You know, the tomatoes are very nice. Women are much
more pursuing than in the past. You don't have to
wait for a man to call you.

Speaker 5 (01:23:37):
You're both married.

Speaker 6 (01:23:38):
Well, that's right, I have a I have a Do
you feel your mother all the time still?

Speaker 2 (01:23:44):
Do you think about her all the time? And do
you do you feel her.

Speaker 8 (01:23:50):
My mother is a guide. Yeah, I wonder for God,
it's it's in my soul or my spirit and yeed
we call it your kishke that tells you your yours
will tell you whether it's a good idea or not,

(01:24:11):
whether you should act upon it or not. I think
it's very good to pay attention what you're paying attention to.

Speaker 2 (01:24:19):
Mm hm.

Speaker 3 (01:24:21):
Hm.

Speaker 8 (01:24:23):
So when you are married, you do two things, you
give and take.

Speaker 7 (01:24:33):
And tolert differences.

Speaker 3 (01:24:37):
Yes, I think that's all relationships, do you. I know
Kate's going to use this in her relationship.

Speaker 6 (01:24:49):
I feel that your daughters are so lucky to have
you as their.

Speaker 3 (01:24:58):
Mama.

Speaker 7 (01:25:00):
I am the luck you went.

Speaker 6 (01:25:02):
Of course, of course, from your from your girl's perspective.
You know, we usually we usually do this thing. I'd
actually like to do it with you guys. We do
this with siblings. Our last question is usually what is
one thing that you would love to emulate about your mother?
And then what is one thing you would love to
be able to alleviate from her? And then maybe mommy,

(01:25:29):
you can say that to your daughter, is one thing
that you just love so much about them that you
wish that she.

Speaker 1 (01:25:36):
Had what, Yeah, the one thing that you wish that
you could take from them, meaning like the one thing
that you love about them that you wish you had
for yourself.

Speaker 6 (01:25:46):
And then and then the other, which is that one
thing you could alleviate, something that you could take away
from them that would make their life better.

Speaker 7 (01:25:57):
Deep.

Speaker 8 (01:25:57):
You know, when I was on Larry King, he asked me,
were there are any kind people among the guards?

Speaker 7 (01:26:07):
And I told him that.

Speaker 8 (01:26:09):
One night when we were in a little German village
in a community hall, I we were told if we
leave the premises, we're going to be shot right away.
But MEGA told me she's so hungry she would die
if I don't get some food. So I didn't listen.

(01:26:33):
So I go outside and I see some carrots next door.
I'm a gymnast, right, so I jump and I steal
the carrots. And as I jumped up, I heard the
clicking of a gun about three times, and I'm saying
to myself, I'm going to die.

Speaker 7 (01:26:54):
But there was this eye contact.

Speaker 8 (01:26:57):
And I don't know if you had ever a German
my father, but he looked at me and he turned
around the gun and.

Speaker 7 (01:27:09):
Shoved me back.

Speaker 8 (01:27:12):
And the following morning he came and he wanted to
know who dared to break the rules some crawling to him.
This is April nineteen forty five, when the German people
are starving, and he gives me a little loaf of
bread and tells me you must have been hungry here

(01:27:32):
last night. I wish I could meet that man because
because he gave me a piece of bread the time
when there were starving as well, So there was kindness
that was practiced even then, even then. So anyway, Larry

(01:27:54):
King wanted me to cook for him Hungarian food and
that somehow.

Speaker 2 (01:28:00):
Thank you for sharing that story.

Speaker 3 (01:28:02):
That's that's wow, the just the stories that you must have.

Speaker 1 (01:28:07):
I got to come to La Joya and just you know,
I know talking, I can do dance.

Speaker 3 (01:28:12):
I can do a dance too. I can dance for.

Speaker 6 (01:28:15):
You, Marianna and Audrey, do you want to maybe?

Speaker 5 (01:28:20):
So the thing that I wish my mother didn't have
was the guilt that she feels about whatever if she
feels built well she did, especially around me, which I
feel is totally inappropriate, and it makes me, it hurts

(01:28:41):
me to see her have that feeling of I mean,
I think part of who I am, and I like
who I am come from what I had it really.

