213 - Growing Up In Germany During WWII ft. Brandon’s Oma | Unsubscribe Podcast Ep 213

We are super excited to bring you this very special episode with Brandon’s Oma! Watch this episode ad-free and uncensored on Pepperbox! https://www.pepperbox.tv/ WATCH THE AFTERSHOW & BTS ON PATREON! https://www.patreon.com/UnsubscribePodcast ------------------------------ THANK YOU TO OUR SPONSORS! GHOSTBED Right now, prices are already lower—but you’ll get an extra 10% off when you use code UNSUBSCRIBE at checkout. Go to https:// GhostBed.com/unsubscribe to get started! HOF Get a 7-Day Free Trial + 50% Off your first month with code UNSUB. Just download the HOF app on iOS or Android, enter code UNSUB, and you’re all set! SURKSHARK Go to https://surfshark.com/unsubscribe and use code unsubscribe at checkout to get 4 extra months of Surfshark VPN! TUSHY Over 2 Million Butts Love TUSHY. Get 10% off TUSHY with the code UNSUBSCRIBE at https://hellotushy.com/UNSUBSCRIBE ------------------------------ UNSUB MERCH: https://www.bunkerbranding.com/pages/unsubscribe-podcast ------------------------------ FOLLOW THE HOSTS: Eli_Doubletap https://www.instagram.com/eli_doubletap/ https://www.twitch.tv/Eli_Doubletap https://x.com/Eli_Doubletap https://www.youtube.com/c/EliDoubletap Brandon Herrera https://www.youtube.com/@BrandonHerrera https://x.com/TheAKGuy https://www.instagram.com/realbrandonherrera Donut Operator https://www.youtube.com/@DonutOperator https://x.com/DonutOperator https://www.instagram.com/donutoperator The Fat Electrician https://www.youtube.com/@the_fat_electrician https://thefatelectrician.com/ https://www.instagram.com/the_fat_electrician https://www.tiktok.com/@the_fat_electrician ------------------------------ unsubscribe pod podcast episode ep unsub funny comedy military army comedian texas podcasts #podcast #comedy #funnypodcast Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:30Speaker 01

  You on a date, how about Schindler's List?

• 0:32Speaker 02

  Unexploded ornament.

• 0:34Speaker 03

  Dude, all I'm saying is me and my friends would have thrown rocks at it.

• 0:37Speaker 01

  Why do women live longer than men?

• 0:39The Fat Electrician?

  Well, she matched her nails to her shirt and her necklace. I don't know what you're doing.

• 0:46Speaker 05

  Say hi to Eli. He's racially ambiguous and random. His hair is fucking fabulous. Donut, a dark joke disposition. And there's a fat electrician who'll come to unsubscribe.

• 1:06Speaker 03

  And then you're gonna drink all of it.

• 1:08Speaker 02

  Down it, yeah.

• 1:09Speaker 01

  You can take a little sip if you want. Just if you want.

• 1:14Speaker 03

  Y'all ready?

• 1:15Speaker 01

  Ready to go?

• 1:16Speaker 03

  Yeah, three, two, one.

• 1:21Speaker 03

  Hi, everyone. Welcome to Unsubscribe Podcast. We are joined today in a very special episode. We have Brandon Herrera. Brandon Herrera's Oma. Eli Double-Tat, myself, Donut Operator. Thank you so much for joining us.

• 1:35Speaker 02

  It feels so weird being on this side. I usually sit there every time.

• 1:39Speaker 01

  Oh, is this throwing you off a little bit? This is normally Eli's seat, on the left side.

• 1:45Speaker 02

  This is the first time ever in 200 episodes. I was so excited to have you. Thank you for coming. You're welcome. Are you excited? Yes.

• 1:56Speaker 06

  You're excited?

• 1:57Speaker 01

  I'm really excited. I teased this, I don't know, maybe twenty, thirty episodes ago. I thought like, I just thought about it during, while we were recording. I'm like, oh man. You know, my, my oma's lived a lot of life and she's, she's got some crazy stories and you know, I think the, our audience might be interested in hearing some of them. And I pitched it by the guys. They said they'd love to come out here and talk to you. And here we are.

• 2:19Speaker 06

  Why you wanna hear an old lady's childhood experience?

• 2:25Speaker 02

  Yes, of course. Amazing stories. Brandon has given us a brief glimpses of your history. And it is phenomenal. And I think that's where we start is you were, where were you when you were a kid? Where did you grow up at?

• 2:40Speaker 06

  I was in Mannheim. And I remember I was about six years old. I went to school. And everything was still quiet. So I don't know if I was in school for one or two years. I'm not sure. And then when the sirens went off more often, we have less in the school. But then they bombed the surrounding areas, so the school were closed. And then we had an organization in Mannheim where they send children,

• 3:24Speaker 06

  they wanna get out of the danger areas. They send them away to safe places.

• 3:32Speaker 01

  So get them out of Germany and to other places that...

• 3:34Speaker 06

  Yep, right.

• 3:35Speaker 03

  So just real quick, when you were six years old, like what time period was that? Like nineteen forty...

• 3:45Speaker 01

  Well, what year were you born?

• 3:47Speaker 06

  Thirty-two.

• 3:48Speaker 01

  Nineteen thirty-two. Okay, so this would have been like thirty-eight, thirty-nine.

• 3:50Speaker 03

  Gotcha.

• 3:51Speaker 06

  So...

• 3:54Speaker 06

  My mom say you got both of my brother, my youngest brother and myself. So about the first one to get picked, of course, I was tiny and you know.

• 4:06Speaker 01

  You were the, you were the pretty one is what you, that was the way I always heard the story.

• 4:10Speaker 06

  Yes, and I really had good people. They took me in. They were rich people. Okay.

• 4:19Speaker 01

  And this was in France?

• 4:20Speaker 06

  Yes, it was outside France, you know, small town. I've forgotten the name of. And I had a maid because they had only one son and he was a baker. Boiled a good cakes he brought home. And I really should have been happy there, but I wasn't. Because she wouldn't let me go see my friends, surrounding friends, you know. She wanted me to be more with her friends. And I got more and more homesick and my mom came and visit.

• 5:02Speaker 06

  And everything was still okay then, but then they mentioned you adopt me. That was it. I saved my money up. I had allowance every week from them. And one day I went on the train and I went home. I left everything behind.

• 5:22Speaker 02

  So this is you going from France back to Germany during this time?

• 5:25Speaker 01

  Okay, because they, they said they wanted to adopt you, right?

• 5:29Speaker 06

  Yeah, they wanted to adopt me and that scared me. So I took off.

• 5:34Speaker 02

  Because you were at six years old at this time?

• 5:36Speaker 06

  No, I was little older, maybe eight, nine, I would say, you know.

• 5:43Speaker 02

  And then what time did you separate from your parents? At eight or nine is when they separated you from, and moved you to France from your parents?

• 5:52Speaker 06

  Yeah, and I didn't stay too long in France. I would say my, maybe six, eight months.

• 6:00Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 6:00Speaker 06

  And then I went back home.

• 6:02Speaker 02

  But still at eight, that's wild.

• 6:04Speaker 06

  And my mom was so mad.

• 6:07Speaker 01

  And you, you went back alone?

• 6:10Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 6:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, so alone at, from France to Germany alone?

• 6:15Speaker 06

  Alone.

• 6:16Speaker 02

  And you bought a ticket by yourself? You saved up?

• 6:18Speaker 06

  Yes. I was every day on the train station, I said, I wanna go home, but I don't have enough money, you know? So I said, I'm gonna save all my money, all my allowance. And one day, I did it. I just went. So like I said-

• 6:39Speaker 01

  Most eight-year-olds today don't know how to order a pizza on the phone.

• 6:42Speaker 06

  That's true.

• 6:44Speaker 02

  I take my nine-year-old to the bus, cuz I don't think he can make it. And that's two blocks away.

• 6:52Speaker 06

  Even when I went home, she was pretty upset, my mom. And I said, "Don't send me back, please, you know? I don't wanna go back. I wanna be with you." So that was number one. Then, they were bombing Menheim for the first time. And we had, at the time, we had a room in the underground bunker.

• 7:24Speaker 06

  Every night, we spent the night there.

• 7:27Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 7:27Speaker 06

  Yeah. Daytime, we went home. But sometimes, the siren went off, so we go to different cellars, you know, whatever we were close by. And that one day, we were looking for food, because we were rationed at the time.

• 7:49Speaker 06

  And we had about half a little bread a week, you know? Yeah? We even eat, I hate to say that, horse meat. It was pretty good at the time.

• 8:02Speaker 06

  And we had nothing, right?

• 8:04Speaker 02

  Meat's meat.

• 8:06Speaker 01

  If you've ever had Taco Bell, then you've had it too.

• 8:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 8:10Speaker 06

  So, um, where was I?

• 8:14Speaker 01

  I said, uh, the bunkers.

• 8:16Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 8:17Speaker 02

  This is 1940-ish, or-

• 8:20Speaker 06

  Oh, don't ask me for this.

• 8:21Speaker 02

  Oh, you're good, girl. You're good.

• 8:23Speaker 06

  I remember the years.

• 8:24Speaker 01

  It's alright.

• 8:27Speaker 01

  I don't- Early 40s, I would say.

• 8:28Speaker 06

  Yeah. I don't know, 100% the H-E, you know?

• 8:32Speaker 02

  Yeah, you're good.

• 8:33Speaker 06

  But pretty close. So, that day-

• 8:39Speaker 06

  We went to bunker and there was a bomb. Matter of fact, one of the bombs hit the bunker. But it didn't injure nobody.

• 8:48Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 8:48Speaker 06

  And it was pretty close, but it was okay. And I don't know if I should tell you that story. We had bunk beds, two, four, six bunk beds in that room. There was my mother on the bottom. I was on the second. My brother was right on the second one, on the other one. And friends of ours were with us. They were good friends. And we always left the door open, but like this, so we get little light into the room. And I-

• 9:27Speaker 02

  And that's the door to like the outside hallway in the bunker or to the-

• 9:31Speaker 06

  Yeah, there was light on the outside.

• 9:33Speaker 02

  Because this is underground. This is no light. It's just pitch black if that door is closed.

• 9:38Speaker 06

  No, there was light.

• 9:39Speaker 02

  Okay, there is light, okay.

• 9:40Speaker 06

  Yeah. But because we didn't want to sleep with the light on, we left the door open to get light from the hallway. So I woke up. You ever smelled somebody that smokes a lot? I mean-

• 9:54Speaker 02

  Connor, yeah Connor, yeah.

• 9:56Speaker 06

  No. What can I do? I mean, heavy.

• 10:02Speaker 02

  Connor.

• 10:04Speaker 06

  I smoke a lot of cigarettes online, sorry. And I woke up and there was a tall guy standing right in front of my bed. I was uncovered, okay? I had pajamas on though. And I thought, I was scared. Of course, I was a young girl, you know? And I didn't want to scream, so I just moved back from the bed to the wall. And I tried to wake my brother up. And my brother said, ah, there she goes again. She got a nightmare, because I did have nightmares sometimes, you know, from the-

• 10:47Speaker 06

  And I said, please, I beg somebody. No, he meant to close the door. See, and it was pitch black. And that's what really scared me. And I said, please, somebody get up and turn the light on. There's somebody in here, you know? Like I said, my brother says she's got nightmares. But the lady that we know, she's, I get up here, she says, I turn the light on. So he was laying on a bench in the room, right? Like he was sleeping, but he wasn't sleeping, you know, I know better.

