Nelly Aufrichtig Profile

I was born on April 22, 1932 in Zagreb, Yugoslavia to Irene (nee) Loeffler and Leon Tzuref. Though the world around us was caving in from the growing Nazi presence, and though I recall several instances that were, as I process them now, quite perilous, I remember a happy and safe childhood. I credit this grounding to my mother and father.

My mother, Irene, was born and raised in Vienna. My father, Leon, was born and raised in Silistra, Bulgaria and at age 18, and was drafted into the Bulgarian army cavalry where he became a lieutenant. He then attended the school of engineering at a university in Vienna and subsequently settled there to join his mother and sister who had already moved to Vienna.

After university, Leon met my mother Irene. They married in 1929 in Vienna a month before the famous 1929 market crash. Also in Vienna, my mother’s younger sister, Ida, married Rudolph (Rudy) Pick who was from Zagreb. Rudy decided to return to Zagreb and open up a watch business where my mother and father joined the business. My mother’s older brother, Fritz, had been in the watch and jewelry business and taught his siblings all he knew about this industry.

Contrary to the norm in that era, my mother and her sister not only worked full time in the family watch business but were largely responsible for its success; while my father travelled quite a bit around the country to various jewelers, my uncle Rudy, my mother and my aunt ran the day-to-day operations. The business produced enough to allow both of our families to live a comfortable lifestyle albeit during this challenging global financial crisis.

My parents and I lived in an apartment not far from my Aunt Ida, Uncle Rudy and their daughters, Fini and Susy.

My maternal grandmother, Charlotte, moved to Zagreb when I was about two years old to help me heal from an undiagnosed condition that left me unable to retain any food. With great patience and determination and a one-spoonful-at-a-time eating regimen, Charlotte helped save my life.

When I was four years old, my parents hired “Mademoiselle”, a governess who spoke only French to me. (My parents, aunt and uncle, and grandmother spoke only German at home; I learned Croatian at school.) I quickly became fluent in French.

By age seven, I was fluent in three languages: French, Croatian and German. As my family’s journey would unfold, I would add several more to my repertoire.

Though I remained a happy, well-adjusted schoolgirl with little knowledge of the horrific world around me, I do recall two events during my elementary school years that provide context for my family’s eventual departure from Zagreb.

BLED, YUGOSLAVIA, 1939
My only memory at age seven was of a family skiing vacation in Lake Bled, Yugoslavia. We ascended the mountain via horse-drawn carriage to a ski resort where I first learned how to ski. One afternoon, while my aunt, uncle and cousins were sitting around a table in the restaurant or chalet of the resort, all three of us overheard a conversation that our parents were having with another couple. This other couple said they were leaving Europe for the United States within the month to attend the World’s Fair in NY on a visitor’s visa and had planned on remaining there. The man told my parents and aunt and uncle that the atmosphere in Europe was worsening daily and they should all get out as soon as possible. The four adults, as I recall, thought this other couple was crazy. Nothing further was said about this in my presence.

Truth be told, that was the first time my mother thought that perhaps they should consider leaving. This provided the turning point for my mother and uncle Rudy, a demarcation in time that would ultimately deem them the leaders of the family in this idea that escaping the looming dread would be their only option for survival.

SPLIT, YUGOSLAVIA, 1940
Before third grade in 1940, my mother, Aunt Ida, cousins Fini and Susy and I vacationed at the shore of Split on the Adriatic Sea. While there, the Germans bombed the resort. My cousins and I had a balcony in our room with a heavy door and shutters to keep the sun out and the room cool. I remember the door falling in from the pressure of the bombs. Though the bombs did not hit our room, I recall the loud noise of the bombs. I have no idea how we got home.

DETERIORATING CONDITIONS, 1941
While I was in third grade at age nine in 1941, the Germans ravaged Czechoslovakia, Poland and Austria. Then, in April 1941, they marched into Yugoslavia. A Commissioner was placed in our family’s watch business to oversee our parents, the owners, insuring that they would not take anything out and leave. I remember having to wear a yellow cloth square with the letter “Z” (the first letter of “Jew” in Croatian). The Jewish school was closed.

My mother was always calm which kept me calm. Daily life remained the same… and then, it didn’t. Everything stopped.

SLOVENIA, 1941
Early in the summer of 1941 at age nine, the seven of us (my parents, aunt Ida, uncle Rudy, Fini, Susy and I) staggered our departures. My mother and I went first followed by the others in small two-to-three-person groups. We boarded a train with false papers. I was instructed to answer to the name “Maria” if questioned. We arrived in Slovenia, a part of Yugoslavia – the Germans were not there yet – and met up with Uncle Fritz, his wife, Aunt Vera, and their two young children.

Grandmother Charlotte stayed in Zagreb, took ill and died in 1941 at age 78.

Throughout this journey, it was imperative for my parents to find a way to take their money across borders. They knew that wherever we settled, they would need money to begin our new lives. A plan was hatched that worked brilliantly; they converted much of their money into diamonds which were sewn by my mother into a bow and placed in my hair. They banked on the idea that border patrol agents would not check a little girl’s hair, which worked. In fact, my future two sons gave two of those diamonds when proposing to their future wives!

My parents called Uncle Oscar, my mother’s eldest brother, a bachelor who lived in Switzerland and who had attained success in the watch business. Oscar used one of his many connections with a lawyer and acquired visas to Cuba for the family.

I believe we remained in a small hotel in Slovenia for several weeks. For me, as young as I was, it all seemed like an exciting adventure! My parents shielded me from the abounding peril, for at any moment, the likelihood of us being caught was great. Thirteen year-old Fini, the big sister/cousin, became the surrogate caretaker of my nine year-old cousin Susy and me. (Now 90, Fini still helps to fill in the blanks in her conversations with me, as her experiences through these delicate years as seen through the lens of a girl four years older than Susy and me recounts a more detailed version.)

