I am the daughter of a forger, not just any forger ... When you hear the word “forger,” you often think “mercenary.” You think “forged currency,” “forged pictures.” My father is no such man. For 30 years of his life, he forged papers -- never for himself, always for other people, and to helpf the persecuted and the oppressed. Let me introduce him. Here is my father at age 19. It all began for him during World War II, when, aged 17, he found himself thrust into a forged documents workshop. He quickly became the forged paper expert of the Resistance. And this story became special as after the Liberation, he went on forging papers until the ’70s.
Kći sam krivotvoritelja. I to ne bilo kakvog krivotvoritelja. Kad čujete riječ „krivotvoritelj“, pod njom često podrazumijevate „plaćenik“. Podrazumijevate „krivotvoreni novac“, „krivotvorene slike“. Moj otac nije takav čovjek. Trideset godina svoga života krivotvorio je dokumente. Nikad za sebe, uvijek za druge, kako bi pomogao progonjenima i ugnjetavanima. Da vam ga predstavim. Ovo je moj otac kad je imao devetnaest godina. Za njega je sve počelo tijekom Drugog svjetskog rata, kad se sa sedamnaest godina iznenada našao u radionici krivotvorenih dokumenata. Ubrzo je postao stručnjak za falsificiranje dokumenata Francuskog pokreta otpora. Ovo nije banalna priča -- nastavio je falsificirati dokumente i nakon oslobođenja, sve do 70-ih godina.
When I was a child, I knew nothing about this, of course. This is me, in the middle, making faces. I grew up in the Paris suburbs and I was the youngest of three children. I had a "normal" dad like everybody else, apart from the fact he was 30 years older than ... well, he was basically old enoug to be my grandfather. Anyway, he was a photographer and a street educator, and he always taught us to strictly obey the laws. And, of course, he never talked about his past life when he was a forger.
Naravno, dok sam bila dijete ništa nisam znala o tome. Ono sam ja u sredini, pravim grimase. Odrasla sam u predgrađu Pariza kao najmlađe od troje djece. Imala sam „normalnog“ oca kao i svi drugi, izuzmemo li činjenicu da je bio 30 godina stariji od... u biti, bio je dovoljno star da mi bude djed. Uglavnom, bio je fotograf i pedagog koji je radio s djecom beskućnicima, i uvijek nas je učio da se strogo pridržavamo zakona. I naravno da nikad nije pričao o svojem prijašnjem životu u kojem je bio krivotvoritelj.
But there was an episode, I will tell you about, that might have tipped me off. I was in high school and got a bad grade, a rare event for me, so I decided to hide it from my parents. And to do that, I thought I would forge their signature. I started working on my mother’s signature, because my father’s one is absolutely impossible to forge. So, I got working, I took some sheets of paper and started practicing, practicing, practicing, until I reached what I thought was a steady hand, and went into action. Later, while checking my school bag, my mother found my assignment and saw the signature was forged. She yelled at me like never before. I went to hide in my bedroom, under the blankets, and then I waited for my father to come back from work with, one could say, much apprehension. I heard him come in. I remained under the blankets He entered my room, sat on the corner of the bed, and he was silent, so I pulled the blanket from my head, and when he saw me, he started laughing. He was laughing so hard, he could not stop, holding my assignment. Then he said, “Really, Sarah, you could have worked harder! It’s too small!” Indeed, it's rather small.
