'Always Remember Your Name': The story of Holocaust survivors Andra and Tatiana Bucci

– My name is Andra Bucci. My sister Tati and I, we are two of the youngest Holocaust survivor from Italy. – [Sonia] So everywhere she goes, she takes the rocks. And then now that she lives in America, she brings them from where she lives. – I saw a stone. I take not only in Sacramento, in San Francisco, and everywhere. – That’s why I do it. I don’t know if that’s why my mom does it, but when we went to my grandmother’s grave, that’s what we did. We had the stones and we did it because we want her part of us now to be there with her. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Deirdre] You’ve done so many of these memory trips. – I think almost 40. – [Deirdre] 40 trips. That’s a lot of students. – Yes. – [Deirdre] Why is it so important to do them? They’re not easy. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – It wasn’t such a huge leap of the imagination for Italians to also join in and participate in the persecution of Jews. – [Sonia] It was sophisticated and planned and industrialized. – [Deirdre] How did children survive? – I don’t know. Maybe I was more strong. – We become the witnesses. (Andra speaking in foreign language) You know, when you’re here with me, you are doing it with me. But when I’m gone, then you’re doing it for me. – Seeing it in real life is much more impactful than just setting it in the book. So I really wanted to come here and experience it for myself. – Oh my God. Every time she tells her story, there’s new things. There’s something you’ve never heard before. – Whether you’re at Auschwitz or another camp, you became a number, you became a thing. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Deirdre] Your mother seemed to know why they would put a tattoo on you and refer to you by number. And she told you something very important about your own name. What is it she told you? – Yes. Always remember your name. – So we just wait for that to come back. – [Host] Repeat after me. I hereby declare, on oath- – I, on oath- – Yeah, we applied at the beginning of August and then she had her test- – In December 9. – By December 9. She was nervous for that one too. (Andra laughing) – This obligation freely, without- – Oh, I’m super excited. – Super. Oh, yes, yes. I sleep very poco- – Little. – Lima. – Little. She didn’t sleep last night. – Little, little sleep this night because I was very excited. (group cheers and applauds) – [Sonia] (laughs) She’s complaining her picture- – [Interviewer] What, she didn’t get a nice photo? – [Andra] It’s like a picture- – She looks like an inmate picture. – It’s terrible. It’s terrible picture. I don’t think I am a normal person, I think. – She thinks she’s a normal person and not special. – Yeah, not special. – [Interviewer] A lot of people would disagree with that, I think. – Yeah, maybe, maybe. I don’t know. But for me, everything is normal. (dramatic music) – I’m gonna go ahead and throw this on you. We can put it right here. Since you have a sweater, I don’t have to get- – Andra and her sister Tatiana have dedicated their lives to sharing their story in Auschwitz. – Dominic, Win is here, Jade. Is Jade here? Yay, I’m glad you’re back. Anytime you can have someone that was there who’s experienced it, speaking about their experience is always gonna have more power than a book or a movie. Always. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – This is Ms. Andra Bucci. She is a Holocaust survivor. She’s going to tell us about her story through her daughter Tatiana. – I knew about my mom’s story forever. Like Sonia, we knew it because, you know, they have the number on the arm, you ask. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – I’ve always been interested in the Holocaust dutifully during school because we never really had much time to go over that lesson. That lesson was always maybe a day, an afternoon, an hour, maybe just a reading about it. And I always wanted to go more into it. My name is Joshua Edwards, and I did my high school senior project on the life of a Holocaust survivor. She was in the Holocaust when she was four years old with her sister, who was six years old, and they survived the Holocaust only because they were believed to be twins. So this is a book by Andra and Tatiana Bucci, “Always Remember Your Name: A True Story of Family and Survival in Auschwitz.” “Ours is a long story, and it begins far away. Our parents met under a clock tower in Fiume, the way young people did in those days and as perhaps they still do today.” (Andra speaking in foreign language) (Andra laughing) – Tati, Tati, Tati. – This one is 1940. – All of these are before? – These all are before. