Committed to memory

SHERBORN -- The mere fact that Helen Stern Kuban is alive raises the kind of questions that could take up an entire term of divinity school.

Questions like: If there is a God, how could he allow the astonishing amount of suffering she witnessed during the Nazi takeover of Czechoslovakia and the Holocaust? But if there isn't, how could she have cheated certain death so many times without divine intervention?

Kuban, 87, chooses to believe. She does so despite the fact that calculating the odds of her making it from the gates of Auschwitz death camp in 1942 to her son Karl's family room in Sherborn last week would have the average mathematician reaching for Extra Strength Tylenol.

``I firmly believe in God," she said during an interview to discuss the new memoir, ``Born Twice," that she and her son have self-published. ``But when I came back, sometimes I did say to myself, `Where is justice?' "

Even by the standards of Holocaust survivors, the story of how Kuban and her late husband, Matyi -- who played a key role in a little-known act of Jewish resistance, made it out of Auschwitz-Berkenau -- is remarkable.

In the book, she tells of the day that on a hunch she refused a German offer of easier work, only to learn later that the young women who accepted were subjected to medical experiments and killed. She also tells of the day that the Nazis decided to reduce the number of prisoners from 15,000 to 1,500, and she was somehow picked to live despite 10-to-1 odds against. Then she relates a story of how, stricken with typhoid fever, she made it through an attempt to weed out the sick and infirm when a Nazi officer, momentarily distracted by a colleague, absent-mindedly directed her toward the ``living" line instead of the one leading to the gas chambers.

``At that time I was saying to myself, `I have two more minutes to live, one more minute to live . . .' " said the Hollywood, Fla., resident, who looks at least 20 years younger than her age.

Kuban's book, at just 72 pages with lots of pictures, is remarkable for its straightforwardness and for its lack of sweeping moral statements.

``That's typical of my mom, not to have a big emotional response to something that deserves it," said Karl Kuban , a pediatric neurologist. ``I think that's what helped her survive. She just trundles on."

The book initially was much shorter, just focusing on her wartime experiences. Family members persuaded her to add material about her life before and after the war and about her husband's role in the destruction of Auschwitz-Berkenau Crematorium IV in October of 1944.

Matyi, or Martin, as he later called himself, had a job driving a wagon that carted off the confiscated worldly possessions of the Jews who had just arrived. At considerable risk to his safety, he funneled clothing to needy prisoners and then smuggled dynamite into the camp inside the wagon's axles.

Unlike his wife, who always felt it was important to tell her story -- finally in book form -- he never wanted to discuss his experiences.

``I was married 43 years, and he had it so deep inside of him that he couldn't talk about it," Helen Kuban said of her husband, who suffered from frequent nightmares and then a series of debilitating heart attacks beginning in the 1970s. She went to work in the clothing business and supported the family until his death in 1990.

``I said, `Please let the world know like I do.' But it was too painful for him."

During a family trip last year, Karl Kuban said he discovered, quite by accident, that his father is included in an exhibit at the National Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington. Gazing at a picture of camp prisoners atop a pile of confiscated material at Auschwitz, he noticed the unmistakable face of his father.

Helen Kuban proudly displays her death camp tattoo -- it is larger than most because she asked the prisoner who was tattooing her to take his time so she could hear news from the men's side of the camp.

She was treated like royalty on a visit to the Holocaust museum, said granddaughter Kaila Kuban. ``It was like going through the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with Mick Jagger," she said.

Another family trip two years earlier -- to her home village of Pezinok -- was more sobering. They wanted to visit the Jewish cemetery where her grandparents were buried and where her parents tried to hide, only to be turned in by a neighbor.

The family walked past a well-kept Christian burial ground, then discovered the Jewish cemetery in shambles. It was choked with weeds and ivy, and broken and displaced gravestones were piled 14 feet high.

``It was a gray, drizzly, horrible day that just underscored how horrible the whole situation was," Karl Kuban said.

``I was speechless," his mother added.

In a way, that experience spurred her to write the book, her son said, since it was the only way to make sure the memory of her family survived.

Her parents, Samuel and Klara Stern , were sent directly to the gas chamber in the camp without seeing her in what Helen Kuban still calls ``the worst day of my life." Her sister Joly was killed after her husband was forced to choose between saving his wife or his mother. Her sisters Manci and Flora were gassed and her brother Isadore was clubbed to death. Only one sister, Margaret , survived because she moved to Palestine in 1939 after getting married.

The book was initially just for her two sons, Karl and Alan , and their children, she said.

``I want them not to forget," she said. ``When they were growing up they said: `Mom, how come everyone has grandmas, grandpas, how come we don't?' What could I tell them?"

Helen Stern Kuban will read from her book and sign copies this afternoon from 3 to 6 at her son Karl's home, 1 Fawn Road in Sherborn. For details, call 508-653-2248. The book is available by visiting www.borntwice.net.