Moments full of emotions: Federal President Alexander Van der Bellen invited guests of the Jewish Welcome Service from Australia, Israel, England and the USA to the Vienna Hofburg.
“I am proud to be standing here. It’s a very emotional moment,” says Carlos Burger, moved. His parents fled to South America to escape the Nazis. Mr. Burger is one of the guests of the Jewish Welcome Service that Federal President Van der Bellen invited to the Hofburg.Kreisky relatives came especially from Tel Aviv. Dorit Schallinger also sat down on a golden armchair in the Hall of Mirrors. The 75-year-old traveled from Tel Aviv and was able to experience first-hand the socio-political and economic changes in the young Republic of Austria. “Bruno’s grandmother was my great-grandmother’s sister. His brother Paul immigrated illegally to what is now Israel in 1938,” says the senior citizen, who speaks fluent German. The popular statesman supported his brother financially. Because Paul was disabled.Australian traveled halfway around the worldDaniel Hochberg lives in Sydney and tells how his 18-year-old mother became afraid during Hitler’s “Anschluss speech” on Heldenplatz. Her father, Samuel Fischer, an electrical engineer, was sure that his family would be treated well because he had received the Iron Cross in World War I. But the machinery of destruction rolled on. Samuel and his wife Frida died in the concentration camp. Daniel’s mother was able to escape death in Theresienstadt, Auschwitz and Bergen Belsen, where they liberated the English. The young woman made it to New Zealand through an aunt. “She remained Austrian in her heart and always cooked in a Viennese style,” says the son, who also feels deeply rooted in his mother’s homeland: “When I walk through the streets here, I feel at home.” He bakes the apricot cake 65-year-old still uses mom’s recipe today. A memorial stone on the Wieden commemorates the sad fate of the grandparents.
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