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Then it was time to worry, with the assistance of Toto, how we would leave the county. I have no idea where Toto was during all this period. I suppose he was somewhere around watching over us in his own way. I was staying at Mrs. Lembessi's, who would see that Toto was after me, and madly in love with me, and she would advise me not to marry him, because he didn't seem to her to be of the same value as me. All that love seemed improper to her. Mrs. Lembessi knew nothing about Toto's sister and her mental disability.
Following the instructions given to Toto, we went on Good Friday, the one preceding Easter, in the evening, to a place where a lorry, sent by the resistance, was expected to pick us up and take us to Evoia [20]. Everything was arranged by Toto in agreement with the partisans.
At this place arrived all the people who wanted to leave Greece: there was Paul Noah and his wife Rita and their young daughter, Lela Nahmias, the wife of Moise Nahmias, who was one of Solon's friends, and many others whose names I don't remember. We were all scattered and the appointment was at a coffee shop where the lorry would come to pick us up. I was sitting with Toto at this coffee shop and we waited and waited and waited and nobody arrived. At some point it became clear that nobody was coming. We were very, very disappointed, and we had to return.
We were later informed that they couldn't manage to come and pick all of us up, and that half of the people were left behind. A few days later we received the message that it was this coming Friday, at the same place, that the lorry would come. Once again we went to the same place, we found the same people and at long last we got into the lorry.
The funny thing is that the driver wouldn't start the engine unless I would wave to him. Of course, I didn't want to do it but the social pressure of all the other passengers was such that I had no choice but to do it and quickly we went off...
With this lorry we went from Athens to the land across from Evoia. It was night when we started out; it was night when we arrived. Everything was very dark and we had to cross the sea to go to Evoia and the Germans had a big searchlight, searching the sea, and we entered little boats, and we had to be very quiet and paddle very silently and finally we arrived in Evoia.
It was during early summer and when we arrived in Evoia it was still very dark. We had to climb a big mountain in order to arrive where the partisans were. This is when, forced to walk what seemed an eternity, I started having blisters on my feet that same day, because I was wearing sandals.
Once we were up there, we were taken to a big room. The floor was not bare ground, it was maybe mosaic or marble, I don't remember, and there were some stinking blankets and we had to sleep there.
It was full of people. A lot of Jews. No, not a lot, everybody was a Jew; Jews that we knew and Jews we didn't know. Yvonne said, 'It's been three weeks that we are here,' and I panicked, only trying to imagine to spend three weeks up there!
We tried to sleep and at four o'clock in the morning they started shouting at us that the boat to take us across to Turkey had arrived and we had to hurry, hurry. Those people had been waiting three weeks and the boat came the same night we arrived!
Since we were up the mountain they gave us mules to take us down. Not for everybody of course; some would walk and others would go on the mules. We knew nothing about mules. The women who sat on the mules the 'cowboy way' by the time we arrived down there, had started bleeding, from the friction, from the animal's movement. Happily enough I sat sideways, you know, two feet together like in a side-saddle and I suffered much less.
When we arrived at the sea, to our big surprise, we found even more people, probably coming from other shelters, and children and old people and all of them were Jews. The partisans had long beards and I was very scared, to be honest you were scared only to look at them. And they gave us a 'lesson.' And what was the lesson? They gathered us and told us that they had caught a guy lying and put a knife here and took it out there: right through his throat. Now if you feel like lying or anything else, think twice.
Of course, the partisans were armed and they had big, long beards and they had bullets all around their belts and chest and... The same night we got up at 3 or 4 in the morning. They called us because the fishermen boat had come. We hardly stayed on the mountain at all. We just slept a little wrapped in a blanket on the floor. We didn't have the time to worry about what to eat, or where to eat, or how or where to wash, how to organize ourselves. We left immediately; we didn't stay three weeks like the others.
They asked for money. They said that whatever you have leave it here because for you it is useless, your money has no value from here on. This was not true, but people left their money there.
As for me, I had nothing to leave. My fee for the trip was paid by Paul Noah and he also gave me some money, because I had nothing. I had no money at all, hardly any clothes, no relatives around me, I had nothing, nothing at all.
I don't know how Paul did it - how he paid the partisans - but I know he did and he paid for Toto too, and I cannot tell you the amount because I was not directly involved in the act; it was Toto who took care of those things. I know that I am in dept to Paul.
We got into the small fishing boat. Except for myself and Toto there was also Mois Nahmias. Rita and Paul Noah with their daughter and Bob were not with us, they had left earlier and everything happened very, very quickly, and when we arrived in Turkey we were already expected there.
