Judy Altmann: prewar life in Karpatorus and Auschwitz; Gitu Cycowicz: look back at Biden visit

Part 1: Last July 13 we aired a quick interview with Gitu
Cycowics just hours after her meeting with President
Biden at Yad Vashem to get her first impressions, and she made us
promise to let her come back to look back when she was not so
tired and had time to think about things. We reached her by phone
at her home in Jerusalem on Aug. 25, 2022.. Gitu -- a/k/a Giselle
(Gita) Cycowicz (née Friedman) -- who was born in 1927 in the
town of Chust in the Carpathian Mountains, then part of
Czechoslovakia, survived Auschwitz and other camps, later
starting a new life in the USA, and eventually getting her PhD in
psychology. In her later years, she moved to Israel and then
worked for decades for AMCHA (https://amcha.org), helping with
the psychological needs of her fellow survivors. On Weds., Jul.
13, 2022, she was one of two Holocaust survivors invited to meet
President Joseph Biden at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. Here is a
YouTube from the live stream of Gitu meeting Biden:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q96DZT4qMXs&t=731s Here is
Gitu's page at Yad Vashem:
https://www.yadvashem.org/blog/i-have-to-tell-my-story-giselle-cycowicz.html


Part 2: Judy Altmann, born and raised in Jasina,
Czechoslovakia, fondly recalls her home and family life in her
town at the eastern edge of Karpatorus, which belonged to
Czechoslovakia from 1918 to 1939, Hungary during WWII, and now
Ukraine. She worked in her family's general store, which served
the lumber industry workers from the tiny surrounding villages.
She recounts her mother's cooking talents and describes the dish
known locally in Yiddish as ריפּינייִק Ripinyik, probably closest
to Potatonik. (She sometimes refers to potatoes as ריבלעך
(riblekh).) At the end, she summarizes her Holocaust experiences.
In 1944, she and her parents and practically all Jews of the town
were taken to Auschwitz. In her family's case, they were first
made to stay for several days without shelter in the Jewish
cemetery. From there they were taken to a ghetto in Mateszalca
(Hungary ) for several weeks. Finally, they were deported to
Auschwitz-Birkenau. She survived, but her parents and most of her
family were killed. We reached Judy by phone at her home in
Stamford, CT, on Aug. 31, 2022.


Air date: August 31, 2022


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