Međutim, zbio se jedan događaj o kojem ću vam pričati, a koji je mi je možda trebao staviti bubu u uho. Bila sam u srednjoj školi i dobila sam lošu ocjenu, što mi se rijetko događalo, pa sam odlučila to prešutjeti roditeljima. Kako bih to i postigla, odlučila sam lažirati njihove potpise. Počela sam kopirati majčin potpis jer je očev potpuno nemoguće lažirati. Bacila sam se na posao. Uzela sam nekoliko listova papira i vježbala sam, vježbala i vježbala sve dok nisam postigla ispravne pokrete ruke, a zatim sam krenula u akciju. Nešto kasnije, kad je pregledavala moju školsku torbu, mama je pronašla školsku zadaću i odmah je primijetila krivotvoreni potpis. Vikala je na mene kao nikad prije. Sakrila sam se u sobu, ispod pokrivača, a kasnije sam čekala da se otac vrati s posla, moglo bi se reći, s mnogo strepnje. Čula sam ga kad je došao. Ostala sam ispod pokrivača. Ušao je u sobu i sjeo na rub kreveta. Nije ništa govorio pa sam provirila ispod pokrivača, a kad me ugledao počeo se smijati. Toliko se jako smijao da se nije mogao zaustaviti, a u ruci je držao moju zadaću. Zatim je rekao „Stvarno Sarah, mogla si se više potruditi! Zar ne vidiš da je potpis premalen?“ Stvarno je bio malen.
I was born in Algeria. There I would hear people say my father was a “moudjahid” and that means "fighter." Later on, in France, I loved eavesdroppin on grownups’ conversations, and I would hear all sorts of stories about my father’s former life, especially that he had “done” World War II, that he had "done" the Algerian war. In my head, I thought that “doing” a war meant being a soldier. But knowing my father, and how was a non-violent keen pacifist, I found it very hard to picture him with a helmet and gun. And indeed, I was very far from the mark.
Rođena sam u Alžiru. Ondje bih čula ljude kako govore da je moj otac „mudžahedin“, što znači „borac“. Kasnije, u Francuskoj, voljela sam prisluškivati razgovore odraslih te bih čula razne priče o očevom prijašnjem životu, osobito da je „sudjelovao“ u Drugom svjetskom ratu i da je „sudjelovao“ u Alžirskom ratu za nezavisnost. U svojoj sam glavi mislila kako „sudjelovati“ u ratu znači biti vojnik. Poznavajući oca i kako je neprestano govorio da je pacifist i protiv nasilja, teško sam ga mogla zamisliti sa šljemom i puškom. I stvarno sam bila daleko od istine.
One day, while my father was working on a file for us to obtain French nationality, I happened to see some documents. These are real! These are mine, I was born an Argentinean. But the document I happened to see, that would help us build a case for the authorities, was a document from the army thanking my father for his work on behalf of the secret services. And then, suddenly, I went "wow!" My father, a secret agent? It was very James Bond. I wanted to ask him questions, which he didn’t answer. And later, I told myself that one day I would have to question him. By then I was a mother of a little boy and thought it was now time, that he absolutely had to talk to us. I had just become a mother and he was celebrating his 77th birthday, and suddenly I was very, very afraid. I feared he'd go and take his silences with him, and take his secrets with him. I managed to convince him that it was important for us, but possibly also for other people that he shared his story. And so he did and I made a book of it, from which I will read you some excerpts later.
Jednog dana, kad je otac radio na jednom spisu za stjecanje francuskog državljanstva. vidjela sam neke dokumente koji su mi zapeli za oko. Ovi su pravi! Ovo su moji dokumenti, rođena sam Argentinka. Dokument koji sam slučajno vidjela, a koji nam je pomogao izgraditi slučaj pred vladom, bio je dokument od vojske u kojem zahvaljuju mom ocu za njegov posao koji je obavio za tajnu službu. Odjednom sam rekla sama sebi: „vau“! Moj je otac tajni agent?! Bio je poput Jamesa Bonda! Htjela sam mu postaviti pitanja, na koja on nije odgovorio. Kasnije sam sama sebi obećala kako ću ga jednog dana pitati o tome. Postala sam majka jednog malog dječaka te sam odlučila kako je došlo to vrijeme -- naprosto mora razgovarati s nama. Ja sam upravo postala majka, a on je slavio 77. rođendan i odjednom me uhvatio strah. Bojala sam se da će otići i sa sobom odnijeti šutnju i svoje tajne. Uspjela sam ga uvjeriti kako je važno za nas, ali i za druge ljude, da podijeli svoju priču. Odlučio ju je ispričati meni, a ja sam je pretočila u knjigu
Here’s his story: my father was born in Argentina. His parents were of Russian descent. The whole family came to settle in France in the ’30s. His parents were Jewish, Russian and above all, very poor. So at the age of 14, my father had to work. And with his only diploma, the primary school certificate, he found work at a dry cleaner’s. That’s where he discovered something totally magical, when he talks about it, it’s fascinating -- it's the magic of dyeing chemistry. that was during the war and his mother had been killed when he was 15. This coincided with the time when he threw himself body and soul into chemistry as it was the only consolation for his sadness. He would ask his boss many questions all day long, to learn, to gather more and more knowledge, and at night, when no one was looking, he'd put his experience to practice. He was mostly interested in ink bleaching.
