s Entertainment At The Movies Remembering Shanghai Detroiters recall times spent as refugees in China. &UZANNE CHESSLER Special to the Jewish News hile the documentary film Shanghai Ghetto recounts five personal stories of Jews fleeing the Nazis, there are similar stories to tell with a Detroit connection. A number of German and Austrian Jews made it to Michigan only after detouring to Shanghai, where no visa was required to gain admission. Journalist Berl Falbaum has his own Shanghai story to tell and has decided to join it with the experiences of some 40 people he hopes to locate and interview for his fifth book. "I think it's very important to docu- ment those times; so I really want to see the movie," Falbaum says. "The memories are not pleasant. There was poverty, and there was disease." Falbaum, born in Berlin, went to China with his parents before reaching his first birthday. The family could not leave Asia until he was 10, and they had to deal with the difficult consequences of the Japanese coming into power. "Our world was a self-contained community," recalls Falbaum, whose parents had to leave their possessions behind as they secured boat passage. "We were safe from the Nazis but not safe from the war." Falbaum, whose father bought and sold merchandise in Shanghai, went to regular school and Hebrew school set up by the people in the ghetto. He had no running water and no indoor toilet. Falbaum's daughter Julie, who grew up hearing about the Shanghai ghetto, went to China five years ago to get a firsthand look. She was able to see a refugee book that documented her family's coming to that country. As Falbaum puts his book together, he will be working with young writers assigned to report specific personal histories. One recruited writer, Gordon Eick, has heard about Shanghai all his life. Eick's father, Ernie, also was in China and wound up living in the same Farmington Hills subdivision as Falbaum. 'As a child, I accepted our situation as normal, but the adults had major prob- lems of adjustment," recalls Ernie Eick, who left China when he was 9. "After 5/16 2003 96 the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, it was very hard for us to get food." Eick, now a cleaning supplies sales- man, will never forget a terrible night in 1945 when the Americans were try- ing to bomb ammunition dumps and hit the ghetto instead. "They didn't have the precision equip- ment they have now, and a lot of people were killed," Eick recalls. "My older stepbrother helped get people out of the rub- ble. The war ended shortly after that, and we went to San Francisco before a sponsor brought us to Detroit in 1948." Eva Haase, of Farmington Hills, was born in the Shanghai ghetto. Her par- ents were able to leave Berlin in 1939, but a decade passed before they could come to America. "I remember going outside the ghetto with my mother to buy staples," Haase says. "She knew which streets to avoid because they wouldn't be safe for us." Haase, who has traveled to Israel many times, thinks of the ghetto some- what as a big kibbutz and remembers playing hide and seek in rice paddies. She didn't see a toy until reaching America when she was 6 years old. "I still speak German," says Haase, who works as an activities coordinator for the Jewish Vocational Service and takes on assignments as a caregiver. "I went back to China to see the area, which now is strictly Chinese. I saw how ultra-modern Shanghai has become." Anna Lindemann, of Oak Park, and became a baker for Awrey's, and her brother worked for Sander's. Zydower remembers the overall crowding of the ghetto, living in one room, observing people desperate for food and hearing about individuals committing suicide. He also recalls the small businesses people had estab- lished and attempts to provide theater and music. "I learned the baking trade there, but I first worked in car factories after coming to Detroit," Zydower recalls. "Much later, I went to work for Sanders and made candy." Charles Growe of Oak Park only lived in Shanghai for 90 days before moving on to another part of China. Clockwise from top left: Eva Haase (far right front) poses with other children of the Shanghai ghetto; her mother is in the back row, far right. Ernie Eick (front left) and others who lived in his building in the Shanghai ghetto, April 1941 Eva Haases father (man at left on truck) helps load a shipment in the Shanghai ghetto. Alfred Zydower, of Madison Heights — sister and brother — spent some of their teen years in the Shanghai ghetto. "Shanghai wasn't too bad when we got there, but it was very bad after the attack on Pearl Harbor," says Lindemann, who learned a bit of the Chinese and Japanese languages but has since forgotten the vocabulary. "I remember it being very dirty. I did some sewing work, and my brother worked for a baker." Although Lindemann's late hus- band also lived in Shanghai, they did not meet until they both were in Detroit. Ironically, her husband Soon after coming to the United States, he had to return to Asia because of being drafted into the mil- itary to serve in the Korean War. "There was a good part to that," Growe says. "I could become a U.S. citizen quickly after my time in the armed forces." ❑ In preparation for a book he is writ- ing, Berl Falbaum would appreciate hearing from anyone who lived in the Shanghai ghetto or knows of somebody who lived there. He can be reached at (248) 737-1588.