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Sonia] Yeah. These are all before. – Zero hour strikes. (alarm blaring) The first shots of the New World War are fired at Westerplatte. (fire hissing) (cannon booms) (artillery blasting) Daily Berlin’s Blitzkrieg spreads death and destruction from the skies. (explosion booming) (audience cheers and applauds) (Adolf speaking in foreign language) (audience cheers and applauds) – You know, our real challenge is to carry these stories forward and inspire students to make the stories their own. Carrying these stories of the survivors onto their children and grandchildren. When the war begins on September 1st, 1939, and they quickly march into Poland, very soon, they put restrictions on Jews. – What we do know, right, is that in this first stage of the war that we had been speaking about, there was no policy of ethnic cleansing. My name is Shira Klein. This is my 12th year at Chapman University. I’m chair of the history department. And so the idea being that sort of, if you could go back in time and change one little thing, it would probably have a very big effect, right? (Mussolini speaking in foreign language) (crowd cheering) – There are some misconceptions about Italian Jews. There are a bunch of them, but probably the most common one was that Italian Jews were treated really well in Italy and more generally, that Italy is seen as sort of this oxymoron, like a bit of a paradox. (Mussolini speaking in foreign language) – Mussolini had come to power in 1922 and Italy was a dictatorship, and so any executive decision was by the fascist regime, and this was no different. Mussolini had racial theorists who put together these laws. Some of them were inspired by the German race laws ‘cause Germany had passed its Nuremberg laws in 1935, 3 years earlier. (Andra speaking in foreign language) (Andra continues speaking in foreign language) – “Aunt Gisella, who that summer had come to Fiume with our cousin Sergio, decided not to return to Naples, since her husband wasn’t there anyway. So we became a single nuclear family without the two sailors, our father and uncle, who were imprisoned far away.” (announcer speaking in foreign language) – The Nazis will send the SS Einsatzgruppen, the mobile killing squads, into the Ukraine and other areas. It’s one bullet per person is, you know, not efficient and you’ve got your killers not wanting to get up in the morning and go kill more people. And the best way to do that, the most efficient, the least upsetting for the killers is to use either carbon monoxide, or then in Auschwitz, they will come up with the idea of using something they already have used in the camps as a pesticide, Zyklon B was in use as a pesticide in a lot of different places, that they can do that in a way that is very efficient. (Hitler speaking in foreign language) – One night, the fascist and the German came to get them. It was night, it was dark, and there was a lot of noise. They knocked the door, they came in. My family was scared. Just imagine, she was four years old. How would you feel at four years old if somebody comes shouting in your house? (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Joshua] “They take us to the rice mill, the big rice-husking factory built in the late 19th century in the Trieste neighborhood of San Sabba. Certainly the eight of us are all together. And we stay together in the cell that is assigned to us.” – [Shira] As soon as Germans came into Italy in September of ’43, they started to round up Jews in every major city and load them onto freight cars and send them northwards to Auschwitz. – [Narrator] Auschwitz, the symbol of Hitler tycoon. Here, the Germans had set up an immense experimental laboratory of fascism, a factory of death. (gentle music) (Andra speaking in foreign language) – We organize every year the travel for the memory, or Viaggio Della Memoria in Italian. It means to travel for the memory. – [Deirdre] You’ve done so many of these memory trips. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – I think almost 40. – [Interviewer] So is this dressing for Italy right here or is this everything? – No, this is for all Italy and Poland. – This is what my mother does. She puts everything in little baggies because she says that when you press the bags, it takes less room in the luggage. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – Listening to somebody telling them their story, only you hear them speaking or whatever, but it’s emotional ‘cause you feel their emotion. You feel the anger, the fear, the sadness. You feel all of it. – [Deirdre] 40 trips. That’s a lot of students. – Yes. – [Deirdre] Why is it so important to do them? They’re not easy. (Andra speaking in foreign language) (plane engine whirring) (gentle music) – They’re impressive. Dinner at 8:00 and ready in the lobby at 6:00. (chuckles) – It’s Deirdre. – Buongiorno. – Buongiorno (speaking Italian). We do two kisses here. (Deirdre laughing) – How are you? – Good. (gentle music) – All the trips start in Rome. Everybody meets in Rome usually? – No. This one, yes. Then the one in Tuscany starts in Florence. – So every year, more than almost 20 years that we have been organizing this kind of travelings. – [Deirdre] So tell us who’s here. – So this is my aunt, Tatiana. – Tatiana. – Hello. – Nice to meet you. – Victor. – And the purpose is to bring the students as an agreement between the Union of Jewish communities in Italy with the Ministry of Education and to bring them directly to the places where the horrifying events of the Shoah happened. (gentle music) – The Jewish ghetto is a very vibrant beautiful place. People love to visit here. Why do people like to come to the ghetto here? – Because it’s full of life. True life. There is a real life of Rome. It’s the character of the Roman people. Not so easy to destroy our Jewish community in Rome and in Italy also. – Perfect. – [Sonia] She has a lot of memories and a lot of ideas and it’s all mixing together. She’s excited about you guys being here. She couldn’t relax. – I suppose you have another shoes for Birkenau? – Boots? Yeah. – Oh, okay. (all laughing) – He’ll need warm things, won’t he? Yes, I