Tomi Reichental | International Person Of The Year | People of the Year Awards | RTÉ One

Tomi Reichental, one of only two holocaust survivors living in Ireland, has dedicated his time to speaking about his experience in schools. He is presented with the International Person of the Year.
See more at: www.rte.ie/player

[@justforschool222]

This is a well deserved award for a man who is an inspiration.

[@MrDanbloom]

A meeting of minds
After a Jewish newspaper in San Diego published a news article headlined "A Tale of Two Holocaust Survivors" on March 17, Tomi Reichental, who was one of the two men mentioned in the story and who is 80, contacted me by email from his home in Ireland and said he would like to get 85-year-old Peter Kubicek's email address and contact him in New York.
"
I read with interest your March 17 artic
le in the San Diego Jewish World
," Reichental wrote. "
I
am writing to you as I would like to get the email address
for
Peter Kubicek. My uncle Oskar Reichental was from Trencin
, where Peter was from
. My son lives in California
,
and I visit San Diego
sometimes
as I have some friends there. I go sometime
s
to New York, too, so it might be a possibility to meet Peter some day in person.
"
When Kubicek heard this news, he was overjoyed, he told me, and he wrote back immediately that very day to Tomi, noting:
"
I am very happy to receive your email address. I trust you read
'
Tale of Two Holocaust Survivors
'
that appeared in the San Diego Jewish World newspaper.
It occurs to me that we may have been on the same cattle-car transport to Bergen-Belsen, in November 1944, from the Slovak concentration
camp
of SERED. The latter was under the command of the notorious
Nazi,
Alois Brunner, whom I still remember.
"
"
Tomi, ešte vypráváš Slovensky
" Kubiceck asked, writing in Slovak, asking if Reichental speaks speaks Slovak. In a subsequent email, Reichental said indeed did still speak Slovak.
They two men might meet later this year, if things work out with their schedules.
"
Peter,
t
his modern technology is fantastic, all happens so fast
, Reichental replied to Peter's first letter, adding:
''
I am delighted to make the contact.
We might have been together in the same transport from Sered, after the selection by Alois Brunner
.
A
propos
,
Brunner
died in 2010 in Syria
and
he is no longer
being sought
after by the Wiesenthal
C
ent
er
as
they have proof that he died
. H
e would have been 102 year
s
old
now, if he was still alive
.
He got away with his crimes.
"
"Peter, it
was the 2nd of November when we were deported
from
Sered and we arrived on the 9th to Bergen Belsen
," Reichental said. "
As you said it was the first transpo
r
t from Slovakia with children, mothers and the elderly that didn’t go to Birkenau because the gas chambers where blown up by the Germans on the 7th of November
due
to the advancing Russians towards the camp. We were in the cattle cart traveling at the time and must have bean diverted to B
ergen Eelsen
. We lived in block 207.
"
"
My son lives in California
,
so I travel to
America
every year,
and
I have also friends in New Jersey
and
New York where I made a visit
a
couple of times so perhaps we might meet one day as per your quote in
San Diego Jewish World
article
,: Reichental ended his letter. "I am looking forward to that day, if we can arrange it."