iz koje ću vam kasnije pročitati ulomke. Dakle, njegova priča. Moj je otac rođen u Argentini. Njegovi su roditelji imali ruske korijene. Cijela se obitelj, 30-ih godina, preselila u Francusku. Roditelji su mu bili Židovi, Rusi i prije svega siromašni. Moj je otac već sa 14 godina morao početi raditi. Sa svojom jedinom diplomom, onom o završenom osnovnom obrazovanju, pronašao je posao u radnji za bojenje i kemijsko čišćenje. Ondje je otkrio nešto posve čarobno, a kad priča o tome, zvuči fascinantno -- otkrio je čaroliju kemijskog bojanja. U to je vrijeme trajao rat i majka mu je ubijena kad je imao 15 godina. To se poklopilo s trenutkom kad se posve posvetio kemiji jer je jedino u njoj pronalazio utjehu. Po cijeli bi dan ispitivao svog šefa i na taj način stjecao sve više i više znanja, a noću, kad nikoga ne bi bilo u blizini, svoje je znanje stavljao u praksu. Najviše ga je zanimalo izbjeljivanje tinte.
All this to tell you that if my father became a forger, actually, it was almost by accident. His family was Jewish, so they were hunted down. They were all arrested eventually and taken to the Drancy camp. They got out at the last minute thanks to their Argentinean papers. They were out, but still in danger. The “Jew” stamp was still on their papers. It was my grandfather who decided they needed forged documents. My father had been instilled with such respect for the law that although he was being persecuted, he’d never thought of forged papers. But it was he who went to meet a man from the Resistance.
Sve vam ovo pričam kako bih vam pokazala da je moj otac zapravo slučajno postao krivotvoritelj. Njegova je obitelj bila, dakle, židovska i zbog toga progonjena. Na kraju su ih uhitili i odveli u sabirni logor Drancy, iz kojeg su se uspjeli izvući u posljednji trenutak, zahvaljujući argentinskim dokumentima. No, iako nisu bili u logoru, još uvijek su bili u opasnosti. Na dokumentima su još uvijek imali otisnut veliki žig „Židov“. Moj djed je odlučio da su im potrebni lažni dokumenti. Moj je otac toliko poštovao zakon da, iako je bio proganjan, nikad se nije sjetio lažnih dokumenata. No, on je bio taj koji se išao sastati s čovjekom iz Pokreta otpora.