know. (lively music) – They normally check in all together, right? Like a big group. But I don’t know what they’re doing now. That’s when their diva comes into place. – [Deirdre] Tell us a little bit about diva. – When they do these trips, they transform into this little diva, this diva thing that it’s all about them. So they had to, you know, the center of the things. So they have certain expectation. They have to sit in the front of the bus. They have to be the first one in and out of the bus. They have to be the first one be sitting at the restaurant, be served. It’s like this small little silly stuff that they have to do. It’s funny. – What is the impact of having Andra and Tatiana leading these tours? – Hearing their story, they were very, very little by then. They were four and six. And it’s very, very, very, very rare that someone can survive because children were used for experiments. So they are the exception that survived somehow. – It takes a while before they decide. Not only are they going to mark them, they’re gonna move them into designated areas of the big cities, especially big ones initially like Warsaw. – [Deirdre] And so the first day, you went to the Krakow ghetto? – Yeah, we went today. Yeah. – [Deirdre] And what were your thoughts as you walked through the ghetto? – It’s very different picturing, as I said before, things in books and then walking along those streets in real life. Imagining that people just like us experienced those lives before. And you kind of feel the snow and the cold and you try to rank it up like 40 times more. It’s really like, it really hits you. – [Deirdre] What is it like to see the Bucci sisters in person? You have studied stories like theirs. What is it like to actually see them? – It’s kind of strange, because in these times we didn’t even imagine that we would live anything like they lived. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – It really hits you. It really feels like people actually did it. People actually experienced it. It really was bad. They really face the consequences. It’s not like a story with a good ending. They don’t all survive. – One morning, it was Saturday morning, 16 October 1943, the Nazi closed all the door, all the street, all around and they went in the homes and they took all the Jews. – [Joshua] “Our arrival is mostly noise. It’s April 4th, 1944. The train stops outside the camp we’re being taken to, which we later found out is Birkenau, the giant death factory in the concentration camp system of Auschwitz.” – Even though we studied the Holocaust a lot and our schools really put a lot of importance on it- (Andra speaking in foreign language) – Seeing it in real life is much more impactful than just setting it in the books. So I really wanted to come here and experience it for myself. (audience applauds) – What do you think about tomorrow? What are your thoughts? – Well, I think it’s gonna be a very emotional experience. I don’t really know how most of us will react to it emotionally, because maybe it won’t even hit us like immediately. And then reflecting back onto it later through the day, it’s gonna settle in more in our brains. (train whistle trumpets) (train rumbling) (Tati speaking in foreign language) (Andra speaking in foreign language) (bell tolling) – [Joshua] “There are cries of fear as well, because dogs are barking and growling, because orders are given in German and almost no one understands it. There’s tremendous confusion, in a ghostly scene of chaos.” – [Marilyn] At Sobibor, Treblinka, there was no selection. At least when you arrived at Auschwitz, you had a chance, right? If you did look like you could work, you might be spared. – [Deirdre] How were you dressed, the two girls? (Andra speaking in foreign language) – This moment of complete horror and unpredictability, one had a sense to try to look stronger and younger. (Andra speaking in foreign language) (bells tolling) (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Deirdre] Where would Andra have arrived? – [Sonia] The train tracks didn’t arrive here yet when she arrives. So the train tracks are about two left that way, two kilometers that way. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Joshua] “Our barrack is near the entrance of the camp. We enter and our immediate impression is that it’s huge. It’s rectangular in shape, like the ones that can still be seen today at Birkenau.” (Andra speaking in foreign language) (Andra continues speaking in foreign language) (Andra continues speaking in foreign language) – This is not my area. My area was another place. And we have not the barrack. Because my barrack was in the wood not (speaking in foreign language) brick. – Not bricks. – Brick. And it was destroyed? – Yeah. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – You just walk through I guess the gates of hell. Somebody can say, I don’t know, but it’s just so different, heavy, and to me, even gets colder. – She’s always cold. A hundred degrees outside and she has a sweater on. The cold is being sucked into her. I don’t think that the cold will ever get out of her bones. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Deirdre] What were days like for the very few children at Auschwitz? (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Sonia] Which is the building that last night she was talking about where she got- – The number. – disinfected and where she got her number tattoo. