Uncounted
Victim
The Journey of a Tortured Soul
A Memoir
As told to
Yael Eylat-Tanaka
Copyright © 2016, by Yael Eylat-Tanaka
All Right Reserved.
No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, or by any information storage and retrieval system without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of very brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter 1- Childhood
Chapter 2- Germany Invades France
Chapter 3- Hope Can Be A Traitor
Chapter 4- Rounding Up The Jews
Chapter 5- Crossing Into Switzerland
Chapter 6- In Hiding
Chapter 7- Liberation
Chapter 8- Palestine
Chapter 9- A Shout Heard Around The World
Chapter 10- “Tarzan”
Chapter 11- Guard Duty
Chapter 12- Heartbreak
Chapter 13- Mother And Daughter
Chapter 14- “Civilian” Life
Chapter 15- Brotherly Love
Chapter 16- Moshe Dayan
Chapter 17- Of More Recent Vintage
OTHER Books By this author
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Foreword
These are the memoirs as told to me by my mother. I have attempted to tell her story as accurately as she presented them to me, piecing together her own written journals, along with various anecdotes that supplemented and peppered stories over my lifetime, without embellishing by interposing my own interpretations of events. This is not a suspense novel, although certainly the events recounted herein were suspenseful to those who experienced them. They certainly sounded suspenseful to me as I heard and read them. So as to avert embarrassment to anyone reading these words, I have on occasion chosen to use pseudonyms, while trying to keep the gist of the story true to form.
My mother was French, and occasionally some French words and phrases appear throughout the text. I have included translations wherever appropriate. She also lived and studied in Italy before moving to Israel, and eventually to the United States. Again, where words and phrases are included in those languages, and I have included translations to the best of my ability.
I wish I could bid the reader enjoy the story; but it is admittedly too terrible to be enjoyed. My heart aches for my mother – and for so many others who have suffered similar experiences, and worse.
Yael Eylat-Tanaka
Tampa 2016
Prologue
This is not an autobiography. Every word written here is as truthful as my memories can be, filtered through the passage of time and my experiences. Yet much has been omitted out of respect to those no longer with us who cannot correct whatever events can be seen only from their own point of view. Other situations have been left out to avoid any embarrassment to those who are still among us.
The purpose of these pages is to record salient portions of my life that I never had the opportunity to describe fully. I am thinking in particular about my daughter whom I did not wish to tire with stories of events that happened before she was born or while she was growing up. Then, more pressing life problems came to the fore, and it seemed that these reminiscences always took a back seat to more immediate concerns. Yet our past is forever imprinted in my memory, at times in convoluted and distorted schemes, to be sure, but nevertheless, our memories are the fabric of what makes us who we are, permeating every cell of our being. I have endeavored to always look ahead to a brighter future rather than dwell on the past, and yet the past has always been an inescapable part of who I had become. We cannot change the events themselves; at best, we can only reframe our outlook and understanding of those events. I have not always been successful.
Chapter 1
Childhood
I know very little of my grandparents. I have only vague memories of the maternal side of the family, but have a much more vivid memory of my paternal grandmother, Memé, who was a very strong presence in our family. My father was deeply attached to her. She was the matriarch in the family, eclipsing my own mother to the latter’s deep frustration. When my own daughter was kidnapped by her father, Memé told me that she, herself, had been divorced from her first unhappy marriage.
My family hailed from Turkey, and my memories of childhood stories include the life of my predecessors and their culture. My father told the story of my grandfather bringing Sultan Hamid, to whom he had been counselor, a beautiful parrot that he had caught on his land, or of returning from the vineyards after the grape harvest, with the children perched atop donkeys, and as they passed the cemetery at dusk, the adults would tell them stories of the dead and the children would blanch in terror at what they imagined what going on.
Although I didn’t know my grandfather, he was a very religious Jew, and as such observed the tradition of never shaving his beard. If a single hair fell from it, he would conserve it in his prayer book. He took a new wife, my grandmother Memé, after she divorced her first abusive husband and had abandoned her first born son. He, himself, had grown children