The amazing internet and a stunning discovery

Those of you who have been following my blog at least since January this year, have read my post about the Holocaust and how my grandmother survived. If you didn't catch that post, here's where you can read about it.

Some of you may not have gotten as far as the comments, but last month (that is five months after I posted about my grandmother), someone posted a comment on that post. And that is what prompted me to post an urgent request to the anonymous writer of that comment to email me immediately.

No where in my post did I mention my grandmother's first name. I only mentioned her last name and how she got it. And here was this comment written by someone in Colorado who knew my grandmother's full name - Maria Kozdrowicz. The comment shocked me.

I immediately went on eBay and put in the number mentioned and got the shock of my life. There it was - my grandmother's Polish Passport for sale on eBay!

I had never seen her passport before. Nor have my parents! I immediately called them while they were away from home on vacation and asked them if they know where her passport is. They had no idea, they've never seen it. When I told them the story they couldn't believe me. I told them it had her photo, her birthdate, her place of birth, and all the right stamps.

The seller was someone in my hometown of Haifa. A name we've never heard of. Because we were really worried about raising any alarms to him that would cause him to raise the price, I ended up buying the passport for the $45 he placed on it.

I received it this week. A piece of family history is now in my hands again. Along with a very important date stamp which my parents had forgotten - August 25th, 1957. The day they got off the boat in Haifa, Israel. The boat from Europe to Israel, finally making it back home after 2000 years in the diaspora. In two months they'll be celebrating 50 years in Israel.

The person who sold this passport did not answer any of my inquiries of how he got it. He's ignored my emails and requests. I will try one more snail mail effort before giving up.

If he knew the entire story behind this passport and the fake name on it, he would have asked for more money or donated to a museum. There's more to my grandmother's story than what I wrote. In June 1976, my grandmother's brother got on a flight from Tel Aviv to Paris. Yes, it was that flight. My great uncle was one of the hostages. That's an entire post in itself.
My grandmother's other brother received a medal of honour from General de Gaulle. Yes, another entry for a post. A third brother wrote a book about his survival at a Ghetto as a doctor, a book that I read once and will never forget (unlike hundreds of other books).

This grandmother is the mother of the painter whose paintings you've been seeing on this blog. And yes, she's the one with the talent and where it all came from.

I have the passport with me now. But how do I thank an Anonymous writer? How can I ever thank him for doing a random search on Google for my grandmother's name and coming across my blog and being gracious enough to put a comment? How do I tell him that he stumbled upon one of those fascinating stories and not just a passport for sale? How do I tell him that he helped a family close a chapter in its history?


My grandmother passed away almost ten years ago, of Alzheimers. May she rest in peace and may her life's memory live forever on this blog.