Back then, documents had hard covers, they were filled in by hand, and they stated your job. In order to survive, he needed work. He asked the man to write "dyer." Suddenly, the man looked very, very interested. “As a “dyer,” do you know how to bleach ink marks?” Of course, he knew. Suddenly, the man started explaining that actually the whole Resistance had a huge problem: even the top experts could not manage to bleach an ink called “indelible,” the "Waterman" blue ink. And my father immediately replied that he knew exactly how to bleach it. The man was very impressed with this 17-year-old who could immediately give him the formula, so he recruited him. Unknowingly, my father had just invented something you find in every schoolchild’s pencil case: the so-called "correction pen." (Applause)
U to su vrijeme dokumenti imali tvrde korice, i u njima je rukom bilo ispisano vaše zanimanje. Da bi preživio, otac je morao raditi. Zamolio je čovjeka da mu napiše „bojitelj“ kao zanimanje. To je odjednom zaintrigiralo čovjeka. "Kako to mislite, bojitelj? Znate li izbijeliti tintu? Naravno da je znao. I odjednom je čovjek počeo objašnjavati kako cijeli Pokret otpora ima jedan golemi problem: čak ni najbolji stručnjaci nisu uspjeli izbijeliti tintu zvanu „neizbrisiva“, plavu tintu Waterman. Moj je otac odgovorio da točno zna kako ju izbijeliti. Naravno, čovjek je bio vrlo zadivljen ovim sedamnaestogodišnjakom koji mu je na licu mjesta mogao reći formulu izbjeljivanja, pa ga je unovačio. Tako je, i ne znajući, moj otac izumio nešto što možemo naći u pernici svakog djeteta: takozvano „bjelilo“. (Pljesak)
But it was only the beginning. That's my father. As soon as he got to the lab, though he was the youngest, he immediately saw there was a problem with the making of forged documents. All the groups would stop at falsifying.. But demand was ever-growing and it was difficult to tamper with existing documents. He thought they should be made from scratch. He started a press and started photoengraving. He started making rubber stamps, inventing all kind of things -- he invented a centrifuge using a bicycle wheel. Anyway, he had to do all this because he was completel obsessed with output. He had made a simple calculation: In one hour, he could make 30 forged documents. If he slept one hour, 30 people would die.
No, bio je to tek početak. Ovo je moj otac. Odmah po dolasku u laboratorij, iako je bio najmlađi, uočio je da postoji problem u izradi lažnih dokumenata. Svim je pokretima falsificiranje bilo dovoljno. Međutim, potražnja je bila sve veća i postalo je sve teže petljati s postojećim dokumentima. Sam je sebi rekao kako ih je potrebno stvoriti od početka. Započeo je s tiskanjem. Foto-graviranjem. Počeo je izrađivati gumene pečate. Počeo je izrađivati razne stvari -- od nekakvog je materijala napravio stroj za centrifugu koristeći kotač bicikla. Radio je sve to, morao je to raditi jer je bio potpuno opsjednut količinom izrađenih dokumenata. Napravio je jednostavnu računicu: za jedan je sat mogao izraditi 30 krivotvorenih dokumenata. Kad bi odspavao jedan sat, 30 bi ljudi umrlo.
This sense of responsability for other people’s lives when he was just 17 -- and also his guilt for being a survivor, since he had escaped the camp when his friends had not -- stayed with him all his life. And this is maybe explains why, for 30 years, he continued to make false papers at the cost of every sacrifice. I'd like to talk about those sacrifices, because there were many. There were obviously financial sacrifices because he always refused to be paid. To him, being paid would have meant being a mercenary. If he had accepted payment, he wouldn't be able to say "yes" or "no" depending on what he deemed a just or unjust cause. So he was a photographer by day, and a forger by night for 30 years. He was broke all of the time.
Taj osjećaj odgovornosti za živote drugih, koji je razvio sa samo 17 godina -- i osjećaj krivnje što je preživio, pobjegavši iz sabirnog logora, dok njegovi prijatelji nisu -- ostao je u njemu cijelog života. To možda objašnjava i zašto je sljedećih 30 godina nastavio izrađivati lažne dokumente iako je mnogo toga morao žrtvovati. Željela bih pričati o tim žrtvama jer ih je bilo mnogo. Očito su postojala financijska žrtvovanja jer je odbijao primiti novac. Primiti novac za njega je značilo biti plaćenik. Da je prihvatio plaću, ne bi mogao reći „da“ ili „ne“, ovisno o tome što je smatrao pravednim ili nepravednim zahtjevom. Trideset je godina bio fotograf danju, a krivotvoritelj noću. Stalno bez prebijene pare.
Then there were the emotional sacrifices: How can one live with a woman while having so many secrets? How can one explain what one does at night in the lab, every single night? Of course, there was another kind of sacrifice involving his family that I understood much later. One day my father introduced me to my sister. He also explained to me that I had a brother, too, and the first time I saw them I must have been three or four, and they were 30 years older than me. They are both in their sixties now.
