Halina Greenwald: “I want the world to remember what happened. Although I have my doubts, I hope that some lesson was learned from that horrible period in history. To live in the past can only have negative influences on our children and grandchildren. We must move on”. I was born in Vilna. Poland. At the occupation by the Germans.my family was placed in the Vilna ghetto. My father died there. My mother was a surgical nurse and worked in the ghetto hospital. She was able to keep me with her during her surgical shift. She kept me hidden behind a screen in the operating room. When it became clear that the time in the ghetto was short my mother with the help of friends got Aryan papers for me and arranged for a local farmer to keep me hidden on his farm. Subsequently, my mother escaped as well and hid in the woods. She would walk for many miles at night just to peek at me. The Russian army liberated us. When Poland was divided in Potsdam my mother and I were the only survivors. From Poland we smuggled our way to occupied Germany. We lived in a displaced persons camp in West Berlin until the blockade in 1948 and at that time moved to Frankfurt. My mother remarried in 1949. I have an older stepbrother who lives in Australia at present. I graduated from Lycee in Frankfurt and came to Columbia University for further studies. There I met my husband. We settled on Long Island. My mother remained in Germany and died in New York while visiting her children in 1970. During the years that I lived in Germany, I did not experience any anti-Semitism. Until this day I have close contact with my non-Jewish school friends.