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – Whether you were at Auschwitz or another camp, you became a number, you became a thing. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Deirdre] Your mother seemed to know why they would put a tattoo on you and refer to you by number. And she told you something very important about your own name. What is it she told you? – Yes. Always remember your name. (Andra speaking in foreign language) (Andra continues speaking in foreign language) – [Deirdre] One day your mother stopped visiting. What did you think? (Andra speaking in foreign language) – So this is my great-grandfather’s cooking book that he got to help him learn how to cook as a prisoner of war. So my senior project, originally I wanted to do a cooking video or cooking lesson or something like that. My name is Joshua Edwards, and I’m Andra Bucci’s grandson. I kind of wanted to be in her shoes, understand what she had gone through. So what I wanted to do was kind of live a week in her life as a Holocaust survivor. And then the biggest part was that my grandmother was my blockova. – [Deirdre] The blockova took a liking to you and your sister. How did you know that? (Andra speaking in foreign language) (Andra continues speaking in foreign language) – [Deirdre] But you saw some blockovas do some pretty awful things. And I remember when we were at the camp, you talked about bricks. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – The ground had little gravels and that’s where the blockova put women in punishment. They would have to kneel and they would have to hold a brick on each end and kneel as long as the blockova wanted to. – [Deirdre] And your cousin Sergio was with you in this barracks too. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – There was a time where the blockova told them, “Tomorrow they’re gonna ask you if you wanna go see your mom. You have to say no. And don’t tell anybody what I told you.” If you guys remember, I told you Sergio was their cousin who was six years old, was in the barracks with them. So they told him, this is what’s gonna happen tomorrow. You need to say no. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Narrator] The late army just saved lives of millions of concentration camp inmates. (Andra speaking in foreign language) (Andra continues speaking in foreign language) – [Narrator] For five years, Europe was a vast prison, yet nothing equaled the atrocities of Auschwitz, Oswiecim concentration camp. – Rooting light of a candle and showed laying down on the floor. – [Deirdre] How do you select the students who will be a part of this experience? – So this special project is how we study the Shoah through a project of art. – Like, this is mine. – It’s beautiful. – It was like the part of the book of Primo Levi, you know? And my part was when they were in the wagon, you know, it was night, so one of the refugees like, lit up again a candle. – It really stirs you up on the inside and you don’t really even know what you’re feeling right then and there. But yeah, it’s something that I’ll probably always remember. – [Interviewer] What was it like interacting with them where they had been at once? – It was always, always interesting to hear their stories. I kind of felt like crying a bit because it really is hurtful to know all they went through. – I think we’re at an interesting juncture in terms of where we get our knowledge from and what weight we attribute to it. On the one hand, I tend to be very optimistic about knowledge, including historical knowledge, but just sort of how informed people are because knowledge has been democratized like never before. – [Content Creator] The Holocaust is not what happened. Let’s look at the facts of that. And Hitler has a lot of redeeming qualities. – I don’t believe in the 6 million number. I don’t believe in the gas chambers thing. – It’s when work isn’t peer-reviewed that we start getting distortions. And unfortunately, again with AI, those distortions sort of blow out of proportion because they are forked in so many different places. So I think it’s not so much the source that worries me, it’s whether people have the capacity to question those sources. (Tatiana speaking in foreign language) (Andra speaking in foreign language) – I teach seventh and eighth, and I’ve taught eighth grade for the last 10 years here. – Her father was Italian and he was a sailor. My grandmother was a seamstress. – In Italy, they teach specifically the Holocaust. Do you think we do enough? I don’t think we teach history enough, whether it’s a genocide or not. We’re thinking about our actions critically. We just don’t. – Technically, again, it’s not in our state standard so it’s not something we’re required to teach but we added in as part of what we teach. