Centropa Stories

Judit Kinszki was born in Budapest in 1927. In 1944 her brother Gabor was sent to a concentration camp, her father was herded onto a death march. Judit and her mother spent nearly five months in the infamous Budapest Ghetto and the day they were liberated by the Soviet Army, they went to the train station every day, hoping to find Judit’s brother and father. Judit’s story is read for us by Jeni Barnet and Judit was interviewed for Centropa by Dora Sardi in 2005.

Zsuzsa Diamantstein grew up in a middle class home in Targu Mures, Romania. Northern Transylvania was ceded to Hungary in 1940 and it was the Hungarian army that deported over 150,000 Jews to Auschwitz and other death camps. Zsuzsa managed to survive but found she had nothing in common with young people who had not gone through hell. Then she met Imre Diamantstein, who had just returned from the camps. Sara Kestelman reads Zsuzsa’s story for us and it is based on the interview conducted in 2005 in Targu Mures by Julia Negrea and Vera Badic.

Roza Kamhi came from the town of Bitola in what is now North Macedonia. She and her boyfriend Beno Ruso joined the partisans when the Bulgarians occupied their region in 1941. Roza was jailed in 1943, Beno took to the hills. On the day of liberation, Roza saw Beno running up the street to embrace her. But why, she wondered, was 24-year-old Beno wearing the uniform of a general?Roza Kamhi was interviewed for Centropa by Rachel Chanin in Skopje in 2005. Her story is read for us by Shelly Blonde.

Leo Luster grew up in Vienna speaking German and Yiddish. He and his parents were deported to Terezin in 1942. While his mother remained there, Leo and his father were sent on to Auschwitz, then a series of work camps. One morning Leo saw that the German guards had fled. He stepped outside to see a Soviet soldier pointing a rifle at him. Leo blurted out, in Yiddish, “I’m a Jew!” The soldier lowered his rifle and replied in Yiddish, “So am I.”The actor Steve Furst read’s Leo’s story for us. Leo was interviewed in Tel Aviv and Vienna by Tanja Eckstein in 2010.

Lisa Lukinskaya was born in a Lithuanian shtetl and survived the war when nuns in a nearby convent took her in. At war’s end she went home to find that her 23-year-old husband had been killed but at least the rest of her family had survived. Lisa tells us of starting over when the family moved to Vilnius and that’s where she met a dashing Soviet officer.Lisa Lukinskaya’s story was read for us by Tina Grey in London. Lisa was interviewed in Vilnius in 2005 by Zhanna Litinskaya.