How You Can Love What Hates You Born in the Vienna of 1923 Hebert Feldman was arrested in 1938 along with his other 2 brothers were jailed for Rassenschande for 6 months. Their father, a decorated officer of the Austro Hungarian Reich, he served Emperor Franz Joseph loyally in WWI. The once lauded officer understood the things, sold assets at a loss to get his 3 teenage sons out of Vienna. On the Jugend Aliyah, one went to Australia, another to Sweden, and Herbert was sent to the region that the British took the liberty of renaming Palestine. The boy lied about his age, joined the Jewish Brigade of the arms of Her Highness, the Royal Queen of England, like his father quickly rose in the ranks to officer. Herbert was fighting Romml on the sands of North Africa while unbeknownst to him his father was dying of malaria across the channel on the island of Mauritania. This is where the father was interred in a holding camp for enemy aliens having as his only passport his Austrian one. Thusly he was put in close quarters with the very Austrians who murdered his family because they were Jews. His country men this by putting women and children and the elderly in ovens after they gassed them. Hebert Feldman survived WWII and then fought in the Israeli War of Independence where his name was changed to Zvi Peled. The enterprising young man married the girl on the bus he was driving and studied nights to become an engineer. He rose in these ranks as well. Representing The Land of Israel, he was sent with his family first to work for the Emperor of Ethipia and then The Shah of Iran where he developed their public bus transportation systems. Fast forward: His 3 children have married well back home in the Land of Israel. Nostalgia overtakes him. While traveling on business for a Swiss firm, Zvi decides to take a train to Vienna. Upon disembarking in the Westbahnhof, he is overcome with emotion for this is the place he said his last farewell to his father. He turns around and takes the next train out of Austria. Some years later Zvi arrives at the old Schwechat airport hoping to visit the beloved Vienna of his youth. His taxi driver waxes on the greatness of Hitler. Zvi asks him to turn around. Zvi then takes the next plane out of Austria. More years pass. Zvi now has a young niece who has come to Vienna to study classical music. She has born a son. Now Zvi comes to visit his family, not Vienna and with his wife. His niece is pushing her toddler son in his stroller along the Hoher Markt by the Anker Uhr when her uncle Zvi walking before her raises both arms in exultation and cries alound, Wien! Ich liebe dich! His niece bursts into sobs. How can he? He loves the Vienna of his youth, long dead and gone. Only the memory of his youth with his family alive and intact living in the glorious city of Emperor Franz Joseph remains.
Posted on: Mon, 24 Feb 2014 14:44:57 +0000