Nadir, Silvia and Rene, my cousins, had decided, long before us, to form a group of their own with two of the Noah children. They also left with the partisans but they never arrived. We have no idea whether they were betrayed, whether the boat was sunk, when and how they died, who caught them, etc. Up to this day nobody knows what really happened.
Anyway, so we entered the boat and we were crammed in the hold. We were less than fifty people, close to thirty. As the boat left, due to the stormy sea, people started vomiting. We had some containers, like buckets, and when they were full somebody would lift them up, throw the content in the sea and give them back to us.
I decided I that I couldn't stay in there anymore. I couldn't breathe. I wasn't seasick so I climbed to the deck and sat in a corner. The captain, a 23-year-old man - I was 20 at the time - saw me and told me that he had his own small cabin and I could go and rest there. All this happened without any effort from my side to charm him. No effort whatsoever.
This way I traveled rather distant from the rest of the passengers, having a place of my own. Toto was also out of the hold and our young captain very efficiently reached the coast of Turkey.
We arrived early in the morning at a place called Tsesme [21], and the captain would take each one of us and carry us one by one to dry land by walking in the sea and when he had brought the last of us he told us to walk ten minutes in a particular direction and wait there, as there were people coming to pick us up. The sun had not risen yet when he and his boat were gone.
A little later Greek people, representing the Greek state, came and took us to a coffee shop where they offered us breakfast. They were from the Greek consulate and they were there to assist us. I cannot recall if we met any Turks.
After we had our breakfast they put us on a train. I remember the train vividly and we were taken to a sort of camp where there were soldiers, Greeks and others. Of course, there were also many Jews.
We decided to look for Paul and Rita who had been loaded on another boat earlier. When we asked, we were told that they had not arrived yet despite the fact that they had left Greece a week earlier than us. We were very worried but one week later they arrived. You see, their captain had a girlfriend on an island and he took the boat with the passengers there, and in order to be with his girlfriend he stayed on the island for a week or ten days and, of course, the passengers stayed in the hold having extreme difficulty with food and the water and all.
What I can say for sure is that our captain was much more efficient in that respect, and brave, and within one or two days he took us to Turkey while the others that had departed one week earlier arrived ten days later.
This is what luck brings. When we were left in Athens, while they departed, we felt sorry for ourselves and thought we had bad luck but in terms of arriving in Turkey it ended up as our good luck, so you see, with luck you never know which is good and which is bad. Things are not what they seem.
Following the instructions given to Toto, we went on Good Friday, the one preceding Easter, in the evening, to a place where a lorry, sent by the resistance, was expected to pick us up and take us to Evoia [20]. Everything was arranged by Toto in agreement with the partisans.
At this place arrived all the people who wanted to leave Greece: there was Paul Noah and his wife Rita and their young daughter, Lela Nahmias, the wife of Moise Nahmias, who was one of Solon's friends, and many others whose names I don't remember. We were all scattered and the appointment was at a coffee shop where the lorry would come to pick us up. I was sitting with Toto at this coffee shop and we waited and waited and waited and nobody arrived. At some point it became clear that nobody was coming. We were very, very disappointed, and we had to return.
We were later informed that they couldn't manage to come and pick all of us up, and that half of the people were left behind. A few days later we received the message that it was this coming Friday, at the same place, that the lorry would come. Once again we went to the same place, we found the same people and at long last we got into the lorry.
The funny thing is that the driver wouldn't start the engine unless I would wave to him. Of course, I didn't want to do it but the social pressure of all the other passengers was such that I had no choice but to do it and quickly we went off...
With this lorry we went from Athens to the land across from Evoia. It was night when we started out; it was night when we arrived. Everything was very dark and we had to cross the sea to go to Evoia and the Germans had a big searchlight, searching the sea, and we entered little boats, and we had to be very quiet and paddle very silently and finally we arrived in Evoia.
It was during early summer and when we arrived in Evoia it was still very dark. We had to climb a big mountain in order to arrive where the partisans were. This is when, forced to walk what seemed an eternity, I started having blisters on my feet that same day, because I was wearing sandals.
Once we were up there, we were taken to a big room. The floor was not bare ground, it was maybe mosaic or marble, I don't remember, and there were some stinking blankets and we had to sleep there.
It was full of people. A lot of Jews. No, not a lot, everybody was a Jew; Jews that we knew and Jews we didn't know. Yvonne said, 'It's been three weeks that we are here,' and I panicked, only trying to imagine to spend three weeks up there!