• 11:28Speaker 06

  And they called the, what they called the manager from the undercover bunker and the preacher. And they came in and they say, sir, you don't have a place to stay or you, you need, you know? He wouldn't answer, like he was sound asleep. I said, he's not sleeping. He was just standing here, you know? And so my dad, the guys, they were across the hall, my dad and other guys. They came over and they say, they got then shook him, you know, and says, look,

• 12:10Speaker 06

  you need some places to stay or what is it, you know? And all of a sudden he jumped up and he ran out of the room. And he said something in a different language. We didn't know what it was. But he had a German uniform on, but it was not complete. He only had a jacket on, you see?

• 12:32Speaker 03

  Ah.

• 12:33Speaker 06

  And even right, we were, we were right next to the exit and the entrance. He took off and we never seen him again, you know?

• 12:43Speaker 03

  Who do you think he was, Brandon? Like a deserter?

• 12:48Speaker 01

  The way I'd heard the story before, I would have assumed deserter, but the other language was, it's interesting. I don't, I don't really.

• 12:54Speaker 06

  I don't know what, like, people cussing us out or some, you know, something like this.

• 12:59Speaker 01

  You had no idea what language? You just, you knew it was different?

• 13:03Speaker 06

  He was kind of, yeah. He was not sure.

• 13:06Speaker 02

  And he just snuck, snuck in in the middle of the night? And thankfully, was it the smell that woke you up?

• 13:12Speaker 06

  Yeah. He had a real bad smell, like real heavy smoker and maybe drinking, who knows? But in a way, from that day on, they closed the doors in the bunker. So nobody could go in and out, you know, after a certain time.

• 13:27Speaker 01

  If only the Buffalo Public School System could take some notes.

• 13:30Speaker 02

  It was Connor, dude.

• 13:32Speaker 03

  I really don't like the comparisons being made between me and this predator.

• 13:40Speaker 02

  But you look great for your age.

• 13:45Speaker 02

  That would have been terrifying, especially when you're eight to 10 years old at that time.

• 13:50Speaker 06

  Maybe a little older, maybe 10.

• 13:52Speaker 02

  That's still.

• 13:54Speaker 01

  Cause you would have been, so if you were born in 32, you would have been 12 to 13 when the war ended?

• 14:00Speaker 06

  I think I was almost 50, 14.

• 14:04Speaker 01

  14, okay.

• 14:05Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 14:06Speaker 01

  Gotcha.

• 14:06Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 14:06Speaker 01

  So that, within that time span?

• 14:08Speaker 06

  Right.

• 14:10Speaker 02

  And you'd go down there, so in that, it was the evening, so during the day you would be up and then?

• 14:15Speaker 06

  We'd be home, you know, when the sirens went off, we said, I was going to which place? Depends if we were out looking for food, of course. My mom and I, we used to go to the farmers and trade the clothes or cheat stuff, you know, for food. Cause we didn't have enough food, you know? And, well, anyway, my brother and I, we used to look if our house was still standing, you know? So we walked home, of course, looking, the houses were burning, you know? That nothing came down on us. And we came to this giant hole, I'll never forget that.

• 15:01Speaker 06

  Giant hole. Now, so what's this? And the closer we got, we seen that big bomb, I mean, big one. That was not exploded, you see? I don't know what they say in English, but we say blind ganger, you know? It didn't explode it.

• 15:19Speaker 02

  Unexploded ordinance.

• 15:20Speaker 06

  And my brother, smart brother, he was only a year older than I. He said, don't move. And I was freezing there. What do you want me to do? You know? He took off. He left me standing there.

• 15:35Speaker 03

  Dude, all I'm saying is me and my friends would have thrown rocks at it.

• 15:40Speaker 06

  Dink, dink.

• 15:41Speaker 03

  Let's see what happens.

• 15:42Speaker 01

  Why do women live longer than men?

• 15:45Speaker 02

  Let's light this candle.

• 15:47Speaker 05

  Hey Brandon, you ever wake up in your bed feeling like you just fought in a war? Walk in.

• 15:54Speaker 01

  Yeah, what do you ask?

• 15:55Speaker 05

  You ever wake up and feel like you slept in a sauna?

• 15:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, I believe that's called night sweats.

• 15:59Speaker 05

  Me, you got a trash mattress, Brandon.

• 16:02Speaker 01

  Why are we talking like Macho Man Randy Savage?

• 16:04Speaker 05

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• 16:47Speaker 05

  Oh, yeah. And you know what, brother? They don't just sell mattresses. They have pieces, pillows, sheets, the whole empanada. Just pick your mattress and grab a bundle.

• 17:00Speaker 02

  Right now, prices are already lower, but you'll get an extra 10% off when you use code unsubscribe at checkout. Head over to ghostbed.com/unsubscribe and get started today. That's ghostbed.com/unsubscribe. Unsubscribe, use the code unsubscribe. Or I'll start rattling chains under your bed until you do. Sleep better, stay cooler.

• 17:20Speaker 06

  And I said, why did you do that? I was tiptoeing backwards, you know.

• 17:25Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 17:27Speaker 06

  He says, I tried to get help. I say, yeah, you tell me to stop. But anyway.

• 17:34Speaker 02

  That's a funny explanation.

• 17:36Speaker 06

  Yeah, so.

• 17:38Speaker 02

  That big bomb just sitting in the middle of the road, especially at that age.

• 17:42Speaker 06

  Yeah, that was.

• 17:46Speaker 02

  Well, how, how was your view at that time? Like with, what was your understanding at that age of what's going on? Like you understood there was a war going on.

• 17:55Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 17:56Speaker 02

  But was it just like, we're civilians, we're scared, we're just trying to get out of the war?

• 18:01Speaker 06

  My mind, well, it was how long is it gonna be? When is it over? Right? That's what I always said. But it was long, long, long.

• 18:11Speaker 06

  In a way, that day. Then my mom got keine Westlasse gehe. She says, the thron bombs now in our city, they get closer and closer, it get more and more. You know? So she says, you need to go to our friends in the Black Forest. We had friends in the Black Forest. And it was safe there, there didn't bomb there, you know? Now, the mom don't send me away again, you know? I didn't wanna go. But meanwhile, before she sent me anyway.

• 18:52Speaker 06

  We went to, like I said, looking where we get some food. And the sirens went off and say, it's too late to go to a bunker where we want, we want a different place. Let's go home. I said, Mom, I'm hungry, you know? Let's get something to eat. And we're going outside. And we did. And there was another funny story. It was on the 10th of May, the day before my birthday. I said, oh, they're sending me a birthday gift early.

• 19:28Speaker 02

  There's that dark humor. Yeah, I love it.

• 19:32Speaker 02

  It's generations deep.

• 19:36Speaker 06

  And, well, we made it through this one. But afterwards, we found out that cellar we used to go to when we were

• 19:48Speaker 06

  out, that supposed to be bomb booth, okay? So they said.

• 19:56Speaker 06

  And now, we found out the bomb that came from the back into the cellar and killed so many people.

• 20:08Speaker 06

  And we went there, of course, terrified, I remember that. When then I found that baby, you know, and I grabbed that baby and I cleaned the sand and the dirt and everything out, you know? And the mother screaming for her babies. She had half of her face missing. I seen that like yesterday. And the baby died in my arms, you know? But, there were no doctors, you know? Hospitals, nothing, everything was a mess. So we had to tell the lady, we okay, we got your baby, you know?

• 20:50Speaker 06

  Just to get her calm down, you know? And the rest of the bodies, they brought them to school areas or restaurants and they lined them up and covered them, you know? And my brother was always gone, my dad. They had to help, help them, stupid Nazis to build a wall. By the water, we lived right by the water, you see? And they were putting like a safety wall or something, I don't know. So they were always gone. So we didn't know what happened to them.

• 21:30Speaker 06

  So we looked at everybody, hoping we don't find them, you know? And...

• 21:41Speaker 06

  Thank you so much. It's okay. And then it was, everything was filled up. They put the bodies up in trucks, just, you know, put them up in trucks. We don't know where they went or what. And now, in a way, another day, another alarm, right? So we went back to, I think it was our cellar, yeah. And we heard commotions. There were, an English plane was shut down over our city.

• 22:21Speaker 06

  And the parachute, the guy came down in our street, you know, where we live. And of course, some people, oh, there's one of them. You know how it was, it was war.

• 22:33Speaker 01

  Do you remember if it was American or British or who it was?

• 22:37Speaker 06

  It was not Americans.

• 22:38Speaker 01

  It was British?

• 22:39Speaker 06

  The English came in first, the English. And so my mom, she was more outspoken than I am. But she went over there and she said, you leave that young man alone. You know, she said, I got a son. And he's in Africa in El Alamein.

• 23:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 23:02Speaker 06

  He got prisoner in El Alamein and then shipped to the States, right? And she tried to protect that young, and there were two SS guys right there. And they arrested my mom. They said, she's a country traitor. She was taken to the, I don't know where they were, you know, their offices or whatever. And they put the sign out with other people that she was a country traitor.

• 23:38Speaker 06

  But I'm jumping ahead there because meanwhile there were more stuff going on me at back traffic.

• 23:46Speaker 01

  Absolutely, but to finish that out real quick, I think what, and correct me if I get any of this wrong, because I've, this is over the course of years here in, you know, stories, some of them secondhand, but they said that they were, I was told that they were about to ship her off to a concentration camp.

• 24:01Speaker 06

  Right.

• 24:02Speaker 01

  And then they were liberated.

• 24:04Speaker 06

  That's why I jumped ahead, I just thought about it because the English, they came, that's why they didn't have time to ship my mom out, see, because the.

• 24:16Speaker 00

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• 24:42Speaker 06

  Nazi was scattering, they took off, you know, that's a little bit too far. Because I forgot the second trip to the Black Forest.

• 24:55Speaker 01

  What is the Black Forest?

• 24:57Speaker 06

  It's an area close to Switzerland.

• 25:01Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 25:02Speaker 06

  And they lived there, but they were good friends of ours, they moved there. And I felt good there because I knew them, you know.

• 25:12Speaker 01

  A town inside a forest, or is it just a city?

• 25:16Speaker 06

  It's a region. No, it's a little city.

• 25:18Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 25:19Speaker 06

  Called Black Forest.

• 25:20Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 25:21Speaker 06

  And so I went to school there, you know, and.

• 25:29Speaker 06

  Then my mom came to visit again. And she got sick. So.

• 25:38Speaker 01

  The Black Forest.

• 25:39Speaker 02

  Oh, okay.

• 25:40Speaker 06

  It's real pretty.

• 25:41Speaker 02

  Beautiful. Oh my God, yeah.

• 25:43Speaker 06

  It's real pretty.

• 25:44Speaker 02

  Gorgeous.