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – To know that this person stood in front of Dr. Josef Mengele and at any time he could have said, off to the crematoria, it’s chilling, it’s special. It changes it because this is someone who is part of history and they survived that history. (Andra speaking in foreign language) (Tati speaking in foreign language) – [Deirdre] So these students are all 12, 13 years old? – Yes, 13 years old. – [Deirdre] At this age, what is your goal with Holocaust education? What do you want them to learn? – To socialize. We want either respect. They learn to respect each other and others, of course. And to know what the real life is around them. It’s not only the reality they see on the social. (Tati speaking in foreign language) – Gracias. (staff speaking in foreign language) – What is it like to have the children stare so intently at you as you’re talking? (Andra speaking in foreign language) – She appreciates that they’re quiet and listen. She appreciates the question because they mean they listen and they wanna know more. – You can tell that they’re listening, can’t you? – Why didn’t you pretend to not be a Jew? – Before this all happened, all Jews had to register. So everybody that was going to the synagogue had to register. So they knew them. They knew their name. They knew who they were. – [Attendee] Do you think the conditions that she experienced in the camps had like lasting effects on her body? – Absolutely, yes. Not so much of the body, but her food. She will not eat certain food. She eats the portion of a bird. I mean, her relationship with food is really bad. (Tati speaking in foreign language) (attendee speaking in foreign language) (Tati speaking in foreign language) – “It should be recognized that in Germany, very serious attention is paid to the story of Nazism.” (speaking in foreign language) – [Joshua] “Greater attention is paid there than in Italy, where, with a few exceptions, it’s concentrated mainly in the week of Holocaust Remembrance Day.” (attendee speaking in foreign language) (Giuseppe speaking in foreign language) (Tati speaking in foreign language) (audience applauds) – [Tatiana] So my aunt just asked him the same thing that she asked him the year before that Italy needs to admit that they were on the wrong side. And she’s hoping that before she dies, Italy would apologize to her and tell her they were on the wrong side. – [Deirdre] You’ve talked about some of the myths that are associated with Italy’s role with World War II and the treatment of the Jewish people in Italy. One of the myths is the good Italian. What is the good Italian? – It has different variations, but in one variation, it’s that Italians never really wanted the war. They never really wanted any racism. And it was Germany who dragged Italy into it. – [Deirdre] German leaders have apologized- – They did it. Italian people, no. – Why? – I don’t know. I don’t know. Because they think the Italian people is like good people, but they are good and no good like everybody in the world. – And historians like me who have looked at the persecution of Jews in Italy and have shown just how brutal it was. So it’s a myth. It doesn’t stand up to scrutiny, but it does exist. (Mussolini speaking in foreign language) – [Deirdre] Do you think you will ever get the apology? – I hope, but it’s very difficult to, I don’t know. – [Interviewer] When he was saying Italy still hasn’t apologized, do you think it’s our duty to right the wrongs that were sort of made in the past or at least learn from them and- – Oh my gosh, million dollar question. The quick answer is yes. Is it our duty? Absolutely. It’s our duty to speak up about what has gone wrong. It’s hard because then you’re taking away part of history. Like, should Jefferson be, you know, seen as a great president or because he had slaves and you know, do we give him grace because that was the times? Do we give people grace because the Holocaust was part of the times? No. So, who decides? (crowd member speaking in foreign language) (Andra speaking in foreign language) – That’s where it started. It ended for some people, but it started for some people, right? – [Deirdre] You brought rocks from Sacramento? – Yeah, for the park, Sacramento River. Every corner when I go to work, I saw a stone, I take. Not only in Sacramento, in San Francisco, and everywhere. – We all do it. We all do it. Even my son Joshua, if he sees a pretty stone, we’ll pick it up and put it in a Ziploc bag so when next time we go to Europe, we have it. Sometimes when she goes to Auschwitz, she brings her stone from here and puts them in Auschwitz too. (crowd member speaking in foreign language) – Because it’s Jewish tradition, when you go in the cemetery, you put in the tomb- – In the tomb. – the stone. This is (speaking in foreign language). You leave your presence. Your visit. And the stone, (speaking in foreign language). – They don’t disappear like flowers. They don’t die. They stay there. Going there to me was closing the circle and bringing, you know, the stones from here is bringing a little part of me there to be with whoever is there. (gentle wistful music) – [Narrator] Among the 2,819 liberating Auschwitz inmates, there were 180 children, 52 of them were under eight years of age. How could they survive this hell? – I mean, how did children survive? – I don’t know. I don’t know why. Maybe I was more lucky than others. Maybe I was more strong and lucky. I have the star for the protection. – [Narrator] The plan of the camp, the situation plan of the crematoria. From 10 to 12,000 bodies were burnt daily in the five crematorium. – [Interviewer] There was a lot of damage done toward the end of the war just in panic on the Nazis part too, right? – Absolutely, and trying to burn, you know, for one hand they were meticulous record keepers, and then on the other hand, they tried to destroy as much as they could. – [Narrator] Masses of terror were packed in sacks. 20 kilos, 22 kilos. Dentist torn out dentures from corps’ mouth to get hold of those teeth. