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Oy Mame! Oy Mame! is the story of Holocaust survivor Abraham Gutreiman and is based on his oral recollections captured during a series of video interviews when he was 90 years old. It includes many stories that he told multiple times over the years to everyone he came across. This time, knowing his end was near, he intended they should be recorded for future generations. The final chapters of this book were recorded later and continue his experiences until his departure from this world aged 95. Abraham’s story beings with his earliest memories as a young Orthodox Jewish boy living in Parysow, located some 50 kilometers southeast of Warsaw, Poland. His family was poor but hard-working. Looking to secure a better future for his family, his father had made a down payment on a house in the nearby town of Garwolin, an act that led to his betrayal and death.
The family, stunned by this tragic loss, were forced to recover through the endeavors of the children until September 1939, when Nazi Germany invaded and occupied the western half of Poland, which included Parysow. A Judenrat and Ghetto were established, leading to the eventual deportation of the region’s Jews to the Treblinka death camp in 1942.
During the journey, a fellow deportee used a smuggled hacksaw to cut through the iron bars in the window of the cattle car. People were pushed out of the small opening, many dying from the fall, but Abraham survived and made his way to a house owned by a sympathetic Polish gentile known to the family. After an anxious 9-day wait, his elder brother Yankel (Jacobo) arrived at the house. Due to Yankel’s indiscrete behavior in locating the house, the two brothers spent the remainder of the war on the run.
Surviving the war and its immediate aftermath, Abraham met and married Frieda, who understood Yankel would remain with them for some time. The three refugees made their way through Germany, Italy, Brazil to settle for some years in Bolivia before finally reaching Costa Rica. Abraham and Frieda built a family, which included Yankel until his death at the age of 101.
Oy Mame! Oy Mame! explores Abraham’s battles with poverty, evil, adversity, and his relationship with God.