Zatim su postojala emotivna žrtvovanja: kako istovremeno živjeti sa ženom i imati toliko tajni? Kako joj objasniti što svake noći radi u laboratoriju? Naravno, postojao je još jedan oblik žrtvovanja koji je uključivao njegovu obitelj, to sam tek kasnije shvatila. Jednog me dana otac upoznao s mojom sestrom. Objasnio mi je kako imam i brata, a kad sam ih prvi put vidjela, imala sam tri ili četiri godine, dok su oni bili 30 godina stariji od mene. Oboje su sada u svojim šezdesetima.
In order to write the book, I asked my sister questions. I wanted to know who my father was, who was the father she had known. She explained that the father that she’d had would tell them he’d come and pick them up on Sunday to go for a walk. They would get all dressed up and wait for him, but he would almost never come. He'd say, "I'll call." He wouldn't call. And then he would not come. Then one day he totally disappeared. Time passed, and they thought he had surely forgotten them, at first. Then as time passed, after almost two years, they thought, "Well, perhaps our father has died." And then I understood that asking my father so many questions was stirring up a whole past he probably didn’t feel like talking about because it was painful. And while my half brother and sister thought they’d been abandoned, orphaned, my father was making false papers. And if he did not tell them, it was of course to protect them.
Kako bih napisala knjigu, postavljala sam sestri razna pitanja. Željela sam znati tko je moj otac, tko je otac kakvog je ona poznavala. Objasnila mi je kako bi im otac, kakvog je ona poznavala, rekao da će doći u nedjelju po njih i odvesti ih u šetnju. Oni bi se lijepo obukli i čekali ga, ali on gotovo nikad ne bi došao. Rekao bi „Nazvat ću vas“. A nije nazvao. Zatim više nije dolazio. A jednog je dana posve nestao. Kako je vrijeme prolazilo, zaključili su da ih je sigurno zaboravio, barem isprva. Vrijeme je prolazilo i nakon gotovo dvije godine, mislili su: „Možda je naš otac umro“. Shvatila sam da je moje postavljanje svih tih pitanja mom ocu probudilo duhove prošlosti o kojoj nije želio pričati jer mu je bila toliko bolna. Dok su moja polusestra i moj polubrat mislili kako ih je otac napustio i kako su siročad, on je izrađivao lažne dokumente. On im to naravno nije rekao jer ih je želio zaštititi.
After the Liberation, he made false papers so the survivors of concentration camps could immigrate to Palestine before the creation of Israel. As he was a staunch anti-colonialist, he made false papers for Algerians during the Algerian war. After the Algerian war, at the heart of the internationa resistance movements, his name circulated and the whole world came knocking at his door. In Africa there were countrie fighting for their independence: Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Angola. And then my father connected with Nelson Mandela’ anti-apartheid party. He made forged papers for persecuted black South Africans.
Nakon oslobođenja izrađivao je lažne dokumente kojima su oni koji su preživjeli sabirne logore mogli emigrirati u Palestinu, prije nastanka Izraela. Budući da je bio gorljiv antikolonijalist, izrađivao je lažne dokumente Alžircima za vrijeme Alžirskog rata. Nakon Alžirskog rata njegovo je ime kolalo središtem međunarodnog pokreta otpora Cijeli je svijet dolazio k njemu po pomoć. U Africi su se zemlje borile za neovisnost: Gvineja, Gvineja Bisau, Angola. Zatim se otac povezao s antiapartheidskom strankom Nelsona Mandele. Izrađivao je lažne dokumente za progonjene crne Južnoafrikance.
There was also Latin America. My father helped those who resisted dictatorships in the Dominican Republic, Haiti, and then it was the turn of Brazil, Argentina, Venezuela, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Colombia, Peru, Uruguay, Chile and Mexico. Then there was the Vietnam War. My father made forged papers for the American deserters who refused to take up arms against the Vietnamese. Europe was not spared either. My father made forged papers for the dissidents against Franco in Spain, Salazar in Portugal, against the colonels’ dictatorship in Greece, and even in France. There, just once, it happened in May of 1968. My father watched, benevolently, of course, the demonstrations of the month of May, but his heart was elsewhere, and so was his time because he had over 15 countries to serve.
