War had again been avoided in the Munich agreement. I was glad because, otherwise, I would not have been released to start my medical studies. A whole new life began with my entrance to the University of Munich. I soon found a room in an old apartment house near the main railroad station. A bicycle became the main method of transportation whether or not it rained or the streets were full of snow. One late evening when I was studying for my basic science examination in mid-November, I heard a loud noise of breaking glass and shouting. My window was directly over a shoe store. I ran downstairs and saw a group of Stormtroopers breaking into the store, smashing all its merchandise. They had entered the store through a broken shop window. My curiosity was answered when I heard the slogan: "Down with the Jewish shops. Down with the Jews." We named the day the "Kristall-Nacht." This was the day the Nazis started to persecute the German Jews openly. The German papers stated that this was the answer for the alleged shooting death of a German diplomat in Paris by a Jew. The Jews who had not left Germany by this time started selling all their property, shops and belongings at 10 to 20 pfennigs on the mark. Whoever could afford it escaped the country. It was the first time I realized that Hitler tried to blame all the failures of the last 25 years on the Jewish race.

During the spring semester break I joined a group of ten skiers on a trip to the Dolomites. An experienced skier and mountain climber had organized the excursion. He had rented a mountain cabin near the Karer Pass, a four-hour climb from Bolzano. The cottage was used during the summer months for cow herders. They made big wheels of Swiss cheese all through the summer. A farmer had put his horse in front of his sled and loaded it with a barrel of red wine and food for the ten of us. There was enough firewood and straw in the cottage to provide for cooking and to let us sleep comfortably on the straw. On the way to Italy each of us had smuggled first-grade German schoolbooks in our knapsack. The import of such books into the German speaking area of South Tyrol was strictly forbidden by Mussolini. The province of South Tyrol was given to the Italians after World War I. Mussolini transferred only Italian-speaking teachers from Sicily to their schools in order to force the population to speak only Italian. Our farmer distributed the books to German- speaking homes and that was the reason that he had a barrel of red wine on his sled. Ahead was a week of great ski-touring through one of the most beautiful parts of the Alps. Many dangerous climbs were made under the supervision of our expert mountain climber. I learned a lot about avalanches and how to avoid them, how to traverse a dangerous slope, and I became an expert in handling winter territory.

The summer of 1939 brought the basic science and anatomy examination. It was a breeze for me. I telephoned my father that I had passed the tests with a straight "A" in all categories. I took my collapsible boat and traveled to Lindau on Lake Constance. A vacation, I thought, was well-deserved. With my boat and sail I paddled or drifted all around the lake for seven days. The sun had tanned me deeply. A visit to all the castles and towns was the highlight of the trip. During my paddling I had a fishing line attached to the boat and managed to catch some "Felchen," a very tasty fish which is a specialty of the lake.

Hitler had now occupied all of Czechoslovakia in spite of the fact that this was a violation of the Munich Agreement. Would this lead to war? Everybody was concerned. France, Poland and England were arming. A decree came from the university: Every male student up to the fourth semester had to serve during the semester break with a farmer in East Prussia and help harvest the grain in order to be eligible to continue his studies. Conscription had already taken a lot of young men into the army. That surely meant preparation for an impending war.

On the first Sunday in August some 300 students met at the Munich railroad station to be shipped by a special train to East Prussia. We had enough beer and food aboard to let us forget that we had to turn into farm laborers. The ride took forever. We had to let every fast train pass and had a long stop in Berlin and Stettin. The trainride had taken over 24 hours and we finally arrived at midnight in Lötzen. This was a town of some 25,000 inhabitants right in the middle of the most beautiful lake district of East Prussia. We had to close all the window curtains while the train traveled through the Polish corridor. We were told that the Poles were also preparing for war. A few peeks from behind the curtains told us that the bridges over the Wisla were already equipped with dynamite.

The farmers with their horses and buggies had waited for six hours at the station until we finally arrived. The "Bärenfang," the Bear Catch, must have flowed heavily during those six hours, because the mixture of 50 percent pure alcohol and 50 percent honey had created a happy atmosphere. As soon as the over-tired students came out of the cars, the farmers rushed at us -- the free laborers, felt our arm muscles for strength and started fighting for the strongest-looking males among us. I felt as though I were in a slave market. Since I was fairly skinny, I was left standing with a group of not-so-sturdy-looking FATHER students. The farmers who had too much "Bear Catch" were still around.

A pretty drunken farmer was willing to try me out as a farm worker. He had his doubts looking me over. I had taken my folded-up kayak along, and he was wondering what I was pulling there behind me. A two-hour ride had us both asleep on the wagon. But his horse knew the way to the stable and brought us there at the crack of dawn. After two hours sleep I rode with the family and two farm-hands to his wheat field. He put one horse before the mowing machine and started the monster, which rattled all day long around the fields. A 15-minute break was all he permitted himself or us. We had to gather the mowed grain in bundles, then stand three bundles upright against each other. It was 14 hours of stoop labor each day. The tempo was fast, the sun rose high and the sweat poured out in buckets. Home-brewed beer was brought to us in big cans to quench our thirst. I had to use all my strength to keep up with the rest of the workers and family members. All my limbs were sore when I hit the hard bed. But every day I felt better, and after a while I had no trouble keeping up with the rest. I proposed to the farmer to work through the last Sunday as the harvest neared its end. I wanted to take a boat trip through several of the many beautiful lakes. They all were willing to work through a holiday.

When they found out that I was a medical student, sick horses, cows and dogs were brought to me even though I assured them that I was no veterinarian. Every human ailment was brought to my attention. We finished the projected work of two weeks with the help of good weather in ten days. I could assemble my kayak and take off. The Masuren lakes are the most romantic lakes I have traveled. With no villages, far away from civilization, they are the breeding place of millions of birds and waterfowl. When my kayak glided through the water and approached a large flock of ducks, they took off simultaneously by the thousands with a tremendous noise. The sky darkened as they flew over me. Each lake was connected with the next one by a small creek. Seldom did I have to pull my boat over land to get to the next body of water. Once as I floated under a bridge, I saw some soldiers attaching explosives under the structure. I had almost forgotten that war could break out any day. Was war really that close and unavoidable? The soldiers were the only humans I saw in four days of traveling. Once again we gathered in Lötzen to board the train home through the corridor. But, we were told, it was too dangerous to travel straight through. We had to take the train to Danzig, then a boat to Stettin, and travel home from there.

© Irmgard & Jürgen Otto 1993 All rights reserved