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.
Sem hčerka ponarejevalca. Ne kateregakoli ponarejevalca: ko slišimo "ponarejevalec", pogosto razumemo "plačanec", slišimo "ponarejen denar", "ponarejene slike". Moj oče ne spada med te ljudi. 30 let svojega življenja je ponarejal osebne dokumente. Nikoli zase, vedno za druge, da bi pomagal preganjanim in zatiranim. Dovolite, da vam ga predstavim. Tu je moj oče star 19 let. Vse se je pravzaprav začelo med 2. svetovno vojno. Pri 17-ih se je znašel v delavnici za ponarejanje dokumentov. Kmalu je postal strokovnjak Odpora za ponarejanje dokumentov. A zgodba ni vsakdanja, saj je po osvoboditvi nadaljeval s ponarejanjem dokumentov, vse do 70. let.
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.
Ko sem bila majhna, nisem o tem, seveda, nič vedela. Tista v sredini, ki se pači, sem jaz. Odrastla sem v predmestju Pariza kot najmlajša izmed treh otrok. Imela sem "normalnega" očija, tako kot drugi, razen dejstva, da je bil 30 let starejši od ... no, lahko bi bil moj dedek. Bil je fotograf, bil je specialni pedagog, in vedno nas je učil, naj ubogamo zakone. O svojem nekdanjem življenju ponarejevalca ni, seveda, nikoli govoril.
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.
Opisala bom dogodek, zaradi katerega bi morda lahko kaj posumila. V srednji šoli sem dobila slabo oceno, kar se je redko zgodilo. Odločila sem se, da je ne pokažem staršem. Zato sem morala ponarediti njun podpis. Lotila sem se maminega podpisa, saj je bilo očetov nemogoče ponarediti. Vzela sem torej papir, na katerem sem vadila, vadila in vadila, dokler se mi roka ni umirila. Nato sem šla v akcijo. Ko je mama kasneje v moji šolski torbi našla kontrolko, je takoj videla, da je podpis ponarejen. Vpila je name kot še nikoli. Skrila sem se pod odejo v svoji sobi in z velikim strahom čakala, da se oče vrne iz službe. Slišala sem ga priti, ostala sem pod odejo, oče je vstopil v sobo in sedel na rob postelje. Ker ni spregovoril, sem pokukala izpod odeje, on pa se je začel krohotati in kar ni mogel nehati. V roki je imel kontrolko. Dejal je: "Sarah, bolj bi se morala potruditi, podpis je premajhen!" Res je malce majhen.
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.
Rojena sem v Alžiriji. Tam sem slišala, da očetu pravijo "mudžahid", kar pomeni bojevnik. Kasneje - v Franciji - sem rada prisluškovala pogovorom odraslih in slišala marsikaj o očetovem nekdanjem življenju. Predvsem sem slišala, da je "bil" v 2. svetovni vojni, da je "bil" v vojni v Alžiriji. Predstavljala sem si, da "biti" v vojni, pomeni biti vojak. A oče je nenehno govoril, da je pristaš miru in proti nasilju, zato sem si ga vseeno težko predstavljala s čelado in z orožjem. In res sem bila daleč od resnice.
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.
Nekega dne, ko je oče pripravljal naše dokumente za pridobitev francoskega državljanstva, sem videla dokumente, ki so pritegnili mojo pozornost. Ti so resnični! Ti so moji. Rojena sem v Argentini. A dokument, ki sem ga videla in ki nam je pomagal pridobiti državljanstvo, je izdala vojska v zahvalo očetu za njegovo delo, ki ga je opravil za tajno službo. Takrat sem pomislila: "Vau! Moj oče - tajni agent?" Zvenelo je kot James Bond ... Postavila sem mu veliko vprašanj, na katera ni odgovoril. Kasneje sem si dejala, da ga bo nekega dne vseeno treba izprašati. Bila sem že mama majhnega fantka, ko sem si dejala, da je skrajni čas, da oče spregovori. Ravno sem postala mama - oče je praznoval svoj 77. rojstni dan - in nenadoma me je postalo strah. Bilo me je strah, da bo odšel in s seboj odnesel svoj molk, da bo odnesel svoje skrivnosti. Uspelo mi ga je prepričati, da je pomembno za nas in morda tudi za druge, da deli z nami svojo zgodbo. Odločil se je, da mi jo pove, jaz pa sem napisala knjigo,
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 katere bom kasneje prebrala nekaj odlomkov. Njegova zgodba, torej. Moj oče je rojen v Argentini. Njegovi starši imajo ruske korenine. Cela družina se je v 30. letih naselila v Franciji. Njegovi starši so bili Judje, Rusi, predvsem pa zelo revni. Zato je moral oče že pri štirinajstih delati. S svojo edino diplomo, z osnovnošolskim spričevalom, je našel delo v izdelovalnici barvil. Tam je odkril nekaj zanj čarobnega - ko o tem govori, vas uroči - odkril je čudež kemije barv. Takrat je divjala vojna in njegova mama je bila ubita, ko mu je bilo 15 let. Ta dva dogodka sta sovpadla, zato se je z dušo in telesom predal kemiji, v kateri je našel edino uteho za žalost. Podnevi je postavljal šefu vprašanja, ker se je želel učiti in si pridobiti več znanja, ponoči, ko ga nihče ni videl, je svoje izkušnje preveril v praksi, predvsem ga je zanimalo razbarvanje črnil.