• 25:45Speaker 06

  Yeah. So my mom got sick. She had a gallbladder attack. And they didn't have a doctor in that little town, you know. So they took her, but I would say,

• 26:03Speaker 06

  I don't know, about four miles away to the hospital.

• 26:10Speaker 06

  She had surgery there.

• 26:13Speaker 06

  And I walked, I think, I can't do, I couldn't do it again. I don't think I could. I walked through the woods by myself with smelling the boars. You know what a boar is?

• 26:31Speaker 02

  The big pigs?

• 26:32Speaker 06

  Pretty bad animal, you know.

• 26:34Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah, boars do, yeah. Very aggressive.

• 26:37Speaker 06

  And when I smelled them, I was going just looking, you know, and see which tree can I climb, you know.

• 26:46Speaker 01

  Just walking through the Black Forest alone as a child.

• 26:48Speaker 06

  Alone that time. My shoes, I had holes in. Honestly, by the time I got to that hospital.

• 26:56Speaker 01

  You said every time you smelled a boar, you were ready to climb a tree?

• 26:59Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah.

• 27:00Speaker 02

  And this is like 12 years old?

• 27:03Speaker 01

  Probably younger.

• 27:04Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah.

• 27:06Speaker 06

  In a way, they were all nice in the hospital. They let me stay there because my mom, you know, and till she could travel. And then we took her back to the friends of ours, you know, but by train. And she stayed till she felt better. And then she said, honey, I gotta go home. That's your partner, that's her husband, you know. So she left. I said, okay. It was hard thinking she wasn't completely healed, you know.

• 27:45Speaker 06

  But I stayed a while and then I said, no, I gotta go home. You know, I gotta take care of her. And I did it again. I saved my money and I went on the train, hidden from Mannheim. And on the way to Mannheim, I heard sirens in the distance. And the train stopped and they said, everybody out. Go to the woods, there were a lot of woods, you know. Because they used to target the butchers, the trains, you know, all this.

• 28:25Speaker 02

  So all the infrastructure that they could damage.

• 28:27Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah. So we had to stay there for a while till we got the clear to go back, you know. So by the time I reached Mannheim, we couldn't go into the, what do they call it? Barnhop, you know.

• 28:44Speaker 02

  Train station.

• 28:45Speaker 06

  Yes, the train station because they was bombed. So I had to have a mile ladder to walk, you know, to go home. And I was glad I went home because mom's wounds didn't look good, you know, they were infected. So I had to take care of my mom, clean the wounds and just take care of her, you know. And then one day, the sirens went off again. So I said, Mom, where are we going now? We don't wanna go to our cellar, it's getting pretty bad, you know, the bombing a lot lately. So I said, there's a underground bunker across the bridge, you know.

• 29:30Speaker 06

  We lived right by the Neckar River. And we thought we could make it good, but it was kinda late. So half of the bridge, my mom walked down, she couldn't walk. She said, I can't walk no more. I said, you have to, you got to get up because we gotta make it, you know.

• 29:52Speaker 02

  You're pushing your mom, so you're trying to, you're motivating her to do.

• 29:56Speaker 06

  And I tried to pull up, nobody helps you, they all run for their lives, you know. And we finally made it, but I seen already the bombs, you know.

• 30:09Speaker 06

  And it seems like I'll never forget it going down the steps with my mom. And like, close the door, like they're coming right at us, you know, the sound of it and all this.

• 30:23Speaker 06

  So that went okay, I guess.

• 30:27Speaker 06

  And I already told you the story with that young man coming down and, you know.

• 30:37Speaker 06

  So.

• 30:37Speaker 01

  Well, while we're there, we kind of, if we could backtrack even a little bit more, because you mentioned in that story that your mom was saying, look, I have a son who was captured as well.

• 30:48Speaker 06

  Exactly.

• 30:48Speaker 01

  I want you to treat him well because I want my son to be treated well.

• 30:52Speaker 06

  Right.

• 30:52Speaker 01

  Can we talk a little bit about your brother?

• 30:54Speaker 06

  Oh, my brother, he was drafted to the army.

• 30:57Speaker 01

  What was his name?

• 30:58Speaker 06

  He was drafted.

• 30:59Speaker 01

  What was his name?

• 31:01Speaker 06

  Hans.

• 31:01Speaker 01

  Hans.

• 31:02Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 31:02Speaker 01

  It was Hans and Willie, right?

• 31:04Speaker 06

  Willie, yeah. He was my oldest brother. He was 10 years. You don't know. Hey, guys, who's gonna get the next triple double in the WNBA?

• 31:12Speaker 01

  Is it Katelyn Clark? None of us watch that.

• 31:14The Fat Electrician?

  It's Katelyn Clark, for sure.

• 31:17Speaker 01

  I don't know what the f any of those letters mean.

• 31:19The Fat Electrician?

  Just use the Hall of Fame app. It's got all the data on everything, all the analytics.

• 31:24Speaker 02

  What's WNBA?

• 31:26Speaker 01

  It's what they play in hell.

• 31:29The Fat Electrician?

  It's like basketball, but nobody can dunk.

• 31:31Speaker 01

  I can't wait to bet on layup after layup after layup.

• 31:34The Fat Electrician?

  Check the app. Can I bet on how many rebounds Angel Reese gets that are from her own missed layups? Is there a parlay for that?

• 31:40Speaker 01

  Wait, the Hall of Fame app, was that the one that was started by two Ivy League grads? This is not your buddy's group chat full of hot takes. It's a full analytics engine. And it's built for the average, everyday sports fan, so it's easy and intuitive to use. No big words that are hard to pronounce.

• 31:54The Fat Electrician?

  Well, there's MLB, NBA, NFL, Hall of Fame has all the analytics. And with over 6,000 five-star reviews, it's safe to say that HOF has already helped a lot of people.

• 32:03Speaker 01

  Unlike my HOA, who I am actively fighting with. Fuck you, Betty.

• 32:07The Fat Electrician?

  Listeners get a seven day free trial and 50% off their first month. That's half. Just download the HOF app and use the code UNSUB at checkout. For a limited time only, our listeners get not only a seven day free trial, but 50% off at checkout when you use code UNSUB.

• 32:22Speaker 01

  Just download the HOF app on iOS or Android, use the code UNSUB, and you're all set.

• 32:27Speaker 02

  My senior.

• 32:29Speaker 06

  Yeah, and like I said, he was in Africa and then he got captured in El Alamein. And.

• 32:38Speaker 01

  So he fought under Rommel with the North African campaign until.

• 32:43Speaker 06

  And first he came to the States. I forgot where he was, but he came to the States and he didn't have it as good, you know, in person. But then he got transferred to England.

• 33:02Speaker 06

  And he had a mate. He was striving for the higher colonel or mayor, whatever he was, you know, he was a striver. He loved it. He had a mate.

• 33:16Speaker 02

  Way better than war.

• 33:18Speaker 01

  Were you allowed to talk to him at all, like any letters or correspondence? Okay.

• 33:22Speaker 06

  Well, when he was in Africa, we did before he got captured.

• 33:27Speaker 01

  Right.

• 33:27Speaker 06

  You know, that little bit we got, I'll never forget it. We always put a little bit of our food, not food, but candy or chocolate or something in his package. And we sent him real thin scarves because of the sandstorms they had, you know.

• 33:46Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 33:48Speaker 01

  You know.

• 33:50Speaker 02

  I know.

• 33:51Speaker 06

  They had sandstorms, yeah. Anyway.

• 33:58Speaker 06

  The other story was, where were we?

• 34:03Speaker 01

  So we were, uh, we were just talking about your brother being captured and then driving for the Colonel and whatnot.

• 34:08Speaker 06

  Right. And, uh, well, little later on, like I said, my, uh, dad were never there, my brother were never there. It was just me and my mom.

• 34:21Speaker 01

  They were off doing labor? They were off being forced to do labor?

• 34:25Speaker 06

  Yes, they were forced to. And, uh, so we had to look out for ourselves, you know?

• 34:32Speaker 01

  Cause your, your father was a lot older, right?

• 34:34Speaker 06

  Yes. Twenty-five years older than my mom.

• 34:40Speaker 02

  Oh, okay.

• 34:41Speaker 01

  Cause, no, I'm recounting a little bit of family history that I think I know about. Please tell me if I'm wrong.

• 34:46Speaker 06

  No, you're not.

• 34:47Speaker 01

  I think that, so he was, uh, he was kind of a little on the older side during World War I, but he was part of like the, the militia that they used for like, not the young men, but it was called the, the Lüngewer, which was basically like a militia of like older people that they won't send to the front lines, but still like ready to fight.

• 35:06Speaker 02

  Gotcha. So they're reserves, army, like army reserves almost.

• 35:10Speaker 01

  Do you remember when your, when your father was born? What year?

• 35:14Speaker 06

  You had, uh?

• 35:17Speaker 01

  Sorry, I know there was, I'm not putting you on the spot, but you said he was 25 years older than your mom.

• 35:22Speaker 06

  Okay, my mom were born in 01.

• 35:24Speaker 01

  Okay, so he would have born, he would have been born in the 1870s?

• 35:28Speaker 02

  Yeah, 1876, 1875.

• 35:31Speaker 06

  Yeah, he was.

• 35:33Speaker 01

  And so at this point in the war, he would be in his 70s?

• 35:35Speaker 06

  No, he was young, I think he was in.

• 35:39Speaker 01

  You think? Okay.

• 35:41Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 35:42Speaker 01

  But still not a, not a spry young man.

• 35:43Speaker 06

  No. But, uh, oh goodness, then, yeah, like I said, my mom were there, whole person, there was still the energy I got them all, yeah. And, uh, my dad came finally home and, uh...

• 36:05Speaker 06

  We decide we'll go to the bunker that's closer to us. Because it was too far to go. Because you couldn't wait the bomb. You know, you can't say wait till we get there. It's impossible. So we went to the bunker by the water. That's the upright bunker, the tall one. You know, supposed to be bomb safe. So me and my brother, me and my dad, we were going and get some food. And mom were already in the bunker. And my brother, I don't know where he was. So we went home, we got food.

• 36:48Speaker 06

  And on the way to the riverside, we heard them cannons, you heard the, you know.

• 36:57Speaker 01

  Like artillery.

• 36:58Speaker 06

  Yeah, you can hear and you don't know where it hits. And one of them came, went in and out. And we went into the doorway, you know, just covered ourselves. But we had to cross the field to get to the bunker. And the English were across the river already by then, you see. So they were shooting guns and everything. So we were calling on the floor, on the ground, get into the bunker, you know. And they were shooting, I just. We made it somehow. And they already closed the bunker, you know.

• 37:42Speaker 06

  And we were banging on them steel doors, open the doors. We need to get in, you know. Finally, they decided it was us, you know. And we made it in. But there was really, really scared, really scared.

• 38:00Speaker 01

  Being shot at is terrifying.

• 38:03Speaker 06

  Totally. So. What else we can?

• 38:10Speaker 01

  Well, there was, there was one story I found really interesting too about your younger brother, which would have been Willie.

• 38:18Speaker 01

  About him surrendering to the British?

