IV: Good, yes. Okay. So..
These 16 years in Poland
LW: 19, 19.
IV: 19? You described it so: You arrived, were very successful and then this wave of antisemitism came, mandated.
How were these 16 years, were you confronted with prejudice, were you accepted up to the point of the political wave?
LW: That is the astounding part.
I had through my studies in Germany, at which time there was not any discrimination.
As a student, among German students, there were a few Poles.
I was just a student. Period.
I never felt that someone was looking at me strangely because of my Jewish origins.
I was somehow immune, in Poland I never sensed that anyone looked at me funny.
But I have to add it was similar in Sweden.
I was in a position where people depended on me. I was someone who could do good, could help.
People came to me for help, to the gynecologist and obstetrician.
So I wasn't in a position where I had to ask someone for anything.
I was independent, and people looked up to me more than down at me.
So I was able to keep many many wonderful friends in Poland.
And children too, that I brought into this world, in special situations, through special situations in pregnancy.
I still have children speak to me and I am like the grandfather of their children because we have close contact.
That warms my heart, leaves traces, positive traces.
So I didn't experience anything negative.
My wife worked for a publishing house, for the magazine "Poland", the German version.
She was the editor, an illustrated, wonderful magazine about Poland.
Published in five languages.
She was in charge of the German editorial office.
IV: Basically up to today, where this car stopped in front of your door with the ban, you never experienced...
LW. Just the opposite.
IV: Or even from the wave that came from the government.
LW: No, until then -
IV: And you didn't, not there either?
LW: Just the opposite, they came up to me.
"It's not meant for you. Keep going and continue working, take on a new position."
They were like: "you are dismissed but you will find a new position. It is not aimed at people like you, you are a good boy."
I told them: "go sit on a tack."
IV: You sensed that that wasn't --
LW: In the end all I can say is that a sore spot for me, where I have a tick is the question of human dignity.
In the camps, in the ghetto I could be kicked into the ground, humiliated, dehumanized, my humanity was denied me.
But I was helpless there.
I didn't have a chance against the SS.
But after the war I reacted strongly to the slightest expression against human dignity.
Very hard sometimes and very strongly.
My dignity is the most important thing... as a conscious being.
That is the most important thing for people to maintain.
And all acts, everything that violated human dignity, that violates me too.
IV: Okay. Thank you.