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.
Z vsem tem vam želim povedati, da je oče v resnici postal ponarejevalec čisto po naključju. Bili so Judje in zato preganjani. Cela družina je bila aretirana in odpeljana v taborišče Drancy. Uspelo se jim je rešiti, zahvaljujoč argentinskim dokumentom. Bili so zunaj, a še vedno v nevarnosti zaradi pečata "Jud" v dokumentih. Dedek se je odločil, da potrebujejo ponarejene dokumente. Oče je zelo spoštoval zakone in čeprav je bil preganjan, ni nikoli pomislil na ponarejene dokumente. Sestal se je s predstavnikom Odpora.
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)
V tistem času so imeli dokumenti trde platnice, podatki so bili vnešeni ročno, med drugim je bil vpisan tudi poklic. Da bi preživel, je moral delati. Prosil je tistega moškega, naj navede poklic "barvar". Nenadoma je moški zainteresirano vprašal: "Barvar? Znaš odstraniti sledi črnila?" Seveda je znal. Moški mu je takoj razložil, da imajo v Odporu veliko težavo: noben strokovnjak, tudi najbolj izkušen, ni znal izbrisati črnila Waterman modre barve, t.i. neizbrisnega črnila. Oče je odrezavo odvrnil, da natančno ve, kako ga izbrisati. Seveda je 17-letni fantič, ki je odrezavo navedel rešitev, naredil ogromen vtis na moškega in bil takoj rekrutiran. Oče je nevede izumil nekaj, kar imajo danes vsi učenci v peresnicah - brisalec tinte. (Aplavz)
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.
A to je bil le začetek. To je moj oče. Ko je prišel v delavnico, je kljub svoji mladosti takoj opazil, da je z izdelavo dokumentov nekaj narobe. Vsi so se zadovoljili s ponarejanjem. A povpraševanje je rastlo, bilo je težko spreminjati obstoječe dokumente. Odločil se je, da morajo izdelati nove. Začel je tiskati, izdelal je grafične matrice. Začel je izdelovati štampiljke. Izumil je marsikaj, izumil je centrifugo, kot material pa je uporabil obroč kolesa. Vse to je moral narediti, ker je bil obseden z rezultatom. Naredil je enostaven izračun: v eni uri lahko ponaredi 30 dokumentov. Če bo spal eno uro, bo umrlo 30 ljudi.
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.
Imel je občutek odgovornosti za življenja drugih, čeprav mu je bilo komaj 17 let. Počutil se je krivega, ker je preživel, ker je ušel taborišču, medtem ko prijatelji niso; ta občutek ga je spremljal vse življenje. Zato je verjetno naslednjih 30 let nadaljeval s ponarejanjem dokumentov, ne glede na vse, kar je moral žrtvovati. Rada bi povedala, kaj vse je žrtvoval, kajti žrtvoval je veliko. Žrtvoval se je finančno, saj je vedno zavrnil plačilo. Če bi ga sprejel, bi bil po njegovem mnenju plačanec. Če bi sprejel plačilo, ne bi mogel zavrniti zadeve, če se mu ne bi zdela pravična. 30 let je bil podnevi fotograf, ponoči ponarejevalec, ves čas pa brez prebite 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.
Potem so tu še čustvene žrtve: kako živeti z žensko in imeti pred njo skrivnosti? Kako ji razložiti, kaj vse noči počne v delavnici? Žrtvoval je še nekaj: družino, kar sem izvedela kasneje. Nekega dne mi je oče predstavil sestro. Razložil mi je, da imam tudi brata. Prvič sem ju videla, ko mi je bilo 3, 4 leta, onadva pa sta bila 30 let starejša. Danes sta oba šestdesetletnika.