• 38:21Speaker 06

  Oh, afterwards, okay. Then the British came across. Before they came across, they were right across the river. Okay, then we went to the bunker, my dad and I. And my youngest brother, we didn't know that till afterwards, you know, he was always gone. The mayor from a city, two other gentlemen and my brother, for some reason, they went in the boat. And they went across the river. Two with the white flag, of course. And to give the city to...

• 39:01Speaker 01

  Surrender, surrender.

• 39:05Speaker 06

  And my brother forgot he had a gun, I mean, a knife in his side pocket, you know. And just before he got all the way across, he realized that. So he grabbed the knife and let it go in the water.

• 39:20Speaker 03

  Dang, I bet you missed that one, don't you, Brandon?

• 39:22Speaker 01

  Right.

• 39:23Speaker 03

  A knife? That would have been kind of cool.

• 39:26Speaker 01

  That would have been a cool heirloom.

• 39:27Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 39:28Speaker 01

  But the, yeah, we've done that many a times at TSA. For the same, for the same reason.

• 39:34Speaker 03

  Yeah, tossed a couple of knives at the airport.

• 39:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:39Speaker 06

  And the Germans, of course, they disappeared from the riverfront, of course, right? Or my mom would have been shipped out, but she was in a time where she was just lucky, you know?

• 39:52Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:53Speaker 06

  I forgot to tell you the story. When I was, I was back, I was maybe

• 40:02Speaker 06

  eight years old, something like this. Where I thought, what is going on? You know, they were getting people out of their apartments. And a lot of Jews had stores and everything. I said, what's going on, you know, we didn't know what was going on. So they told the people, they're gonna send the Jews to a new colony where all the Jews get together, their own, you know.

• 40:36Speaker 01

  Little Jew colony.

• 40:37Speaker 06

  Yes. And while they were gone, that's my clock.

• 40:43Speaker 01

  Means it's six o'clock.

• 40:44Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 40:46Speaker 06

  And while they were gone, they burned everything. I remember they torn furniture out of the windows. You know, it was terrible. There was a sight I never forget either. You know, they shipped them out and we didn't know where they were going.

• 41:03Speaker 01

  At eight years old, you have no concept for what's going on?

• 41:06Speaker 06

  You know?

• 41:07Speaker 02

  You're just seeing stuff thrown out one day.

• 41:09Speaker 06

  We did not heard about the concentration camps till the war was over. Honestly, we didn't know. And I couldn't believe it. Matter of fact, later on, when I met your Oprah, we went to a movie, the first movie we went, they showed concentration camps and all this. I was shocked. I was shocked and I said, and my mom would have been there too, you know? After all you go through.

• 41:51Speaker 06

  It was miserable. It was not a good childhood, put it this way, you know?

• 42:01Speaker 00

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• 42:31Speaker 06

  And even my mom and my dad, I shouldn't say that, but 25 years is too much different in a marriage, you know? It was good in the beginning because she was young, he was still in his 50s, you know, it was okay.

• 42:55Speaker 06

  But laying it on is when it started, you know, because my mom wanted a new dress laying it on and, you know, she wanted to look good. My dad wore chillas. It's crazy. Because my mom were a good-looking woman, you know. So there were always fights and where was I? Under the table, you know. So from small kid, it was, you know, we didn't have no gratulations or stuff like that, you know.

• 43:33Speaker 03

  When did you make your way to the United States?

• 43:38Speaker 06

  Well, I was, I was eighteen and a half when I met her dad.

• 43:47Speaker 01

  All this time in Germany and she shacks up with the first Texan she meets.

• 43:54Speaker 03

  You met a Texan boy?

• 43:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 43:57Speaker 06

  Yeah, he was from Laredo.

• 44:00Speaker 03

  Laredo? Where did you meet him at?

• 44:02Speaker 06

  Frey, really. You know where Frey is?

• 44:06Speaker 01

  It's like Dilly?

• 44:07Speaker 06

  Oh, Dilly.

• 44:08Speaker 01

  Yeah. Frey County.

• 44:10Speaker 03

  How did you meet a Texan boy?

• 44:13Speaker 06

  Well, my brother and I, we went to, what do you call it? Gestags, we called it, okay, west one. And they started first, the guy was playing the harmonica.

• 44:28Speaker 03

  Accordion?

• 44:28Speaker 01

  Accordion.

• 44:29Speaker 06

  Accordion. And we go there on a Saturday, you know. But my brother didn't let me go alone. I was almost nineteen.

• 44:39Speaker 01

  It's a protective brother.

• 44:40Speaker 06

  Yeah. And I met really my husband's friend first. You know, they were all in the same company. And he was a darn good-looking guy, I tell you. But he was, he likes to fight. When there were a fight going on in the place, he was involved and I didn't like that, you see. So I said, no, that's not the guy for me. And one day, he brought that with him. And now.

• 45:21Speaker 06

  We were talking when he was gone, you know, and I said, "Yeah, I know he want me to be his girlfriend, but I don't like it when somebody get involved in somebody else's fights," you know? And he said, "Yeah, he's kind of fighter," you know, we were talking. He said, "Well, you want go movie with me next week?"

• 45:42Speaker 02

  He slid in and DMs.

• 45:46Speaker 03

  She would have hated us.

• 45:49Speaker 01

  Like, "He likes to fight," and we're just all like...

• 45:54Speaker 02

  "Want to go see a movie, though?"

• 45:56Speaker 01

  That's funny.

• 45:59Speaker 02

  What movie did he take you to?

• 46:01Speaker 06

  You know, I don't remember. I think the first movie, one of the movie from the concentration camp. I believe so. It could be.

• 46:10Speaker 01

  It's a hell of a thing for a first date.

• 46:12Speaker 02

  I know.

• 46:12Speaker 01

  A little heavy. Harsh first date. "Love to take you on a date. How about Schindler's List?"

• 46:19Speaker 06

  Do what?

• 46:22Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah, he didn't speak German at the time.

• 46:24Speaker 02

  Oh.

• 46:25Speaker 06

  No. I didn't speak English.

• 46:27Speaker 02

  Oh, my God.

• 46:28Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 46:29Speaker 03

  Were you guys using hand signals to talk to each other?

• 46:33Speaker 06

  No.

• 46:34Speaker 01

  Pointed cinema?

• 46:39Speaker 01

  That guy?

• 46:41Speaker 01

  No good.

• 46:43Speaker 06

  Yeah, so I said, "Okay, I go to English school," you know?

• 46:48Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 46:49Speaker 06

  And I did for a couple of weeks. And every time I came home and I learned something, and he said, "What did you say?" I couldn't understand.

• 47:01Speaker 03

  So, wait, wait, you, you were living with him?

• 47:04Speaker 06

  No.

• 47:04Speaker 03

  Oh, okay.

• 47:05Speaker 06

  No.

• 47:06Speaker 03

  I thought you said you came home.

• 47:08Speaker 06

  To my mom's side.

• 47:09Speaker 03

  Oh, okay.

• 47:11Speaker 01

  Hey, Brandon. You know what I can tell you about Surf Shark, brother? We are not doing this bit again. What bit are you talking about? Go ahead, Eli. What, what is Surf Shark? It's a VPN, Brandon. Oh, that's what the porn people use, right? And the servers offer the best speeds around. By default. It's easy to un-

• 47:34Speaker 07

  And you can run unlimited uses on a single subscription.

• 47:39Speaker 01

  Did you know you can overcome location-based price discrimination on plane tickets and car rentals by changing your VPN location? For real? Yeah, no, no, I didn't even know that. It's always a good sign in the ad when that happens. I genuinely didn't know that, but that's really good to know. Surfshark. Surfshark. Plus, you can be safe on public Wi-Fi because Surfshark encrypts your data, making it useless for anybody who steals it. Again, very important.

• 48:04Speaker 07

  Identity theft is not a joke, brother. Encryption ciphers scrambles that data so no one can make sense of it. Kind of like my thoughts. It's so scrambled, nobody can make sense of it.

• 48:23Speaker 07

  It just sounds like the horny Kool-Aid Man.

• 48:25The Fat Electrician?

  Head over to surfshark.com/ unsubscribe and use code unsub10 to get an additional four months of Surfshark VPN.

• 48:34Speaker 01

  That's surfshark.com/ unsubscribe using code unsub10.

• 48:39Speaker 06

  And he says, "I don't know what you're saying." And I said, "Why I go to school for?" You know? I stayed another week or so, and every time I come home, he says, "I don't know." It was a school English, and he just couldn't understand it, you know? And I said, "Forget it." So I quit, and I said, "Now you're gonna teach me," you know? It's amazing how much you can communicate when you have to.

• 49:09Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah.

• 49:09Speaker 06

  Isn't that true? Right?

• 49:12Speaker 01

  Depends on what you're communicating, I guess.

• 49:15Speaker 01

  Certain things go beyond words, I assume.

• 49:18Speaker 03

  I live with a Mexican opa. I don't understand half of what she's saying to me, but I understand it. I don't know the words, but I know what she's saying.

• 49:29Speaker 01

  She's even crazier because she speaks perfect English.

• 49:34Speaker 02

  She hits me with flip flops. She'll take her shoe off and she'll hit me with her shoe. Chocolates. The chocolates. There's one, oh, sorry.

• 49:43Speaker 06

  Yeah, I drove my husband crazy with TV. Every time we watch TV, I say, what she says, what she said. You know, I ask questions. That's how I learn. But by me tried to learn how to speak English.

• 50:02Speaker 06

  My kids never kept to German because, you know, I wanted to learn English. So I wanted him to keep speaking English. So I learned.

• 50:13Speaker 02

  First generation, it's.

• 50:15Speaker 06

  Oh, they understand words, you know. Especially the ones they're not supposed to say. That's the worst.

• 50:22Speaker 02

  Wow. Scheiße. Scheiße?

• 50:28Speaker 06

  Yeah, they learned the bad things first.

• 50:31Speaker 02

  You had, Brandon told a story during war that you went. There was a bomb, you were supposed to go into a different shelter. And then it got bombed, or someone was saying, come in. Oh, like a house. Yeah, come in the house, but then you didn't go in the house and then something happened to the house.

• 50:48Speaker 06

  Oh, the back of a house got bombed.

• 50:51Speaker 02

  Yeah, can you tell that story?

• 50:54Speaker 06

  Well, there was, when we checked, my brother and I, you know. The front were okay, then there is a, what they called it, between the back house. And this is not a garden, but a.

• 51:09Speaker 02

  A common area.

• 51:10Speaker 06

  Yeah. And that was bombed. And our apartment, we lived on the second floor. The wall, the wall was that much, we could look up to the third floor. It was just, you know, so we were lucky, didn't think, we're very lucky, I tell you.

• 51:33Speaker 06

  And I don't know, I have so much more, I know, but I can't.

• 51:39Speaker 01

  There is one that I thought was really funny that I heard of where I can't remember. I think it was your mother, but it was when the British came in and they busted into the house, you know, when they were first taking the city.

• 51:52Speaker 03

  They had some hot Texans with them.

• 51:55Speaker 01

  Apparently so.

