Copyright 2009
I was born in South Africa to a very affluent, influential, Zionistic Jewish family. My father was born in Tel Aviv, Palestine in 1927. In 1929 his parents left because of Arab rioting that scared them and left them penniless. My paternal grandfather at just 12 years of age, ran away from home in Poland, walked through Europe for two years, eating out of trash cans in order to come home to the Promised Land. My grandmother and all her family came to Palestine in the early 1900?s and spent 5 years in Alexandria, Egypt. 12,000 Jews who had mostly migrated from Russia, were deported by the Turks, for refusing to accept Turkish citizenship.
At the age of nine we came to Israel for the first time. A two month visit. My parents went to Europe and we spent the time here with our grandmother. We being, my elder brother, sister and myself. I have memories of walking down the streets of the Old City in Jerusalem with my fancy Safta Chaia ( grandmother)?dressed in her elegant clothes, high heels and all. A cigarette with a fancy holder between her lips. Every hair meticulously in place. Very sophisticated from living in affluent South Africa?.if a vender in the market dared to touch her by mistake, she would turn her head and a raging torrent of swear words in Arabic would come tumbling forth from her unsuspecting sophistication ?.. Another memory I have of her and her Middle Eastern culture ? is being in a fancy store in Johannesburg and she bargaining to get the price down. I wanted to bury myself with shame. Eventually they would give her a discount just to get rid of her!
My mom?s parents fled from Europe with the uprising of anti Semitism and came to South Africa. They lived in the Transkei and my mom was born in an African hut .
All through my childhood I heard that we are ?going home?. Life was lived through our Jewish and Zionistic identity. We attended a Jewish day school, went to Reform synagogue every Friday, Saturday and Holiday. Life just revolved around being Jewish and longing to ?go home?. My parents always hosted Israeli dignitaries. Ben Gurion was driven around in my father?s fancy car while in South Africa. I always cried while singing Hatikva ? the Israeli anthem, or when hearing Israeli songs or dancing traditional Israeli dances??I was obsessed by the Holocaust as a teenager and the only books I read at that age were about this subject. I longed to be ?home and safe?.