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.
Za potrebe knjige sem sestri postavila nekaj vprašanj. Želela sem vedeti, kdo je bil moj oče, kdo je bil oče, ki ga je ona poznala. Dejala mi je, da jima je oče govoril, da bo vsako nedeljo prišel in ju peljal na sprehod. Lepo sta se oblekla in ga čakala, a skoraj nikoli ni prišel. Dejal je, da bo poklical. Ni poklical. Ni prišel. Nekega dne pa je enostavno izginil. Čas je mineval. V začetku sta si govorila, da ju je gotovo pozabil. Čas je mineval še naprej. Dve leti kasneje sta si rekla: "Oče je verjetno umrl." Takrat sem dojela, da sem s svojimi vprašanji obudila preteklost, o kateri oče morda ni želel govoriti, ker je preveč bolelo. Medtem ko sta moja polsestra in polbrat mislila, da ju je zapustil, celo da sta siroti, je oče ponarejal dokumente. Povedal pa jima ni, ker ju je želel obvarovati.
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.
Po osvoboditvi je izdeloval dokumente za preživele taboriščnike, ki so se želeli izseliti v Palestino, preden je bil ustanovljen Izrael. Ker je bil zagrizen antikolonialist, je ponarejal dokumente za Alžirce med alžirsko vojno. Po alžirski vojni je med mednarodnimi osvobodilnimi gibanji krožilo njegovo ime. Vsi so prišli trkat na njegova vrata. V Afriki se je veliko držav borilo za neodvisnost: Gvineja, Gvineja Bissau, Angola. Oče se je povezal s stranko Nelsona Mandele, ki se je borila proti apartheidu. Ponarejal je dokumente za preganjane črnce Južne Afrike.
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.
Potem je bila tu Latinska Amerika. Oče je pomagal upornikom, ki so se borili proti diktaturam v Dominikanski Republiki, na Haitiju, v Braziliji, Argentini, Venezueli, Salvadorju, Nikaragvi, Kolumbiji, Peruju, Urugvaju, Čilu in Mehiki. Potem je bila vojna v Vietnamu. Oče je ponarejal dokumente za ameriške dezerterje, ki niso želeli dvigniti orožja proti Vietnamcem. Tudi Evropi ni bilo prizanešeno. Ponarejal je dokumente za upornike, ki so se borili proti Francu v Španiji, proti Salazarju na Portugalskem in proti vojaški diktaturi v Grčiji. V Franciji je ponaredil dokumente samo enkrat, maja 1968. Oče je z naklonjenostjo spremljal majske demonstracije, a njegovo srce in čas sta bila drugje, kajti delal je za 15 držav.
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.
Vendarle je privolil, da bo ponaredil dokumente za nekoga, ki ga boste morda prepoznali. (Smeh) Takrat je bil veliko mlajši. Oče je privolil, da mu ponaredi dokumente, s katerimi bi lahko prišel govorit na miting. Povedal mi je, da so bili ti dokumenti medijsko najbolj odmevni in najmanj koristni, kar jih je naredil v življenju. Ni privolil zato, ker bi bilo življenje Daniela Cohna-Bendita v nevarnosti, temveč zato, ker je bila to lepa priložnost, da se ponorčuje iz oblasti. Hotel jim je pokazati, da ni nič bolj prepustno kot meje, in da jih ideje nimajo.
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.
V otroštvu so očetje mojim prijateljicam pripovedovali Grimmove pravljice, moj pa meni zgodbe o skrivnostnih junakih, ki so neomajno verjeli v utopije in vse čudežno razrešili. Ti junaki niso potrebovali armade, nihče jim ni sledil, razen peščice prepričanih in pogumnih mož in žena. Kasneje sem spoznala, da mi je pred spanjem pripovedoval svojo zgodbo. Vprašala sem ga, ali zaradi vsega, kar je žrtvoval, kdaj obžaluje svojo odločitev. Rekel je, da ne. Da ne bi mogel le gledati in trpeti nepravičnosti, ne da bi kaj storil. Bil je prepričan - in še vedno je - da je možen drugačen svet, svet, v katerem nihče ne bo potreboval ponarejevalca. Še vedno sanja o njem. Moj oče je danes z nami. Ime mu je Adolfo Kaminsky. Prosim ga, naj vstane. (Aplavz) Hvala.