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My father worked at the Agency for Peace Uses of Atomic Energy. When everything started in 1968, he got retired and removed from the party. I already had children and was very worried, not about what would happen to me, but about the kind of life they were going to have here. I thought about leaving the country. But I have never considered leaving without my parents. First I had a talk with my father. He was the spiritual guardian and the one who could be relied on to solve problems. And he said, 'If you are worried, and your Polish husband is willing to go, then go. But I am not going. Even if I know that you and Jula love me very much and that you will do everything to support me and your mother, I am not ready to depend on anyone's generosity for my living, even yours. Nor the state's. My retirement pension will suffice for me and your mom here; it's modest, but we don't have great needs.' So I stopped thinking about leaving. After he was removed from the party, my father wasn't doing very well emotionally. He worked for the Jewish Institute [31], but I think he worked only as a volunteer. He died in 1975. My mother died earlier, in 1973. They are buried at Okopowa Street, at the Jewish cemetery. I visit their graves whenever I can, but not always on the anniversary of their deaths.
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Location
Poland
Interview
rena michalowska