One day before the celebrations of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, on just another grey cold day of the usual long German winter, I was accompanying my friend for a walk in the West Berlin. It was the day of the weekly open fair in her area and we wanted to take some fresh air and reconnect with the street vibe, after her long sickness.
An energetic woman, a former survivor as a kid of the forced labour camps in Eastern Europe that succeeded to reach the shores of the then-Palestine before the creation of the state, my friend enjoys talking with the vendors in her impressive German.
A lively ambiance on the streets, that defides the unpleasant weather, with mostly people in their retired years, curious about prices, ordering some Turkish products for the late lunch or just spending some time outside their homes. This is the usual mood and age spectrum in the conservative, quiet and predictable West Berlin.
We made a stop at the fruits' stand, with many tempting sorts from all over the world and we started to ask about different fruits and their proveniences. (Don't expect any bargaining at these markets!) Suddenly, a chat between one of the vendors and an old lady starts whose topic I somehow missed, but anyway, it covered the very exciting issue of fruits and their production. Noticeable, it ended with the old lady sniffing with a casual smile on her face: "Hahaha Arbeit macht frei!" Mesmerized, we both stopped from debating how much does it last to bring fruits from South Africa to Berlin and starred in shock at the lady. The vendor kept laughing at her very good joke.
We exchanged looks and cursed the witched trying to figure out how old was she at the time of the camp or maybe her genealogy too.
But honestly speaking, all these details didn't matter, the indifferent smile and her self-contained sniffining when she said those words were enough for me, at least. It was just another example of a reality that you cannot touch it if you are in the full admiration of the cheap bubbling life of Berlin as seen from the bar and disco scenery from the English speaking Eastern Berlin.