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – It’s the first time that they were felt safe there. She doesn’t remember the languages anymore, but she has a little song that she learned while she was in the orphanage. (Andra singing in foreign language) (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Joshua] “In Lingfield we began to live again. There we finally recovered our childhood, which had been lost and stolen. It was wonderful and indelible memory, one of those memories that stays with you and make you nostalgic but are also very comforting.” – I think it saved my mom life. Going there is what gave her some stability and gave her time to get back into society, right? So the way they wash them, the way they have people, you know, care about them. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – After all this time, she can tell that Lingfield was happiness and it’s still happiness. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Deirdre] In September of 1946, Alice Goldberger called you to her office to tell you something. – [Narrator] “Dear Alice, thank you very much for the photos of the Bucci children. They will be passed on to their parents. I enclose here with a photo which ought to be given to the children. Sincerely, A.M. Lagner, Jewish Refugees Committee.” (Andra speaking in foreign language) (Andra continues speaking in foreign language) – [Narrator] “Dear Ms. Alice, I am writing a few words to thank you for all your kindness. Your dear letter comforts me a great deal. I am really still in pain because I don’t know when I will have the pleasure to see my dear daughters. Yours sincerely, Mira Bucci.” – [Deirdre] That trip back to Italy, what do you remember about that? (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Interviewer] Is that the train station to the right there of you and your sister? – Yes. This is in Victoria Station in London. – [Interviewer] Is that on your way back to Italy? Oh, that’s the bonnet and the dolls. – This is my doll and this is… – [Interviewer] Wow. And you still have them after all these years? – Good night. – This is 1942. This is before. (Andra speaking in foreign language) (speaking in foreign language) (Andra speaking in foreign language) – So the Italian Jews that came back, they oftentimes found people occupying their houses. They oftentimes found their property had been sold or had been confiscated by the state. And there was a painful process to start to pick up the pieces and to pick up where they’d left off. – That is also the decisions and actions that were taken by the Fascist regime. And this is a specific responsibility that we are working on in Italy. – They were making these comparisons whereby Italy emerged, you know, in a far rosier light. And so I think that is also what was happening in the postwar that led Italian Jews to be a part of what propels forward the myth of a good Italian. – [Deirdre] All of these names are people who were deported to Auschwitz. – Yes, yes. For example, in front of this door, you can see how many people. The Jewish ghetto until 1870 was this part, you see? Now, this is new, but this part, the great synagogue, this building who is a school was the Jewish ghetto. The Jewish ghetto was very small. And this ghetto, there were from 3,000 to 10,000 people. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – I was over there for a summer vacation in elementary school. I was there and I first got like a little like, digital camera and I was really excited about it. I was taking pictures of everything and noticed that she had her numbers tattooed on her arm. And I think I’ve always noticed them, but this is like having the camera and wanting to actually like focus on it. Created this back and forth conversation with me and her and asking like, where do these tattoos come from? – I think there were survivors who did tell their stories and wanted to tell their stories. There were those who tried and found that there just was no connector. – It’s too easy for people to forget. To put it under the rug and say, “Ah, not touch it.” Because they don’t want to think about something that is hurtful for people. They just wanna say, “Yeah, it happened, but not really. It wasn’t that bad.” It’s too easy. – [Deirdre] How well-known is the Bucci sister’s story in Italy? – Of Tatiana? All the people know Tatiana and the sister. – [Deirdre] And why is their story so important to people here? – Because they were children and they survive. Listen, from Rome, not from Italy, only from Rome, 200 children died in Auschwitz, 200. And you know, to find after the war two Italian children from the north of Italy still alive was a miracle. – The survivors themselves, as we can understand, you know, it’s like when you go through a cancer surgery or something, the last thing you want is to keep yourself focused on it and keep thinking about it. You want to embrace life and what’s good in life. And, you know, most survivors did. (speaking in foreign language) (Andra speaking in foreign language) – That doesn’t mean they didn’t have ongoing trauma, screaming, and nightmares at night they couldn’t control. You know, sometimes bouts of anger, violence, and they didn’t have the systems to help that we have now. (Andra speaking in foreign language) (Sonia speaking in foreign language) (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Interviewer] What was it like walking back through Birkenau? (Andra speaking in foreign language) (Andra continues speaking in foreign language) (Andra continues