• 51:56Speaker 03

  Very good looking Texans with them.

• 51:58Speaker 06

  You know, when the first English came in, right? We were on the second floor. I was in the corner, I was scared stiff, you know, because they were with guns, of course, and they came, looked at apartment, you know, and my mom tried to say, "Hi Hitler."

• 52:18Speaker 03

  Wrong crowd, wrong crowd. Were they just like?

• 52:22Speaker 06

  He did.

• 52:24Speaker 01

  How did they react?

• 52:26Speaker 06

  I think they didn't pay too much attention. They took all our jewelry, you know, and stuff, the English. And I thought I died when she did that. I said, "Mom, I hope they didn't hear you."

• 52:43Speaker 06

  But she was scared because she was taking, you know, and she thought, I don't know what she was thinking.

• 52:48Speaker 01

  Six years under.

• 52:50Speaker 03

  Yeah, she thought they were Nazi Germany type soldiers.

• 52:54Speaker 06

  They were scared. Oh my goodness.

• 52:57Speaker 01

  Yeah, you're just covering down.

• 52:58Speaker 06

  It was really scary.

• 52:59Speaker 01

  Yeah. How does your family feel about the Nazis coming to power?

• 53:04Speaker 06

  Do what?

• 53:05Speaker 01

  How does your family feel about the Nazis coming to power?

• 53:08Speaker 06

  You know, I'm gonna tell you something. I shouldn't say that, but I say it.

• 53:14Speaker 06

  First, Hitler was okay. When he first started, he was okay. We had food, everything, everything great.

• 53:23Speaker 03

  A good economy, like that's a very good economy.

• 53:25Speaker 06

  Everything was great. And then it started slowly, you know? He got greedy in other parts. Then he wanted to take other...

• 53:40Speaker 06

  Countries like France.

• 53:42Speaker 03

  Poland.

• 53:44Speaker 06

  You know, Poland and all this, he went slowly. He wanted more and more and more. He got greedy. And then when they went into Russia,

• 53:57Speaker 06

  that's when they made a big boom boom.

• 53:59Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 53:59Speaker 06

  Okay. Because the German army were not prepared for that cold weather. You know, the Russians were used to it, you know. So most of these people, the soldiers died, they froze, you know. That's when he lost it. And.

• 54:18Speaker 01

  Well, so if if I recall correctly, there is a there was an instance where Hitler came to your town, right?

• 54:28Speaker 06

  He was, yeah.

• 54:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 54:29Speaker 06

  He was in a.

• 54:29Speaker 01

  You you you got to see Hitler in person?

• 54:31Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 54:32Speaker 01

  And what abouts was that? Was that that was before the war?

• 54:36Speaker 01

  Or was it?

• 54:36Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 54:36Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 54:36Speaker 06

  No, I think it was. I don't quote me on that. I know. I remember all the people lined up and he came in the big Jeep or whatever it was, you know.

• 54:47Speaker 01

  A Volkswagen.

• 54:48Speaker 03

  Yes, it was a Volkswagen, yeah.

• 54:50Speaker 02

  Parade.

• 54:50Speaker 06

  Yeah. Kind of, yeah. And

• 54:56Speaker 06

  there, my mom could have got in trouble there. She couldn't keep her mouth shut, you know.

• 55:02Speaker 06

  I said, Mom.

• 55:03Speaker 01

  It seems to be a recurring theme.

• 55:06Speaker 03

  Generational.

• 55:09Speaker 06

  Oh gee, we told her, you better do what the others do or you'll be picked up, you know. That was before she got picked up, you know.

• 55:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 55:17Speaker 06

  And.

• 55:18Speaker 03

  So you actually saw Hitler.

• 55:21Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 55:22Speaker 03

  Two degrees of separation away from Hitler, Brandon Herrera.

• 55:26Speaker 01

  One degree for me, two degrees for you guys.

• 55:28Speaker 03

  Oh, dang it.

• 55:30Speaker 01

  Yeah. Six, so what is it? Six, seven degrees from Kevin Bacon?

• 55:34Speaker 06

  Your mom didn't salute them, did she? I remember one of the German army. I don't know if it was Gobels, Gobels or.

• 55:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, Kirbels.

• 55:47Speaker 06

  Or was the other one? One of them were good guy, you know.

• 55:53Speaker 01

  Is it Rommel?

• 55:54Speaker 03

  Got it.

• 55:55Speaker 06

  Rommel?

• 55:55Speaker 03

  What was it?

• 55:56Speaker 06

  Yeah, one of them.

• 55:57Speaker 02

  The good one.

• 55:57Speaker 01

  Rommel, because I think Rommel.

• 56:03Speaker 01

  Because I think Rommel was kind of one of those, he was just a really good general, but I don't think he was exactly pro Hitler.

• 56:09Speaker 02

  Connor, come here, come here, come here, step in for a second, I'll be over here.

• 56:13Speaker 01

  Hess, was it Hess?

• 56:15Speaker 06

  No.

• 56:16Speaker 01

  Oh.

• 56:16Speaker 06

  Was Scoppers, Scoppers or, or Rommel, one of the other.

• 56:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, I think Rommel was one of the ones that was not, he was, he was a good general and he loved Germany, but I don't think he was a Nazi necessarily.

• 56:29Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 56:30Speaker 01

  He wasn't super down with the program. If I'm remembering correctly, this is all just, you know, history.

• 56:36Speaker 06

  He was really, really good too.

• 56:38Speaker 01

  There is one thing I thought was kind of funny that I wanted to bring up. Because it was a funny story, I remember we, we took a road trip at some point. And I, I played a song for you. And it was Erica.

• 56:51Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 56:52Speaker 01

  That, that song from, from World War II, you know, the soldiers would sing it a bunch and such.

• 56:57Speaker 06

  I was there, I had a blue eye, I'm trying to see.

• 56:59Speaker 01

  Yep, yep. I was just, I was curious to know if you, to see if you knew it, and you started singing along with it, and I thought that was very funny, and, because the song's about, you know, a flower back in my hometown that is, you know, singing about a girl.

• 57:12Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 57:12Speaker 03

  Are they singing about Rommel?

• 57:14Speaker 01

  Well, so funny enough, what, what was your story? You said you heard the, the soldiers walking through town singing the song, or you were a little, little girl?

• 57:23Speaker 06

  What do you mean?

• 57:23Speaker 01

  I ju, I remember you, you saying at one point that the, the soldiers would be walking through town and you hear them singing the song.

• 57:30Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 57:30Speaker 01

  And as a little girl, you're like, that's me.

• 57:32Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 57:35Speaker 06

  I said, they're singing my song.

• 57:39Speaker 02

  With your, your two brothers, were they, when they got, they got drafted, correct?

• 57:43Speaker 06

  Yes, only one got drafted.

• 57:46Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 57:46Speaker 06

  My oldest brother.

• 57:48Speaker 02

  Oldest brother got drafted, and then your other one?

• 57:50Speaker 06

  He had to do what the, what they call it, SS, the Nazi told him to do.

• 57:57Speaker 01

  The assassin.

• 57:59Speaker 06

  He had to help build the war, the war, by the river, all kinds of stuff, we never know what it meant.

• 58:05Speaker 01

  So it would have been like Gestapo?

• 58:06Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 58:08Speaker 01

  Because I think you guys had to do like kind of Hitler Youth kind of stuff, right? Or he did at least.

• 58:14Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah.

• 58:15Speaker 02

  Oh, so he was told, hey, you have to do that. Now, when he surrendered for the town, you said, right?

• 58:20Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 58:21Speaker 02

  So they were just, that would be terrifying. So it's just like go across the river on a boat and then just hope they don't shoot you?

• 58:28Speaker 06

  Yep.

• 58:29Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 58:30Speaker 02

  That's wild.

• 58:31Speaker 06

  Of course.

• 58:33Speaker 00

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• 58:59Speaker 06

  The Nazi were gone by then, you know.

• 59:03Speaker 01

  But the British who had just fought all the way to that point, they don't know that.

• 59:06Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 59:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 59:08Speaker 06

  That was, yeah.

• 59:11Speaker 01

  But I think he was later recognized by the city for that, wasn't he?

• 59:14Speaker 06

  Yeah. Matter of fact, I wish I had a letter from the governor, you know, what a brave and young man he was, you know, to do this, you know. I don't know if I ever find it, I have it somewhere, you know? And they even wrote to me while I was here, you know?

• 59:39Speaker 01

  In the US?

• 59:40Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 59:41Speaker 01

  Oh, wow.

• 59:41Speaker 06

  Yeah. And my father, he wasn't scared of nothing.

• 59:48Speaker 01

  How did you feel about the British coming in? Were you afraid of them or?

• 59:51Speaker 06

  Of course I was afraid. And look, I was still a young kid, right? And the first black man I seen, I was hiding. I'd never seen a black man, you know, at the time. I never did. And we were scared of them, you know?

• 1:00:09Speaker 01

  You've just never seen any? Anything like it?

• 1:00:10Speaker 06

  No.

• 1:00:11Speaker 02

  Were you told they were gonna hurt you?

• 1:00:13Speaker 06

  Yeah, well, not your stories. They're gonna you, they're gonna do, you know, stuff like this. And then later on, the tea eyes, the English told Candace to the kids, you know, there was later. And there was something, I never forget seeing the black guy, he said, my god, how did he get black?

• 1:00:39Speaker 02

  Just confused.

• 1:00:45Speaker 02

  That would be wild if you've never seen that, you're like, what the fuck?

• 1:00:49Speaker 01

  Tell that, tell that to Netflix.

• 1:00:54Speaker 02

  So what, what age was it when you decided to move? Oh, you moved at eighteen to America, but what, what made you to decide?

• 1:01:02Speaker 01

  Or was it, did you move to America at eighteen or was it years later?

• 1:01:06Speaker 06

  No, no, it was, I was twenty, I think, twenty?

• 1:01:12Speaker 01

  So you'd been dating Oma for?

• 1:01:14Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:01:14Speaker 01

  A year and a half?

• 1:01:15Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:01:16Speaker 01

  So?

• 1:01:16Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:01:17Speaker 02

  Oh, so he was over in?

• 1:01:19Speaker 01

  Yeah, he was in Germany.

• 1:01:20Speaker 02

  Oh, okay.

• 1:01:21Speaker 01

  He was occupational for us.

• 1:01:22Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:01:22Speaker 02

  Mannheim was in West Germany?

• 1:01:28Speaker 02

  Yeah, well, you met an American, so you're in West Germany, right?

• 1:01:32Speaker 03

  Can I ask a question real quick?

• 1:01:34Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:01:34Speaker 03

  We call, we call her Oma.

• 1:01:37Speaker 01

  Oma, oma. Oma means grandmother and Oma is grandfather.

• 1:01:42Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 1:01:42Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:01:43Speaker 03

  Okay, gotcha.

• 1:01:44Speaker 06

  Oma and Oma.

• 1:01:46Speaker 02

  Gotcha, so both, and did he bring you stateside together? Did you move to America together?

• 1:01:53Speaker 06

  Well, there was another big story.

• 1:01:57Speaker 01

  I may not know this one.

• 1:01:59Speaker 03

  Was it another one of his friends you'd like to find?