MONTE CATINI
Next stop via another train was Monte Catini, the place in which my prominent memory was learning how to ride a bicycle. Our family resided there for several weeks.

MILAN
We arrived in Milan where we stayed for six months.

We lived in a boarding house where food was scarce and the threat of being caught was pervasive. The Italians were known, at that time, to be less combative and less anti-Semitic than the Germans. I recall needing an identity card called “lasha-passare” to walk around. Uncle Rudy and my father had to periodically pay off the police for new cards.

My two cousins and I attended “The Swiss School”, a German school where we also learned Italian (language #4 for Nelly). Every day, Fini was in charge when the three of us took a streetcar to school. Fini recalls being told, “Take care of the children.”

There was no entertainment. No playing outside. No practicing of religion during this time.
One night during the fall of 1941, our four parents heard that there may be air raids by the British. Sirens went off. They all went to the basement as the British started bombing the center of town. After the all-clear signal, everyone ran out into the streets. Italians were cheering.

A time later, our parents heard that the boarding house was going to be raided, the authorities searching for Jews. Without any explanation, Fini was told to take Susy and me to the “Piazza del Duomo” in Milan, a huge square in the town center with a famous huge cathedral. I don’t remember much but Fini has supplemented details. Fini was told to go with us to the piazza and wait for our parents. But if no one comes to get us, Fini was told, take them by foot across the mountains into Switzerland. On the way, if you find a convent, ask the people there to take you in. A thirteen year-old instructed to escape across the mountains with two nine year-olds. Not really the best plan since Fini had not a clue about the direction of Switzerland! The three of us circled the piazza for hours which explains why I have had intermittent recurring nightmares for years of walking in circles around a grand church. In the end, our mothers eventually came.

SPAIN
Visas to Spain eventually arrived in the winter of 1942. Uncle Oscar secured passage to Portugal from which we would depart on a boat to Cuba. Unfortunately, we could not get transit visas there, so we went to Spain and remained there for one month.

Again, food was scarce. My mother stood in line to get an egg and corn bread for me. We lived in a boarding house in Madrid across the street from the National Theater. Standing at the window, I remember seeing Dictator Franco and his daughter entering the theater, his daughter wearing a white ermine cape.

I knew we were eventually heading to Cuba but not when, how, or where. It almost never happened. Our fake Rumanian passports had expired. My father went to the Rumanian consulate to obtain an extension of his passport. The man behind the counter started to laugh. Apparently, the worker knew it was forged, and that Jewish passports were not renewable for three years. My father’s persistent pleading got it done – with a bit of luck and a kindhearted worker, my father arrived home with visas for Portugal on his illegally extended passport.

PORTUGAL
We took the train to Portugal which seemed, to me, a world away from Spain. Uncle Rudy was able to buy a huge bag of food for all of us. I recall this as a different world from Franco’s Spain, as everything seemed available and plentiful. We spent one week in Portugal gorging on food!

CUBA, 1942
The final leg of our voyage commenced in January 1942, a transatlantic journey from Portugal to Cuba that lasted almost a month. My family travelled in conditions that were substandard, as we resided in the steerage section of the ship.

Though my family was forced to pick up our life, travel surreptitiously from country to country and cross borders with forged visas aboard a ship to a new land, I do not recall feelings of fright nor panic. Parents, in those days, kept difficult issues from their children which is exactly what I attribute to the calmness of my nine year-old self. Though I knew things were not right, I always felt safe and secure because my parents took care of any and all problems and shielded me from thoughts of danger.

A tragedy befell my family while en route to Cuba, specifically to my Aunt Vera and Uncle Fritz’s family. They lost their then eight year-old son, Paul. While the ship was docked in Bermuda to refuel, one of its coal chutes was erroneously left ajar and Paul accidentally fell into it and broke his neck.

We arrived in Cuba in February 1942 and lived in a small apartment, at first, and then, after some time, moved to a larger one in which I had my own bedroom. My aunt, uncle and cousins with whom I had shared this entire unbelievable expedition lived a short distance away. My mother enrolled in a Spanish class and met the father of a girl my age who also spoke fluent French; the two parents made a “shidach” – a match – so the two of us could meet and speak French together, hoping we would never lose that language. Turns out Felicia became a lifelong friend of mine (and as memory recalls, we never spoke a word of French together in Cuba!).

My parents enrolled me in a convent school of French Dominican Sisters, one of the best schools around. As the only Jewish student, I was excused from prayer services and religious instruction. After two years there, I attended the American school where I learned English.

NEW YORK, FINALLY!
In December 1945, at age 13, four years after leaving the only home I ever knew in Zagreb, I experienced my first plane ride when my parents and I left Havana for Miami, Florida and then, boarded a train to New York City. We first lived in a boarding house on 112th street off Broadway. Felicia and her family lived there, as well. Felicia used to tell the story about how my nickname became “calm Nelly”. During our stay there, a fire erupted one night; while all the tenants were gathering their things hurriedly and chaotically, I sat calmly putting on my nylons, moving slowly, not worrying in the least.

A few months after arriving in New York, we moved to a lovely building on 72nd street and Riverside Drive where I would live until marrying Paul Aufrichtig at age twenty in 1952. Paul had emigrated to New York City from Vienna with his parents in 1938 at age seven.

When I was in high school at age fourteen or fifteen, I joined a B’nai B’rith group for girls and boys. It was in this group that I met not just my future husband, Paul, but also many of our lifelong friends who became family to us.

~ ~ ~

When I think about all of the circumstances of my early life, I realize that every one of them involved a great deal of luck, money and brains; a bit of bribery and forgery; and mostly, the sheer will to thrive and survive.