A Woman in Berlin

FRIDAY, 11 MAY 1945

Housework. We soaked our laundry, peeled the last potatoes from our kitchen stores. Fräulein Behn brought us our new ration cards, printed in German and Russian on newsprint. There’s one type for adults and one for children under fourteen.

I have my card right here beside me and am making a note of the daily ration: 200 grams of bread, 400 grams of potatoes, 10 grams of sugar, 10 grams of salt, 2 grams of coffee substitute, 25 grams of meat. No fats. If they really give us all that it will be quite something. I’m amazed even this much order has been brought out of the chaos.

When I saw a queue in front of the greengrocer’s I took my place and used our coupons to get some beetroot and dried potatoes. You hear the same talk in the queue as at the pump: everyone is now turning their backs on Adolf, no one was ever a supporter. Everyone was persecuted, and no one denounced anyone else.

What about me? Was I for… or against? What’s clear is that I was there, that I breathed what was in the air, and it affected all of us even if we didn’t want it to. Paris proved that to me, or rather a young student I met in the Jardin du Luxembourg three years after Hitler came to power. We had taken shelter from a sudden shower under a tree. We spoke French, and recognized right away that it was a foreign language for both of us. Then we had fun bantering back and forth guessing where the other was from. My hair led him to place me as a Swede, while I pegged him as a Monegasque – I’d just learned what citizens of Monaco are called and found the name amusing.

The rain stopped as abruptly as it had begun. We set off, and I gave a little skip so I would be walking in step with him. He stopped and proclaimed, ‘Aha, une fille du Führer!’ – a daughter of Hitler, in other words, a German, unmasked the minute she tried to march in perfect step with her neighbour.

So much for fun and banter. For then the young man introduced himself, not as a Monegasque, but as a Dutchman and a Jew. And that was the end of our conversation. We went our separate ways at the next fork in the path. The experience left a bitter taste. I brooded over it for a long time.

I realized it had been ages since I heard about Herr and Frau Golz, my neighbours from my earlier building that burned down, who used to be faithful party followers. I went the few buildings’ distance to find out. It took forever before their neighbours finally cracked open the door, keeping it on the chain, and told me that Herr and Frau Golz had stolen away unnoticed, and how that was a good thing since some Russians had been by looking for him. Evidently he’d been denounced.

Late in the afternoon someone knocked on our door, calling for me. I was amazed to see one of the figures, now practically forgotten, from our basement-past: Siegismund, believer in victory, who’d heard from somewhere that I had connections to ‘higher Russians’. He wanted to know if it was true that all former party members had to report voluntarily for work or else risk being lined up against a wall and shot. There are so many rumours flying about, it’s impossible to keep up with all of them. I told him that I didn’t know anything and didn’t think anything like that was planned, that he should wait and see. It was almost impossible to recognize the man. His pants were billowing loosely around his emaciated body, his whole person looked miserable and crumpled. The widow gave him a sermon about the dangers of fellow-travelling, how he surely sees for himself what that can lead to. Siegismund – I still don’t know his real name – swallowed it all meekly, then asked for a piece of bread. And he was given one, too, which caused a family row as soon as he left. Herr Pauli fumed and shouted that it was outrageous for the widow to give that man something – after all, he was responsible for the whole mess, and the worse off he was now, the better, they ought to lock him up and take away his ration cards. (Pauli himself was always against; he has a contrary character – dissenting, negating, a Mephistophelian ‘spirit that always denies’. From what I’ve seen there’s nothing on earth he’s in complete and unreserved agreement with.) At any rate no one wants to hear another word about Siegismund and the man, he doesn’t dare show himself in the house. Everyone would give him a tongue-lashing; no one wants to have anything to do with him, especially not those in the same boat. He must find it all bleak as well as baffling. I also gave him a piece of my mind, which bothers me right now Does that mean that I, too, am following the mob? From ‘Hosanna!’ to ‘Crucify him!’ – the eternal refrain.

Half an hour ago, in the evening twilight, sudden shots. Far off, a woman’s scream. We didn’t even look out of the window. What for? But reminders like that aren’t a bad thing – they keep us alert.