• 1:02:06Speaker 01

  My mom might not know this story. She just looked over and asked her mom for confirmation.

• 1:02:28Speaker 07

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• 1:02:31Speaker 07

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• 1:02:34Speaker 05

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• 1:02:38Speaker 05

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• 1:02:54Speaker 05

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• 1:03:49Speaker 05

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• 1:03:59Speaker 06

  We wanted to get married, right? I said, "I'm not going to States not being married." See? But he said he's gotta go to States first.

• 1:04:12Speaker 06

  Because of his father or some, I don't know, something. He probably was sick or some, I forgot. And I said, "Oh, there we go." He goes to States, he never come back, right? That's what she think. And I'm in the work and one day up work I got I was my husband you know he won my husband and I said I can't believe it you did come back he said of course I told you I'll be back you know

• 1:04:43Speaker 01

  Running out on a family in the 50s was so easy

• 1:04:48Speaker 01

  You could move a town over and change your name

• 1:04:51Speaker 03

  You didn't have a family yet that's adorable How long was that before he came back?

• 1:04:56Speaker 06

  He was in the States maybe

• 1:05:01Speaker 06

  I would say three weeks four weeks something

• 1:05:03Speaker 01

  Oh okay and then he just showed back up in Germany and knocked on your door? All right and tell the truth you waited on him?

• 1:05:10Speaker 06

  No I thought he'd never come back

• 1:05:15Speaker 01

  She found the fighters You started going back out with the fighter?

• 1:05:19Speaker 06

  No I didn't go out no

• 1:05:22Speaker 03

  But

• 1:05:30Speaker 03

  Omar was an attractive young lady

• 1:05:33Speaker 01

  I'm here I'm learning some family history today

• 1:05:38Speaker 06

  Yeah no I'm in the work and like I said he came and he surprised me at work And then he asked me you wanna marry me? And I looked at him I said I gotta think about it

• 1:05:53Speaker 06

  I was a bad girl

• 1:05:57Speaker 06

  I gotta admit I wasn't teeth set

• 1:06:05Speaker 01

  You get one sip of claw in this one

• 1:06:08Speaker 03

  Omar likes to party

• 1:06:11Speaker 06

  I told him I gotta think about it you know And he said why I told you you know

• 1:06:17Speaker 03

  He flew back out here he's like I'm here so?

• 1:06:22Speaker 03

  I don't care.

• 1:06:25Speaker 06

  You know what I did? He was on CQ. You know what CQ is?

• 1:06:30Speaker 01

  What is that?

• 1:06:34Speaker 03

  CQ is when you're on guard. CQ. Yeah, CQ. Yeah, you're on duty.

• 1:06:39Speaker 06

  He was there. So I used the towel around my face and I called his number. And he answered and I said, "Oh, I heard about you. You wanna go to movie with me?" I pretended I was somebody else, okay?

• 1:06:57Speaker 01

  1950, relationship testing.

• 1:07:00Speaker 03

  Yeah, trying to see if he's gonna go out with another girl.

• 1:07:03Speaker 01

  We are the same.

• 1:07:07Speaker 01

  We are the same people, just 75 years later.

• 1:07:11Speaker 05

  A girl sliding into like your DMs, like the best friend sliding into your DMs to see if you'll answer back. That's what Omar was doing.

• 1:07:22Speaker 03

  Did he say yes?

• 1:07:23Speaker 06

  No.

• 1:07:23Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 1:07:24Speaker 06

  He said, "Oh, I'm sorry. I'm taking..."

• 1:07:29Speaker 03

  Hung up. I know that was Eric. That German accent I know from anywhere.

• 1:07:37Speaker 01

  You'd never believe this. My girlfriend just called me through a towel.

• 1:07:41Speaker 03

  Oh, he threw me off.

• 1:07:44Speaker 06

  And then when he came home, he told me about it. He said, "Would you believe some girl called me?"

• 1:07:49Speaker 01

  Oh, he knew. He knew. He had...

• 1:07:53Speaker 03

  Some German girl called me. It sounded like she was talking through a towel.

• 1:07:58Speaker 06

  I said, "What? What did you say?"

• 1:08:01Speaker 01

  You told him the story later, right?

• 1:08:04Speaker 03

  How long after that did you accept his proposal? How long after that did you accept his marriage proposal?

• 1:08:11Speaker 06

  Oh, it was... Then I started lying to him, okay?

• 1:08:15Speaker 03

  Wait, what?

• 1:08:18Speaker 06

  I said, "I don't know." I said, "You don't know? I have a kid."

• 1:08:24Speaker 03

  She was testing him?

• 1:08:27Speaker 02

  What kind of tests are these? I have a child. I just came back to Germany for it.

• 1:08:34Speaker 06

  You know what he said? He said, "Really? You didn't tell me that in the beginning, you know? But can I see the kid then? When I got in trouble, I didn't have a kid."

• 1:08:46Speaker 06

  I finally had to admit that I was, you know, testing him. I finally told him, "Yeah, I'm marrying you."

• 1:08:53Speaker 03

  Oh my gosh.

• 1:08:54Speaker 01

  He's like...

• 1:08:55Speaker 03

  You put him through hell.

• 1:08:56Speaker 06

  Yes. Before that, she met several guys at the same corner. Oh, yeah.

• 1:09:01Speaker 02

  Wait, what?

• 1:09:02Speaker 06

  I was a teaser.

• 1:09:07Speaker 02

  Her excuse is, "I was a teaser." I love it.

• 1:09:11Speaker 07

  I'm just a girl.

• 1:09:15Speaker 06

  You have so many guys who wanted to go out with me, you know?

• 1:09:19Speaker 03

  Oma is a hottie.

• 1:09:21Speaker 02

  Well, she matched her nails to her shirt and her necklace. I know what you're doing.

• 1:09:26Speaker 06

  So I used to say, you know, good-looking guys, right? And I'd say, "Okay, I'll meet you over there on the..."

• 1:09:36Speaker 06

  Wherever, on the corner of the restaurant. And then I went over there and see if he really showed up. And then I go home.

• 1:09:44Speaker 06

  I didn't ever...

• 1:09:44Speaker 03

  Oh my god. You were breaking hearts.

• 1:09:48Speaker 06

  I did.

• 1:09:49Speaker 03

  You broke so many hearts, Oma.

• 1:09:50Speaker 02

  Just for fun?

• 1:09:52Speaker 06

  One day I got caught.

• 1:09:55Speaker 02

  Doing what?

• 1:09:57Speaker 01

  Like, just standing him up, essentially.

• 1:10:00Speaker 06

  Yes.

• 1:10:01Speaker 02

  That fool? In the restaurant across the street. She runs across the street. Why did she do this to all of us? We can see her.

• 1:10:11Speaker 01

  Look, that asshole did what he said he was gonna do.

• 1:10:16Speaker 02

  Now to wait for the one to come back from America and tell him I have a child.

• 1:10:22Speaker 01

  But was it Oma that caught you?

• 1:10:24Speaker 06

  Ruthless. Yes.

• 1:10:24Speaker 01

  Yeah. Oma was the one who caught you.

• 1:10:26Speaker 02

  No, he caught you.

• 1:10:27Speaker 06

  Yes, he did. Before we were my heart, okay?

• 1:10:31Speaker 01

  Well, I hope so.

• 1:10:33Speaker 03

  What was special about Oma? Out of all the hearts you broke.

• 1:10:38Speaker 06

  He was not a fighter like some of the guys I met. But the only thing, I was a good dancer when I was young, you know? He couldn't dance, he did it for nothing. So I had to teach him how to dance, you know? He stepped on my feet all the time.

• 1:11:01Speaker 06

  But he learned the poker and, you know, a couple of things. And if somebody, your daddy was very chill. When somebody asked me to dance, right? He was okay the first time, but he came back a second time.

• 1:11:18Speaker 02

  Now he's a fighter.

• 1:11:22Speaker 06

  She's not dancing right now, he said.

• 1:11:27Speaker 06

  He was very chill.

• 1:11:30Speaker 02

  And then you moved back to the United States after that? Or how long did you live in Germany?

• 1:11:38Speaker 06

  We left Germany, like you said, in the seventy-two, right? That was way later, you're talking about first. Oh, the first time. First time was fifty, uh, let me see, fifty.

• 1:11:57Speaker 06

  I'll say fifty-three. Fifty-three, fifty-four. Something like that. Yeah, around that. You know, we went to Oklahoma, you know? But meanwhile, we had a couple of kids, you know, after we were married. We got married, I was twenty-one.

• 1:12:17Speaker 06

  All grown up.

• 1:12:19Speaker 02

  Yeah, very grown up, everything.

• 1:12:21Speaker 03

  You have real kids, not the fake one. You told them that you had.

• 1:12:24Speaker 06

  Right.

• 1:12:27Speaker 06

  I had real kids.

• 1:12:31Speaker 06

  So my oldest, Henry and Robert, were born in Germany, okay? But we had problems getting married, you never believe why? We wanted to get married by church. My church were baptized in Germany.

• 1:12:53Speaker 06

  I wish I wouldn't marry us because he didn't have a baptism paper.

• 1:12:59Speaker 01

  So he's- Germany very big on papers.

• 1:13:01Speaker 06

  Yeah. And then I had to get a paper from the court that I'd never been in jail or in trouble, right?

• 1:13:11Speaker 01

  To marry you? To get married. That's wild.

• 1:13:13Speaker 06

  Yeah. So, he sent to Texas that he get a birth certificate, right? But we had a date set when we want to get married. Everything was arranged. And paper never came in, you know? So we got married in a way, but not in church. We got married in the-

• 1:13:38Speaker 01

  Courthouse?

• 1:13:39Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:13:40Speaker 01

  In Germany?

• 1:13:41Speaker 06

  In Germany, yeah. And so we never got married by church, you know?

• 1:13:48Speaker 03

  So was he still on duty with the army in Germany? When you guys got married at the courthouse?

• 1:13:55Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:13:55Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 1:13:57Speaker 01

  I think he stayed through, he was active duty with the military until after the Korean War.

• 1:14:04Speaker 03

  Ah, okay.

• 1:14:06Speaker 06

  But then,

• 1:14:09Speaker 06

  what I wanted to say, then,

• 1:14:13Speaker 06

  when he had to go back, right?

• 1:14:17Speaker 06

  I wasn't ready to go with him because my papers didn't, were all together from the courthouse, you know? And,

• 1:14:29Speaker 06

  so he went

• 1:14:32Speaker 06

  to the States and I stayed with the kids, two kids I had then. And talking about scared, I couldn't speak English. And-

• 1:14:45Speaker 06

  I had to go on a certain time. I had to go over to meet him. And I was tempted not to go, I'll be honest with you. I was scared to death, you know? And no. So I went in a way and.

• 1:15:01Speaker 01

  To a country whose language you don't speak.

• 1:15:03Speaker 06

  Right.

• 1:15:05Speaker 01

  Alone with two kids.

• 1:15:06Speaker 06

  I arrived in New York. Didn't know. He always told me, he said, if I cannot make it to pick you up in New York. Ask for the Red Cross to help you, you know? And I had this in my head. So I came to New York. I stood looking for him. He wasn't there. I said, oh, my gosh.

