Fee-Christine Aks - Thoughts are Free

Or is it simply fate that Germany is ruled by the Führer’s party for over eleven years now? Ruled by the Nazi party with the Swastika symbol and Adolf Hitler who brought them the second Great War.

Most people that Paul can see in the streets seem to believe that. They sing praises of the government top in Berlin. Even after the air strike’s bombings that destroyed wide parts of the inner city around the river Alster, most of the people in the streets still have an unshakeable believe in the Thousand-Year-Reich and the best general of all times.

But Paul isn’t so sure. Unlike the others, he does not believe everything the Führer tells. For instance, Paul could never understand why a German should be blond, tall and blue-eyed only.

Not, that he would have problems with that, as he is pretty tall himself and has bluish gray eyes and a head full of hazelnut coloured curls; quite contrary to some others, especially among the government leaders: There is fat and aged Reichsmarschall (Reich Marshal) Hermann Göring and, of course, small and limping Reichspropagandaminister (Reich Minister of Propaganda) Joseph Goebbels. And even the man who calls himself Germany’s Führer (Leader) is of just average height and has neither blue eyes nor blond hair.

But why are they instigating such hatred against the Jews? They never did them anything. And what does the Führer have against people like Maria Goldberg for example, who met all requirements for the German ideal with her blonde curls and blue eyes? Or Katja and Peter Lipowetzky? What did they do?

Paul asked his father those questions numerous times. But Father does not know the answer. He often remembers the revolution, back then in 1918, when he was just twenty years old, full of ambitions and ready to change the world.

Back then, he was a very devoted member of Karl Liebknecht’s and Rosa Luxemburg’s Spartakus-group; an idealist. Then he became a moralist, like his favourite author Erich Kästner whose works are all blacklisted; all but Emil .

Just like Kästner his father is older, more settled and more thoughtful now.

During the past years he tried his best, to live a more secluded life. He called it an inner emigration. But sometimes he just can’t control himself.

Even at forty-four years old Father still has the energy and sparkling eyes of a young sailor, whenever he talks in a low voice about a better Germany.

But even those break-outs became less, after many of his former comrades went to Fuhlsbüttel prison or were deported to one of the concentration camps with their infamous sections for political prisoners. None of them survived even a year in the camps.

Four years ago, when an enormous wave of arrests rolled through the Reich, Father got lucky and was spared. Most of his co-workers had to attend at least a police questioning at the Gestapo Headquarters on Neuer Wall.

That was when Father had to promise to Mother to be a lot more careful in the future: No more meetings, and no more communication with the former members of the Communist party.

Father agreed. Since the Communist party was prohibited, he only belongs to his own party anyway, he told Paul. And that from now on he would only fight on his own behalf. For the personal freedom of the individual, for peace, equality and for the abolishment of the anti-Semitic Nürnberger Gesetze (Nuremberg Laws), because every person is born equal and should be treated that way.

“Always remember, Paul”, he had said. “Even the ‘almighty’ Führer is just a human being; and a giant liar as well. Forget all that rubbish about ‘master race’ and ‘inferior race’. We all are human beings and have to treat each other respectfully, no matter where we are from or who our parents and grandparents are.”

Back then Paul realised for the first time that what he learned at school is wrong: Arians, Racial disgrace, blood and soil. Ever since, whenever his teacher talked about the Nordic race and their advantage over the inferior races, he imagines a big pack of puppies, little dogs clumsily stumbling over their own paws. Some are black, some are white, others brown. Some are spotted. They all are dogs. They do not make a difference; they wag their tails for all and everyone.

Father was pleased and laughed, when Paul told him about that thought.

“You turned out all right, my boy”, he had said.

But then he warned him, to keep this thought better to himself. Don’t ever mention it to the teacher. And don’t talk about it, when Herr Braun or the Blockwart (block warden) is anywhere near.

“You can think what you like”, Father said seriously. “But these days, you have to be careful what to talk about in public.”

Paul didn’t understand that right away. Then his father reminded him of Herr and Frau Müller from across the street. They were former Communist party members, just like Father, and just opened their mouth in public one too many times. That was, when the Nazis raided the Jewish music store in May 1936. Herr Müller was standing at the scene, shook his head and murmured: “It’s a shame that those brown pigs won’t get punished for that.”

Unfortunately he didn’t notice the three smirking Hitler boys behind him in the gateway. First they insulted him, calling him a Jew-friend and a traitor to the fatherland; then, protected from views, they beat him down and kicked him. The same evening they could hear Frau Müller’s desperate screams, when she and her husband where pushed onto a truck. Paul never saw them again.

“They were brought to Dachau concentration camp”, Hans Schönemann told him later. He lived in a little attic flat above the Müllers’ apartment until 1938, when he was arrested himself.

In the spring of 1934, people already started to vanish from Paul’s street. Goldbergs from No. 41 were picked up in April by numerous men in long coats. The Reichbergs, the Schönfeldts and the Giesemanns and many others followed.

When Paul asked his father, where they were taken, Father told him about the concentration camps the Nazis set up. Everybody the Nazis have a problem with is taken there.

Since the year before last, there is a camp named “Auschwitz”.

This camp is located in occupied Poland and the reason why Father broke his promise and became active again. His conscience just doesn’t allow him to sit around and do nothing, he told Paul. Not as long as “Auschwitz” exists.

Paul did not want to believe his father, when he told him that people in there, in particular Jews, are truly murdered. Is something like that really possible? That somebody just gives a cruel order to murder thousands of people, just because he doesn’t like them?

The whole thing sounds outrageous, but it is the truth. Father knows one of the Jews that was in there and lucky enough to escape. Father and his friend Hein helped this young man to get away to America. For hours, Paul’s parents and Hein were talking in the kitchen about that incredible cruelty, while he and Annemarie were sleeping. Father also told Paul about the selection process, the furnaces and giant mounts of laundry, jewelry and human hair that pile up in one of the extermination camp’s big halls.

They had this talk two weeks ago. Back then, they took the Weiß family that was living underneath their apartment for many years. Paul remembers how Pauline Weiß and he always played together with Axel, Maria and Liza, when they were younger.

They got woken up early in the morning. They could hear loud voices and crying in the hallway.

After that, the Behm family moved into the Weiß’s apartment. Behms are brown shirts, Father says. He is talking about the Nazis that used to wear brown shirts in the beginning of Hitler’s reign. Nowadays you can’t really tell who a Nazi is. Not all of them are wearing a uniform or a Nazi Party Swastika badge in their coat’s buttonhole.