Speaker 7 (01:28:58):
I am.

Speaker 5 (01:28:58):
I try really tried not to be the obnoxious older sister,
but maybe sometimes all the time.

Speaker 6 (01:29:08):
Alie, Alie doesn't try hard not to be, he tries
hard to be.

Speaker 5 (01:29:15):
Okay, Well, the advantage of a sister over a rather problem.
And what I feel like I got from my mother
is my mother is an incredibly kind person. And I
think people say and I feel like a kind personal
I'm happy, there's positive things to do. So I don't

(01:29:39):
know if you know anything about me, but my special
tis child psychology and sports psychologist, so different ends of
the spectrum. And and I love to watch people get
better and better and do better at whenever they do.
And I and you know, this is something I think
that my mother has embodied.

Speaker 2 (01:30:01):
Wow, I love that, amazing, Audrey.

Speaker 11 (01:30:07):
Okay, that's a hard question, but I think I think
the word is you're never satisfied, And that can be
negative or positive, because I always feel like I always
need to be accomplishing something, so that can be positive
or negative. Sometimes it's a good kick in the butt

(01:30:28):
and sometimes it's like enough already at ninety four, do
you really need to work every day? So it's sort
of a it's a dichotomy in a way, you know,
like when can you rest? And anyway, I like to
play a lot, and I also do executive coaching, so

(01:30:50):
I have like very different sides of me.

Speaker 9 (01:30:54):
And I think that's okay.

Speaker 11 (01:30:56):
And I think I would I wish that she had
a little more of the you know, go play bridge.

Speaker 2 (01:31:03):
Or something right like clip the playful like.

Speaker 11 (01:31:07):
Yeah, like enjoy like the gifts. I mean, life can
be really fun too. But anyway, on the good side,
I do never give up, regardless of what happens.

Speaker 9 (01:31:19):
And you know, life is up and down, and with her.

Speaker 11 (01:31:25):
Gifts, I think it is just like I said in
that article, it's in my DNA. It may you know,
things may hurt and be horrible, but I always know
I'll find a way out. And uh and I do
never give up. And this this is the role model
right here.

Speaker 2 (01:31:44):
Amazing.

Speaker 7 (01:31:45):
Thank you, honey.

Speaker 6 (01:31:48):
Now, if you could take one good thing that your
daughters have and adopt it as yours, what would that be.

Speaker 8 (01:31:57):
That curtiosty and not really living in a past. And
then what if could you could take away something that
weighs them down or is difficult for them and you
could sweep it away for them, turning shit into fertilizer

(01:32:18):
and plant rosa on it.

Speaker 2 (01:32:23):
Okay, that was I think that's a great way to end.

Speaker 1 (01:32:26):
Oh god, I might I might just take that quote
for myself and run with it.

Speaker 7 (01:32:36):
And turn the bed into good.

Speaker 2 (01:32:38):
I love it, you guys. Thank you so much for
joining me.

Speaker 8 (01:32:43):
My love to your mom, and I hope you'll come
and give you a big hug.

Speaker 1 (01:32:49):
I know, I really want to figure that out because
I could talk to you for hours and hours.

Speaker 2 (01:32:54):
Oh, thank you guys. This is so great.

Speaker 6 (01:32:57):
I really, this was really really just really touched me
just so deeply on such a such a personal level,
and I'm so grateful, so thank you for spending this
time with us.

Speaker 3 (01:33:08):
Yeah, really appreciate it.

Speaker 7 (01:33:10):
Yes, you, thank you much. Okay, I love you.

Speaker 3 (01:33:16):
We'll see you guys soon.

Speaker 1 (01:33:20):
Sibling Revelry is executive produced by Kate Hudson and Oliver Hudson.

Speaker 2 (01:33:24):
Producer is Alison President.

Speaker 3 (01:33:26):
Editor is Josh Wendish.

Speaker 2 (01:33:28):
Music by Mark Hudson aka Uncle Mark.

Speaker 1 (01:33:31):
If you want to show us some love, rate the
show and leave us a review.

Speaker 3 (01:33:35):
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