• 1:15:31Speaker 01

  He gave you an address in New York, right?

• 1:15:34Speaker 06

  From the Red Cross.

• 1:15:35Speaker 01

  OK. So I just, go to New York, I'll find you.

• 1:15:40Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:15:40Speaker 02

  I mean, there's no text. You're not texting anyone. And it's all snail mail. It's literally like, oh, I'm here.

• 1:15:48Speaker 06

  It was the 50s.

• 1:15:50Speaker 02

  That's it. I'll wait.

• 1:15:53Speaker 06

  They didn't notify him on time to catch the plane to New York in time, you see? So that's why he went there.

• 1:16:04Speaker 00

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• 1:16:30Speaker 06

  So I said, well, he told me to go to the Red Cross. Where's the Red Cross, you know?

• 1:16:35Speaker 01

  He was off asking women on dates and just seeing if they.

• 1:16:38Speaker 06

  Show up.

• 1:16:42Speaker 06

  So, um, he said, go to the bus takes you to the Red Cross. So I'm in the bus, suitcase, two kids. And then there were other girls to get married, you know, and one French girl, I never forget. She said, oh, you're traveling by yourself? I said, yeah, my husband can make and blah, blah, blah. And she said, where are you going? And I said, he told me to go to the Red Cross, they will help me. She said, you're in the wrong bus. I was in the wrong bus. So I had to get take the kids again, suitcase and go to the other bus, it was in front.

• 1:17:20Speaker 01

  Were you speaking her in French?

• 1:17:22Speaker 06

  She spoke with English.

• 1:17:24Speaker 01

  Or English, okay.

• 1:17:24Speaker 06

  She could speak good English.

• 1:17:26Speaker 01

  Okay, so you knew a little English at this time, then?

• 1:17:29Speaker 06

  No, I didn't even know the money. The guy on the airport, you know, that had my luggage. I said, oh my God, so I grabbed my money and I just put the hand, I not to the day, I know what he took.

• 1:17:45Speaker 01

  Take what you need.

• 1:17:47Speaker 02

  Very trusting.

• 1:17:49Speaker 01

  It's the, the, the meme, is this enough?

• 1:17:55Speaker 06

  I didn't know.

• 1:17:56Speaker 03

  Have you watched nineteen twenty-three yet?

• 1:17:58Speaker 01

  I've seen the first season.

• 1:18:00Speaker 03

  So like his wife is trying to come to England.

• 1:18:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:18:02Speaker 03

  It's the same, it's the same thing. You don't know like what you're doing, you're just arriving in a foreign country. You don't know what's going on.

• 1:18:10Speaker 06

  Right.

• 1:18:12Speaker 06

  Now, I, I, the bus, she told the bus driver, please tell him to get off, you know? So I got up, it was coming down rain. You can imagine with two kids, one little wrestler that liked to run off right on my head.

• 1:18:29Speaker 03

  How old were they at the time?

• 1:18:32Speaker 06

  Let me see, Henry, he was about.

• 1:18:36Speaker 06

  I don't know, two years old. And the other one was still a baby, you know. And a big suitcase, you know. I was open, but I looked like a wet rat. Anyway, we got to the Red Cross.

• 1:18:54Speaker 01

  You gotta work on that self-talk, Oma.

• 1:18:58Speaker 06

  We, we didn't know it was closed, you know. So that French girl happened to be there. And she says, well, we gotta wait till they open up. And I'm pretty sure they give you room upstairs to clean up, you know, and get the kids changed. And they were screaming, Robert was screaming, my baby. And he wanted milk, of course. And they were used to want milk. Where do I get milk? I couldn't get milk. Oh, my goodness. And then I'm gonna change the kids in the restroom. I lost the key to the suitcase.

• 1:19:42Speaker 06

  So I had to break the suitcase open, right? And so I changed them, you know. Meanwhile, the Red Cross opened up. And that French girl helped me a little bit. She asked if they have milk or can get milk for the baby, you know. And they did. And I wanted the milk in the bathroom because they were used to want milk, you know. So I said, no.

• 1:20:08Speaker 01

  If I can just interrupt for a second. It is amazing to me how vividly you remember this 70 years later.

• 1:20:16Speaker 06

  I'm amazed at myself.

• 1:20:17Speaker 01

  Well, this is your first time in America, right? This was your first time in America.

• 1:20:24Speaker 06

  So.

• 1:20:27Speaker 06

  How do I close the suitcase? You know, I say, oh my, oh, I took the belt off. I had a and I strapped it on my suitcase. And then the lady from the Red Cross said, come on, there's a room upstairs. You can stay there till your husband comes. Can let the kids rest and all this. We made it up to the stairs, right? And I heard my husband's voice. He said, this is not my wife. And I turned around, looked down the stairs, and there was a French girl.

• 1:21:08Speaker 07

  So he could have gone bride shopping.

• 1:21:10Speaker 02

  Honey, hi.

• 1:21:13Speaker 06

  And then she said, if you're looking for your wife, she's right up there, you know? And we were still soaking wet, you know? And he came up and we changed, like I said, the kids and I changed and all this good stuff. We stayed there for a couple of hours.

• 1:21:32Speaker 03

  What'd you do that couple of hours?

• 1:21:34Speaker 02

  Oh, come on.

• 1:21:43Speaker 06

  Made Brandon's mom.

• 1:21:48Speaker 06

  So.

• 1:21:51Speaker 03

  You were happy to see.

• 1:21:55Speaker 02

  They read the Bible.

• 1:21:58Speaker 02

  They sang hymns.

• 1:22:02Speaker 06

  So he said.

• 1:22:06Speaker 07

  I need another claw.

• 1:22:08Speaker 03

  So you're in New York City. You're at the Red Cross. Your husband has just showed up.

• 1:22:13Speaker 06

  We had only two hours left, I believe. And then we had to leave, you know, there was just. So we were all tired. So my husband went into the hotel room. And it was so amazing. The bed had a box on the back. I'll never forget it. You put a quarter in and the bed goes.

• 1:22:40Speaker 06

  And I said, great, I can put the kids there. They're going to sleep.

• 1:22:49Speaker 02

  What flavor would you like, buddy?

• 1:22:52Speaker 06

  Anything, thank you.

• 1:22:54Speaker 02

  Look at this baby nap machine.

• 1:22:56Speaker 01

  I was told it's also a funny, funny story of you learning to drive stick.

• 1:23:01Speaker 06

  Oh yeah, that's a good story too. But I'm not finished with it. I'm sorry, I'm sorry.

• 1:23:07Speaker 02

  Go on with the bed story.

• 1:23:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, please continue with the.

• 1:23:15Speaker 02

  Yeah, continue with the vibrating bed story. I'm excited.

• 1:23:17Speaker 06

  I've never seen that before.

• 1:23:22Speaker 01

  There you go.

• 1:23:25Speaker 02

  Brandon, thank you for inviting us here. I hope you're having a grand old time.

• 1:23:31Speaker 06

  And then next day, next morning,

• 1:23:36Speaker 06

  we were relaxed. We went to train station.

• 1:23:45Speaker 02

  Oh man. Oh, stress melted away.

• 1:23:49Speaker 01

  See, nobody who started the first 20 minutes of this episode thought it was gonna be anything like this.

• 1:23:54Speaker 02

  This one. So you were well rested, a little dehydrated when you went to the train station.

• 1:24:00Speaker 01

  About 30 years too early for Gatorade.

• 1:24:09Speaker 06

  So we went in the train to Oklahoma. And halfway the train stopped, let everybody out to eat. They get started. And there was another shock for me. I was looking at a couple, you know, one was white, one was black, you know, it was so new for me. And the waitress said, you can come in here. That's only for whites. That's excuse me. They can come in here. I didn't say that, but I was thinking that.

• 1:24:46Speaker 01

  There's still segregation.

• 1:24:49Speaker 01

  Early mid 50s.

• 1:24:51Speaker 06

  Fifty-five. There was, I was in shock. She said, "You can come here and he gotta go in that place." Well, it's black scope, you know.

• 1:24:59Speaker 01

  What, what state was this? Oh, well.

• 1:25:02Speaker 06

  It was halfway from New York to Oklahoma.

• 1:25:05Speaker 01

  Well, it was one of those states. How about that?

• 1:25:07Speaker 02

  One of the twenty-five on that, out of the country. That would be so crazy, because if you've never seen that.

• 1:25:13Speaker 06

  Never seen that. And I, I couldn't believe it. They had to eat outside because he don't want to separate from her, you know? That was crazy. And then we got to Oklahoma. And.

• 1:25:28Speaker 01

  Was that, was that Fort Sill? Was he stationed there, or do you remember?

• 1:25:35Speaker 06

  Fort Sill, Oklahoma. Yeah, yeah. Lot, matter of fact, Lot, Oklahoma. So, right away, they didn't have quarters for us, you know? So, we rented a house on the outside, had a tornado bunker and everything, boy, the works. And, and then we moved to a little town. I've forgotten the name of it, too. And I learned how to drive, right? I couldn't drive then.

• 1:26:19Speaker 06

  And my husband, he had no patience. Every time I did something, it was stick, you know? I did something wrong, he, "Don't you get it?" You know? I said, "Okay." So one day he was at work, and I went in the car. I said, "Learn myself," right? So I went in the car.

• 1:26:45Speaker 02

  Honey, I am proficient at stick driving.

• 1:26:48Speaker 01

  Good news.

• 1:26:48Speaker 02

  The transmission's gone.

• 1:26:50Speaker 01

  Good news, I learned how to do it. Bad news. Car's smoking now.

• 1:26:56Speaker 06

  And I drove, I mean, I put it in the back and I chirped.

• 1:27:04Speaker 06

  And forward too, and I said, I hope I don't get in the garage.

• 1:27:10Speaker 06

  But I did pretty good. And I said, hmm, I'm gonna visit my girlfriend. She was halfway between London and, you know, that little town. And I did great and I drove, you know, was fine. But I had problem every time I stopped, the motor shut off.

• 1:27:28Speaker 01

  Install it.

• 1:27:30Speaker 03

  Release the clutch.

• 1:27:32Speaker 06

  So I said, oh, well, just start it again right now.

• 1:27:35Speaker 01

  Oh, no.

• 1:27:36Speaker 06

  Those curbs are probably.

• 1:27:39Speaker 02

  Well, how many, so you had your kids home alone. You took all your kids with you, I'm guessing?

• 1:27:44Speaker 06

  Of course.

• 1:27:46Speaker 02

  Do you remember what kind of car it was?

• 1:27:48Speaker 06

  No.

• 1:27:50Speaker 01

  A manual.

• 1:27:53Speaker 06

  I went to a friend I met, you know. And now, my husband had to go by the highway to go home, you see. And he seen the car, you know. And he stopped and he said, who drove the car over here? And I said, they said, what? The rims were destroyed.

• 1:28:14Speaker 06

  Yeah, there's another story.

• 1:28:18Speaker 06

  Then, anyway, this, we stayed there for a while and then when we got orders to go to Panama.