speaking in foreign language) – [Deirdre] So everything from the girls being dressed the same, mistaken for twins, sequential tattoo numbers, the blockova liking the two sisters, a mother who says remember your name, sent to Lingfield house, restoring a stolen childhood, both parents surviving the camps, reunited as a family, and then going on to have what you all described as a relatively normal happy life. How? – I have no clue. I always say it’s a series of little coincidence or a little act that saved my mom and my aunt. Like for example, did my grandmother knew that by having her kiss that picture every night, she was making a difference later on in life? No, right? Did she knew telling them to remember their name, right, was, I mean, she knew and she didn’t know, right? So all this little thing that happened, having them wearing matching clothes, like you say, all these little events that happened are moments of faith. You know, faith made happen something, right? (Andra speaking in foreign language) – 20 kids, 10 female, 10 male. – [Deirdre] Sergio is the hardest part of telling your story, isn’t it? (pensive music) – So the kids came forward, they were put on a cart and they were sent to Hamburg, to another camp. I’m sorry, I always get emotional here. – [Interviewer] When did you find out what happened to Sergio? (Andra speaking in foreign language) – 1945, on the night of April 20, SS men murdered 20 Jewish children in the school basement. – There was this place where the children were taken, this doctor, one with the children, wanted to make experiments on how tuberculosis spreads. They were injected tuberculosis. They did a bunch of stuff. And then the day before the Americans freed the camp, the doctor- – In April, 1945. – The doctor came and- (Andra speaking in foreign language) – Came and killed them all. He hanged them. But most of the children were so thin that they were not dying. They were not. So a soldier was going around and pulling them down. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Tatiana] As I said, 20 kids died this way. And now in Germany, every 20th of April, there’s a ceremony to remember these children. (bells tolling) – Tomorrow we go to (speaking in foreign language) to give the memory to the Tuscany school for the student. When I speak, it’s difficult for me because everything come another time so quickly. So it’s not easy to remember because sometime (speaking in foreign language). – [Sonia] She feels like she’s back there. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – We’ve studied these kinds of things. People have taught us the value of memories and the value of remembering these events and not taking them lightly. So we recognize the importance of what we were seeing. (Andra speaking in foreign language) – Families were looking for their relatives, mostly children. – [Sonia] I don’t want the story to die. Not the story, I’m sorry, history to die. – What I would like and I think I saw the Bucci sisters saying this very thing and I was just so thrilled ‘cause this is like, this is my dream. My dream is not that we get rid of sources like Wikipedia. My hope for humanity is that we learn to critically evaluate those sources. – I think, unfortunately, for whatever reason, a lot of younger people hear the word history and think boring and think of it in terms of chronology, which is not what history is. History is story. – “Speaking about our experience, testifying about it, is crucial for us, because we hope that it will be useful to the young. Our conviction is that, even if one of those students has really understood, it’ll be right to have given our testimony.” – [Deirdre] You started so many lives in Fiume and Birkenau and Czechoslovakia and Lingfield, back to Trieste, and now you live here, in Northern California. (Andra speaking in foreign language) (group cheers and applauds) (Andra speaking in foreign language) – [Host] Way to go. We got 12380. – I used to go run on Wednesday night and she would complain that I was, you know, leaving every Wednesday night and be gone for so long and somebody said, “Well, just take her with us.” – [Deirdre] It’s funny how you can be in a big group of people like you were in the marathon that day with your mom running and everybody is kind of suffering, but you don’t really know what the person next to you has been through or what they’re all about. (whisk whirring) When you’re out and about here in Elk Grove or you know, you’re shopping, you’re doing whatever, people just met your mom. They ever have any idea what her background is? – They would know. But most people, nah, they don’t. (Andra speaking in foreign language) (Joshua speaking in foreign language) – [Deirdre] How long will you continue these memory trips? (Andra speaking in foreign language) (gentle pensive music) – I suppose you have another shoes for Birkenau? – Ah, boots? Yes. – Okay. (all laughing) – [Staff] I’m just gonna get you getting ready to set up. (Andra laughing) – [Staff] What do you think, Bob? (Andra speaking in foreign language) (Tati speaking in foreign language) – I was told to change position. – Why is that? – Who knows? I just follow orders. You see what happened when I don’t follow orders. When you don’t follow orders. – [Interviewer] Andra, do you get excited when you come back to Italy ‘cause you get Italian food? – (laughs) Yes. (Sonia speaking in foreign language) (Andra and friend singing in foreign language)

