It takes nearly all the money you have, but a bribe to the ticket seller at
the railroad station in Szeged is your only chance. She gives you a ticket
that will take you all the way across Hungary, changing trains in Budapest
and ending up in the provincial capital of Gyor. Once you are there, my
Jewish friend,
she says sarcastically, you're on your own.
However,
you have little choice; Gyor is as far west as you can get in Hungary, your
only opportunity to get out of Eastern Europe.
When you arrive in Gyor, you walk to the Szechenyi Ter, the central square of the town where you notice a strange tree stump, covered with iron plates and thousands of nails. A friendly passer-by stops and tells you that apprentices learning the iron trade used to put a nail in the stump to show that they had passed by.
I feel like that stump myself,
you comment, after all that has
happened to me during the war. Only I have no home, nowhere to pound
in my own nail.
The stranger takes you by the arm. Come! I'll show
you a place where you can completely feel at home.
He leads you to an apartment on Tanaczkoztarsasag Utja, a boulevard which leads through the town. Seated around a table, to your great astonishment and joy, are representatives of Brichah, the organization that helps Jews leave Eastern Europe. With great excitement, you receive a promise of help. It is only left for you to choose the route.
If you decide to go west through Bratislava, continue to page 127.
If you choose to go south to Italy, continue to page 92.