Zatim je došla Latinska Amerika. Moj je otac pomagao onima koji se se odupirali diktatorskoj vladi u Dominikanskoj republici, na Haitiju, a zatim i u Brazilu, Argentini, Venezueli, Salvadoru, Nikaragvi, Kolumbiji, Peruu, Urugvaju, Čileu i Meksiku. Na red je došao i Vijetnamski rat. Moj je otac izrađivao lažne dokumente američkim dezerterima koji se nisu htjeli boriti protiv Vijetnamaca. Ni Europa nije bila pošteđena. Radio je lažne dokumente disidentima koji su ustali protiv Franca u Španjolskoj, Salazara u Portugalu, protiv vojne hunte u Grčkoj. Pa čak i u Francuskoj. Dogodilo se to samo jednom, u svibnju 1968. godine. Moj je otac gledao, blagonaklono naravno, svibanjske demonstracije, ali srce mu je bilo drugdje, kao i njegovo vrijeme jer je morao udovoljiti zahtjevima 15 zemalja.
Once, though, he agreed to make false papers for someone you might recognize. (Laughter) He was much younger in those days, and my father agreed to make false papers to enable him to come back and speak at a meeting. He told me that those false papers were the most media-relevant and the least useful he’d had to make in all his life. But, he agreed to do it, even though Daniel Cohn-Bendit’s life was not in danger, just because it was a good opportunity to mock the authorities, and to show them that there’s nothin more porous than borders -- and that ideas have no borders.
Jednom je prihvatio izraditi lažne dokumente za nekoga koga možda prepoznajete. (Smijeh) Tada je bio mnogo mlađi, a moj je otac prihvatio izraditi mu lažne dokumente kako bi se vratio u zemlju i održao govor na sastanku. Rekao mi je kako su to bili medijski najvažniji i ujedno najbeskorisniji dokumenti koje je u životu izradio. No, pristao ih je izraditi iako život Daniela Cohn-Bendita nije bio u opasnosti; izradio ih je jer je to bila dobra prilika da se naruga vladi i da im pokaže kako ne postoji ništa poroznije od granica -- i kako ideje ne poznaju granice.
All my childhood, while my friends’ dads would tell them Grimm’s fairy tales, my father would tell me stories about very unassuming heroes with unshakeable utopias who managed to make miracles. And those heroes did not need an army behind them. Anyhow, nobody would have followed them, except for a handful [of] men and women of conviction and courage. I understood much later that it was his own story my father would tell me to get me to sleep. I asked him whether, considering the sacrifices he had to make, he ever had any regrets. He said no. He told me that he would have been unable to witness or submit to injustice without doing anything. He was persuaded, and he's still convinced that another world is possible -- a world where no one would ever need a forger. He's still dreaming about it. My father is here in the room today. His name is Adolfo Kaminsky and I’m going to ask him to stand up. (Applause) Thank you.
Cijelog mog djetinjstva, dok su mojim prijateljicama očevi pričali priče braće Grimm, meni je moj otac pričao priče o skromnim junacima i njihovim nepokolebljivim utopijama, koji su uspjeli učiniti čuda. Tim junacima nije bila potrebna vojska. Uostalom, nitko ih ne bi ni slijedio osim šačice hrabrih i odlučnih muškaraca i žena. Kasnije sam shvatila kako mi je otac prije spavanja pričao svoju vlastitu životnu priču. Pitala sam ga, s obzirom na žrtve koje je morao podnijeti, žali li za čim. Rekao je da ne, rekao mi je kako ne bi mogao biti svjedok nepravde ili je podnositi, a da nešto ne poduzme. Uvjeren je i još uvijek vjeruje kako je drugačiji svijet moguć -- svijet u kojem nikome nikad neće trebati krivotvoritelj. On još uvijek sanja o tome. Moj je otac danas ovdje u dvorani. Zove se Adolfo Kaminsky i zamolit ću ga da ustane. (Pljesak) Hvala.