‘Always Remember Your Name’: The story of Holocaust survivors Andra and Tatiana Bucci

“I don’t want the story to die. It’s too easy for people to forget.”

Updated: 11:04 AM EST Jan 27, 2025

Andra Bucci finally became a United States citizen in 2023 at the Placer County Fairgrounds in Northern California.The newly naturalized Italian American from Sacramento said she slept very little ahead of the ceremony out of sheer excitement. She clapped and laughed as she marked the start of a new chapter in her life. When asked if she got a nice picture, she responded by saying her naturalization ID photo looked more like a picture an inmate would take. Andra would know. She and her sister Tatiana Bucci survived the Holocaust, the systematic mass murder of 6 million Jewish people during World War II.The sisters were young children when they were placed into Birkenau, the portion of the Auschwitz concentration camp complex that focused on exterminating Jews. Andra was 4 years old, and Tatiana was 6. Surviving filled Andra’s life with purpose. Andra, now 85, has spent her life educating others about the Holocaust to make sure that history is not lost to time. She’s returned to Auschwitz nearly 40 times on “memory trips” with students.On Holocaust Remembrance Day, survivors and world leaders are marking the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz at the site of the former death camp.Sister station KCRA spent five years learning about Andra and Tatiana Bucci’s tale of survival, which involved a mother’s genius, the luck of being mistaken for twins, the kindness shown by someone who was cruel to others and the daughter of Sigmund Freud. Their documentary “Always Remember Your Name” also shines a light on Italy’s lesser-known involvement during the Holocaust in persecuting Jews. Watch KCRA’s documentary in the video player at the top of this story. App users, click here for the best digital presentation of this article. For photos shared by the Bucci family, interactive maps and graphics detailing Italy’s history during World War II and resources to continue learning about the Holocaust, click here.

SACRAMENTO, Calif. —

Andra Bucci finally became a United States citizen in 2023 at the Placer County Fairgrounds in Northern California.

The newly naturalized Italian American from Sacramento said she slept very little ahead of the ceremony out of sheer excitement. She clapped and laughed as she marked the start of a new chapter in her life. When asked if she got a nice picture, she responded by saying her naturalization ID photo looked more like a picture an inmate would take.

Andra would know. She and her sister Tatiana Bucci survived the Holocaust, the systematic mass murder of 6 million Jewish people during World War II.

The sisters were young children when they were placed into Birkenau, the portion of the Auschwitz concentration camp complex that focused on exterminating Jews. Andra was 4 years old, and Tatiana was 6.

Hearst Owned

Surviving filled Andra’s life with purpose. Andra, now 85, has spent her life educating others about the Holocaust to make sure that history is not lost to time. She’s returned to Auschwitz nearly 40 times on “memory trips” with students.

On Holocaust Remembrance Day, survivors and world leaders are marking the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz at the site of the former death camp.

Sister station KCRA spent five years learning about Andra and Tatiana Bucci’s tale of survival, which involved a mother’s genius, the luck of being mistaken for twins, the kindness shown by someone who was cruel to others and the daughter of Sigmund Freud. Their documentary “Always Remember Your Name” also shines a light on Italy’s lesser-known involvement during the Holocaust in persecuting Jews.

Watch KCRA’s documentary in the video player at the top of this story.

For photos shared by the Bucci family, interactive maps and graphics detailing Italy’s history during World War II and resources to continue learning about the Holocaust, click here.