From The Wedding by Joseph Levine Chapter 16

From the Wedding
by Joseph Levine
Chapter 16

I travel to Berlin. I send for my mother in the hope that they would take pity on her and give me a passport.

That winter passed and they still had not given me a passport. So I sent a letter to my mother asking her to come. Perhaps if she would ask, they would give me a passport. She came, but that also did not help. I realized that they wanted to delay me until the next draft board meeting and then force me to become a soldier! My mother and I conferred and decided that the best plan would be for me to travel to Germany where I could quickly learn a trade. Since I would be earning money, I could always go from there to America.

We immediately put the plan into effect. We left Grodna and traveled to Bialystok where we stayed for Shabbos. After Shabbos, by eight o'clock at night we were already by the train station waiting for the train. My mother had to catch the ten o'clock train to Brest Litovsk. The whole time we were standing with our arms around each other crying. So much was our crying that the heavens should have split. My mother assumed that this would be the last time she would ever see me. She would never see me again. The other passengers waiting for the train all cried along with us until finally the train pulled in. My mother climbed aboard still crying and with a heavy heart.

I watched the train pull out with my mother aboard. I looked around and realized how alone I was... alone like a stone. Just a moment ago I was standing with my loving mother, my devoted mother, and now she is flying away. I stood there totally undecided and confused, unaware of what my next move should be.

One of the men who was in the crowd of people who witnessed how my mother and I cried and held one another before she departed, came up to me and asked where I was traveling. I told him that I wanted to go to Graeva. He replied, "If so then we are traveling together." He told me that a train was leaving for Graeva in a couple of hours. Sure enough, the train came and by Sunday morning I had reached my destination. At the station, a man approached me and asked if I planned to cross the border. I told him, "Yes." He told me to jump onto his wagon and took me to his home. We davened (prayed the morning service) and I ate the food that my mother had given me. After that we got back in the wagon and drove to the border crossing. I was instructed to walk right across the border. I passed the border guard who said nothing to me. I walked to the German side and waited for the man. I paid him one ruble and 50 kopecks. Then I took the train to Berlin.

The trip to Berlin lasted until Tuesday, 8 o'clock in the morning. The train pulled into a huge station with many, many doors. By the time I looked around, all the passengers had left the terminal and another train pulled in. I was standing there thinking, "What do I do next? Where do I go?" There was no one to ask. Train after train kept coming. The trains would pull into a long, wide, glass enclosed area. People were running around like flies. They would jump off the train and meet family or friends, kiss and embrace. They would hire a cab and go home or to a hotel. But I had no clue where to go. Just standing there was also not a solution. So I finally picked up my packages and took off, in no particular direction. I walked several blocks then turned down another street. Everything looked the same to me. There were large stores with pretty windows. I entered a clothing store and asked if they needed a tailor. They did not understand my language and I did not understand their language. That is how I wandered around until two o'clock in the afternoon. I had hit a brick wall. I stood pondering which way to turn but I just did not know.