We tried to sleep and at four o'clock in the morning they started shouting at us that the boat to take us across to Turkey had arrived and we had to hurry, hurry. Those people had been waiting three weeks and the boat came the same night we arrived!
Since we were up the mountain they gave us mules to take us down. Not for everybody of course; some would walk and others would go on the mules. We knew nothing about mules. The women who sat on the mules the 'cowboy way' by the time we arrived down there, had started bleeding, from the friction, from the animal's movement. Happily enough I sat sideways, you know, two feet together like in a side-saddle and I suffered much less.
When we arrived at the sea, to our big surprise, we found even more people, probably coming from other shelters, and children and old people and all of them were Jews. The partisans had long beards and I was very scared, to be honest you were scared only to look at them. And they gave us a 'lesson.' And what was the lesson? They gathered us and told us that they had caught a guy lying and put a knife here and took it out there: right through his throat. Now if you feel like lying or anything else, think twice.
Of course, the partisans were armed and they had big, long beards and they had bullets all around their belts and chest and... The same night we got up at 3 or 4 in the morning. They called us because the fishermen boat had come. We hardly stayed on the mountain at all. We just slept a little wrapped in a blanket on the floor. We didn't have the time to worry about what to eat, or where to eat, or how or where to wash, how to organize ourselves. We left immediately; we didn't stay three weeks like the others.
They asked for money. They said that whatever you have leave it here because for you it is useless, your money has no value from here on. This was not true, but people left their money there.
As for me, I had nothing to leave. My fee for the trip was paid by Paul Noah and he also gave me some money, because I had nothing. I had no money at all, hardly any clothes, no relatives around me, I had nothing, nothing at all.
I don't know how Paul did it - how he paid the partisans - but I know he did and he paid for Toto too, and I cannot tell you the amount because I was not directly involved in the act; it was Toto who took care of those things. I know that I am in dept to Paul.
We got into the small fishing boat. Except for myself and Toto there was also Mois Nahmias. Rita and Paul Noah with their daughter and Bob were not with us, they had left earlier and everything happened very, very quickly, and when we arrived in Turkey we were already expected there.
Nadir, Silvia and Rene, my cousins, had decided, long before us, to form a group of their own with two of the Noah children. They also left with the partisans but they never arrived. We have no idea whether they were betrayed, whether the boat was sunk, when and how they died, who caught them, etc. Up to this day nobody knows what really happened.
Anyway, so we entered the boat and we were crammed in the hold. We were less than fifty people, close to thirty. As the boat left, due to the stormy sea, people started vomiting. We had some containers, like buckets, and when they were full somebody would lift them up, throw the content in the sea and give them back to us.
I decided I that I couldn't stay in there anymore. I couldn't breathe. I wasn't seasick so I climbed to the deck and sat in a corner. The captain, a 23-year-old man - I was 20 at the time - saw me and told me that he had his own small cabin and I could go and rest there. All this happened without any effort from my side to charm him. No effort whatsoever.
This way I traveled rather distant from the rest of the passengers, having a place of my own. Toto was also out of the hold and our young captain very efficiently reached the coast of Turkey.
We arrived early in the morning at a place called Tsesme [21], and the captain would take each one of us and carry us one by one to dry land by walking in the sea and when he had brought the last of us he told us to walk ten minutes in a particular direction and wait there, as there were people coming to pick us up. The sun had not risen yet when he and his boat were gone.
A little later Greek people, representing the Greek state, came and took us to a coffee shop where they offered us breakfast. They were from the Greek consulate and they were there to assist us. I cannot recall if we met any Turks.
After we had our breakfast they put us on a train. I remember the train vividly and we were taken to a sort of camp where there were soldiers, Greeks and others. Of course, there were also many Jews.
We decided to look for Paul and Rita who had been loaded on another boat earlier. When we asked, we were told that they had not arrived yet despite the fact that they had left Greece a week earlier than us. We were very worried but one week later they arrived. You see, their captain had a girlfriend on an island and he took the boat with the passengers there, and in order to be with his girlfriend he stayed on the island for a week or ten days and, of course, the passengers stayed in the hold having extreme difficulty with food and the water and all.
What I can say for sure is that our captain was much more efficient in that respect, and brave, and within one or two days he took us to Turkey while the others that had departed one week earlier arrived ten days later.
This is what luck brings. When we were left in Athens, while they departed, we felt sorry for ourselves and thought we had bad luck but in terms of arriving in Turkey it ended up as our good luck, so you see, with luck you never know which is good and which is bad. Things are not what they seem.
Period
Interview
Renée Molho