Casgliadau Arlein

Oral history recording with Des Golten collected as part of The Hineni Project, an insight into the life and stories of a Jewish community in all its diversity. Hineni was a collaborative project between Cardiff Reform Synagogue and Butetown History & Arts Centre.

My childhood in Zilina, Slovakia was the happiest time of my life because I had no worries. I was in the midst of a loving family and everything was very good. We were extremely poor but somehow it didn’t matter to me because I had anything and everything which I wanted. I went to a Jewish school, and I was the top pupil and won a grant. In 1938 things were getting very awkward because Hitler was threatening Czechoslovakia. Fortunately at that time, representatives from the Board of Trade from the UK came to Prague and were looking for people to come to Britain to start industrial businesses. My father had a small engineering business, manufacturing tubular furniture, and was offered the opportunity to start a business either in South Wales or Newcastle. Father decided to go for South Wales because it was nearer to London where my uncle lived. We came to Britain at the end of August 1939 and stayed with my uncle in London. We didn’t speak a word of English, and when we moved to Cardiff I went to grammar school to learn English and pass my O-Levels. I was going to be a doctor, but when I was interviewed I didn’t speak English too well, so I couldn’t present my case and I was refused. My father was approached one day at the office and asked if he’d like to join a new shul, a Reform shul. The temptation, I think, was the monthly payment was less than the Orthodox, and so we were among the first members to join the Reform shul. I met my wife through an orchestra in Pontypridd, as I sat next to her brother. I had been playing violin since I was seven. I’ve been back to Zilina four times, and the last time I took my grandson with me. Strangely enough, I left Zilina when I was eight years old, but when I came back for the first time in about seventy years I felt very happy there. I mean, my friends were gone, but I could see the house where we were living, the school, and I could see the synagogue. It was, of course, very sad because we had a service in the cemetery, and on the walls there are all the names of hundreds of people who perished during the war. Unfortunately, my family is amongst them because it was quite a large family so a lot of them didn’t survive. Out of the big Jewish community only about thirty or forty are alive. The congregation uses the basement of a small synagogue, the rest of which is rented to a car spares company. I describe myself as being very fortunate. My life has been up and down. I was very happy when I was very young. Then came a period when things were going very badly and I was unhappy, but basically I had a very happy life. But I never sort of settled down and said, “Well, this is my home.” My home is here with Ina, but my home outside here is non-existent because whenever I speak to somebody the first question they ask is: “Where do you come from?” I don’t feel Welsh. I’m very happy when Wales wins a football or a rugby game but basically I’m not Welsh. On our sixtieth wedding anniversary we had a card from the Queen. Our granddaughter wrote to her and the Queen replied graciously. So I feel British in a way.