Selected text
This is where my parents' friendship with our Christian neighbors in Salonica, Niko and Elli Sanikou, saved us. These neighbors had moved to Athens and lived in the suburb of Nea Smirni. They took us into hiding at great risk to themselves and their two little girls. We stayed there in hiding for nearly 15 months.
From time to time the Germans and their collaborators would organize searches in different areas of Athens looking for hiding Jews or communists. They would collect all the males in the central square and there masked traitors would point a finger at those involved with the resistance or who were giving shelter to Jews.
It was at that time that my father started losing his eyesight, so he had an excuse for not going to the gathering on the ground that he was blind. My mother was supposed to be his nurse. I would go and hide in a small hole under a stairway. Once I spent eight hours doubled up like this, while I could hear the Germans and their collaborators shouting through loudspeakers: 'Any male found hiding will be shot on the spot ...' Great fun! I must have felt pretty awful, but while it happens your adrenaline goes up and helps keep your courage.
On other occasions, when we knew in advance that the Germans were coming the following day for a round up, Father and I would take off and walk past the cemetery of Nea Smirni in the direction of Palio Faliro. We would stay all day near the mountain, until the Germans would leave the suburb. We would then just walk back together in the evening.
My mother's German came useful one night while hiding in Nea Smirni. It was towards the end of the German occupation. The Germans were so short of manpower that they had recruited young boys for the air force - I mean boys aged 15-16. Some were stationed at the air force base at Faliro. Some of them deserted one night and there was a search by the German military police. They came into the house in Nea Smirni where we were hiding. I was sleeping on the floor, and they woke me up and started barking at me in German, thinking that because of my blond hair and blue eyes, I was one of the deserters. Fortunately my mother's German came all back. She explained that I was her son, not a deserter. That saved the day.
While we were in hiding I continued learning English because there was an American lady married to a Greek, who gave me lessons in Nea Smirni. Then I would go home and study further from an English translation of Eugene Sue's 'Mysteries of Paris' with the help of a dictionary.
From time to time the Germans and their collaborators would organize searches in different areas of Athens looking for hiding Jews or communists. They would collect all the males in the central square and there masked traitors would point a finger at those involved with the resistance or who were giving shelter to Jews.
It was at that time that my father started losing his eyesight, so he had an excuse for not going to the gathering on the ground that he was blind. My mother was supposed to be his nurse. I would go and hide in a small hole under a stairway. Once I spent eight hours doubled up like this, while I could hear the Germans and their collaborators shouting through loudspeakers: 'Any male found hiding will be shot on the spot ...' Great fun! I must have felt pretty awful, but while it happens your adrenaline goes up and helps keep your courage.
On other occasions, when we knew in advance that the Germans were coming the following day for a round up, Father and I would take off and walk past the cemetery of Nea Smirni in the direction of Palio Faliro. We would stay all day near the mountain, until the Germans would leave the suburb. We would then just walk back together in the evening.
My mother's German came useful one night while hiding in Nea Smirni. It was towards the end of the German occupation. The Germans were so short of manpower that they had recruited young boys for the air force - I mean boys aged 15-16. Some were stationed at the air force base at Faliro. Some of them deserted one night and there was a search by the German military police. They came into the house in Nea Smirni where we were hiding. I was sleeping on the floor, and they woke me up and started barking at me in German, thinking that because of my blond hair and blue eyes, I was one of the deserters. Fortunately my mother's German came all back. She explained that I was her son, not a deserter. That saved the day.
While we were in hiding I continued learning English because there was an American lady married to a Greek, who gave me lessons in Nea Smirni. Then I would go home and study further from an English translation of Eugene Sue's 'Mysteries of Paris' with the help of a dictionary.
Period
Year
1943
Location
Nea Smirni
Greece
Interview
mario modiano