• 1:28:29Speaker 06

  We went to Panama. No matter of fact, this was the first time I drove a ship. The other one was not a ship.

• 1:28:37Speaker 06

  I don't think. Anyway, so Oklahoma, well, we got there and I died almost with heat. They had no air conditioning. They had a giant fan and at them years I had migraines, you know. And that wasn't very good with the fan, you know.

• 1:29:00Speaker 06

  But again, I learned how to drive. We went to the commissary. It was up the hill. Oh, God.

• 1:29:09Speaker 02

  In Panama?

• 1:29:10Speaker 06

  Panama. And I drove up. Everything good. My girlfriends were with me. And we had a babysitter then, you know. And there were guard houses before you get into the commissary, you know. And we had to show our ID. And, okay, I got my ID, you know. And I was on the guard house. I said, oh, my God, the car is going backwards.

• 1:29:41Speaker 02

  That's not real.

• 1:29:44Speaker 06

  And I told the guard, I said, I'll be right back.

• 1:29:54Speaker 03

  Just look at it real quick.

• 1:30:00Speaker 06

  Even the guard.

• 1:30:05Speaker 06

  Oh, gee.

• 1:30:06Speaker 02

  Oh, my God.

• 1:30:07Speaker 06

  Panama, it was so hot over there. Oh, my God.

• 1:30:10Speaker 02

  Yeah, that's tropical heat. That's that humid, humid, humid.

• 1:30:14Speaker 06

  And six months of rain. That was terrible. And the crabs, they had crab season. I never seen anything like it. The whole, everything patio, everything full of crabs. The fire department came and, you know. Yeah.

• 1:30:35Speaker 03

  Oh, dude, the documentaries with the crab migrations, where they just go across the island.

• 1:30:40Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:30:41Speaker 02

  Snow crabs?

• 1:30:42Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's crazy.

• 1:30:43Speaker 06

  And they go in your tires, you know. When you come apart, they want your tires.

• 1:30:49Speaker 01

  Everything infested with crabs. Kind of reminds me of a fable, actually.

• 1:30:53Speaker 03

  So Panama, where they're vibrating beds?

• 1:30:59Speaker 01

  We're not gonna let that one die, huh?

• 1:31:02Speaker 02

  Kenny's like, I have an opportunity.

• 1:31:07Speaker 01

  Germany, Oklahoma, Panama, did you go anywhere else after moving around for the

• 1:31:12Speaker 06

  No, my husband went to Vietnam, Korea, and I had to take care of all of the kids by myself. That was not easy, you know, and I had to take the car to buy my house in Germany. I mean, yeah, Germany, you know, that was hard.

• 1:31:31Speaker 01

  You had to take what now? Sorry, I didn't.

• 1:31:32Speaker 06

  My car. I always had to take it on, how do you explain that?

• 1:31:38Speaker 01

  Ship it, like transported?

• 1:31:41Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:31:42Speaker 01

  Okay, transported to Germany.

• 1:31:44Speaker 06

  And, oh, Lord, it was hard times, you know, it was always hard times, but still funny when you think about it.

• 1:31:52Speaker 01

  You know, something that is also, you just spurred my memory, we have some family, like family, well, family of yours, family of mine, but that were on the other side of the Berlin Wall in East Berlin.

• 1:32:05Speaker 06

  It was my dad's family. I never met, I never met, because the war were going on, they built it a wall, you know, and for me, as an American, my husband said, you're not going across, you're not coming back.

• 1:32:23Speaker 01

  I know.

• 1:32:25Speaker 06

  My part of it, but for me, it was too dangerous, you know, being married to an American.

• 1:32:31Speaker 01

  Right, those guns pointed inward.

• 1:32:32Speaker 06

  Yeah, and so I never met.

• 1:32:35Speaker 02

  That's amazing. You have lived quite the life, ma'am.

• 1:32:39Speaker 06

  Oh, my goodness, I tell you, there's probably more I can remember more.

• 1:32:46Speaker 01

  No, I've always been impressed by, always, always been impressed by just how sharp you are and just how much you remember.

• 1:32:53Speaker 06

  You know, that I still got my mind, actually.

• 1:32:57Speaker 03

  I have a question, though. Do you have any funny stories about Brandon? Like, growing up as a little boy?

• 1:33:06Speaker 06

  He was a cute little boy.

• 1:33:08Speaker 03

  Of course, he's cute. Do you know, do you have any funny stories, though, about Brandon?

• 1:33:13Speaker 06

  I used to pick him up from school, right?

• 1:33:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:33:16Speaker 06

  And I'd take him home, and he didn't want to go home, he wanted to stay with me.

• 1:33:20Speaker 01

  Why?

• 1:33:21Speaker 06

  I don't know.

• 1:33:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, I'll wrap myself out on that one. The, I was always sneak into Oma's house because she'd have Nutella.

• 1:33:30Speaker 06

  Oh, Nutella.

• 1:33:31Speaker 01

  Which you always called the Nuket.

• 1:33:33Speaker 06

  Nuket.

• 1:33:34Speaker 01

  Yeah. Drink sugar water. Yup, just fattening me up.

• 1:33:40Speaker 06

  The fun time I had in my life is, I think, when we had all the campers. My son had a camper, they had camper, we had a camper, and we parked kinda, you know, all together. And that's when Brandon, every morning, disappeared, came to drink. And look at.

• 1:34:04Speaker 01

  My parents would be looking for me, I'm just waving from the window with. Chocolate, red.

• 1:34:10Speaker 02

  Alright, guys.

• 1:34:13Speaker 02

  Brandon's got a drum.

• 1:34:16Speaker 02

  It's all chubby Brandon.

• 1:34:17Speaker 01

  Little fat kid.

• 1:34:22Speaker 06

  Oh my goodness. Then, we got. Born in Germany. She's a German too.

• 1:34:30Speaker 01

  Oh, she's German? You were born on a army base, right? On a base in Germany?

• 1:34:34Speaker 06

  Sure. Yeah.

• 1:34:37Speaker 06

  She remembers.

• 1:34:38Speaker 01

  She's like, I don't remember.

• 1:34:41Speaker 02

  American.

• 1:34:46Speaker 02

  Well, thank you so much for sharing your story. We truly, truly appreciate your time.

• 1:34:51Speaker 06

  I never doubt I would tell you. Because I'm not a. How do you say?

• 1:34:58Speaker 02

  Storyteller?

• 1:34:59Speaker 06

  She can, she can talk, but I can't.

• 1:35:02Speaker 01

  Yeah, not. Not like braggadocious or a storyteller or?

• 1:35:07Speaker 06

  No.

• 1:35:09Speaker 06

  Like a preacher, right, in church, he came.

• 1:35:12Speaker 02

  Charismatic, yeah.

• 1:35:14Speaker 06

  He said, "Don't you wanna tell your story?" I said, "What?" I said, "No, my daughter can talk, not me."

• 1:35:23Speaker 01

  Lies?

• 1:35:23Speaker 02

  You killed this. You did amazing.

• 1:35:26Speaker 01

  I think you did really good, I'm sure the audience will agree, but I've always said that, you know, the stories that I've heard growing up, and just, you know, picking this up piece by piece and hearing bits of your story. When I was six, eight, 12, 15, you're, you've got an awesome story, and you're, you're one of the most inspirational women I've ever met.

• 1:35:48Speaker 06

  Well, like, like I said, I, I see everything like it was, but I can't think of dates or how old I was, you see? That's.

• 1:35:58Speaker 01

  I can't remember what I had for breakfast yesterday.

• 1:36:01Speaker 06

  Oh, yes.

• 1:36:03Speaker 02

  Well, we truly appreciate your time. Thank you so, so freaking much.

• 1:36:06Speaker 06

  I'm showing you guys, and nice have met you, okay?

• 1:36:12Speaker 03

  Very nice to meet you.

• 1:36:14Speaker 02

  Even you, Cody.

• 1:36:18Speaker 03

  Cut it a little bit.

• 1:36:19Speaker 06

  And got the glasses on, I couldn't tell on one picture, he said, wait a minute, which one?

• 1:36:26Speaker 03

  That was Eli's fault.

• 1:36:30Speaker 03

  He put, he put my face on Brandon, and Brandon's face on my face, and people couldn't tell the difference.

• 1:36:36Speaker 02

  Nope.

• 1:36:37Speaker 01

  On first glance, it was a little confusing.

• 1:36:39Speaker 03

  Yeah, it was confusing.

• 1:36:41Speaker 02

  I was laughing.

• 1:36:41Speaker 06

  How many pictures was that you showed me?

• 1:36:44Speaker 03

  While we're still filming.

• 1:36:45Speaker 06

  And I had to look twice. I said, which one is mine?

• 1:36:48Speaker 01

  I have a, I have a question. One last question for you. If you could give any piece of advice, living the life that you've lived, if you could give any piece of advice to young people, what would it be?

• 1:36:58Speaker 03

  It's a great question.

• 1:36:59Speaker 06

  That they're very lucky today, what they got, you know, really. And a lot of kids today do not appreciate what they got, you know? We appreciate every little thing. Let me tell you, we were hungry. And when we get our ration for the week, depends how many the family was, when the potatoes ran out, we peeled all the potatoes and we fried them. There was another meal, you know, for us. I forgot something. Yeah.

• 1:37:38Speaker 06

  When, when the British came in, you know, and there were still the rifles and all this. But by then, we were so hungry. All the stores were gone, you know, I'm sorry, I have a cramp.

• 1:37:54Speaker 01

  You okay?

• 1:37:55Speaker 06

  A cramp.

• 1:37:57Speaker 01

  Do you want some water or something?

• 1:37:58Speaker 06

  No, I'm fine.

• 1:37:59Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 1:37:59Speaker 06

  And so I said, well, let's go to the stores. They were bombed. We find some food, you know, canned food or something, you know. So me, my brother, we went across the street. There were big, what do you call it? Not a warehouse, but where they sell everything.

• 1:38:25Speaker 01

  Like a general store?

• 1:38:26Speaker 06

  Yeah, big store. And they also had food store in there. We went in there and there was that English guy with machine gun, you know? And he just looked at us and we looked at him and we keep on going, you know? Hoping he don't shoot us, you know? But he didn't. He understood, I guess, you know?

• 1:38:47Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:38:48Speaker 06

  And...

• 1:38:49Speaker 03

  So you're saying kids should be grateful for what they have now?

• 1:38:53Speaker 06

  Yeah. They do not. They don't know I would go take out a channel. They not appreciate. Mm-mm.

• 1:39:02Speaker 02

  I agree fully, Oma.

• 1:39:04Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:39:04Speaker 03

  Well, Oma, on a lighter note, I want to show you. So this is our faces swapped. So this is me and Brandon swapped.

• 1:39:16Speaker 06

  You're kidding?

• 1:39:17Speaker 03

  No.

• 1:39:19Speaker 06

  Wow.

• 1:39:21Speaker 03

  That's my face on Brandon's head.

• 1:39:23Speaker 06

  That's not, that's Brandon.

• 1:39:33Speaker 03

  So that's me with Brandon's face and that's, that's Brandon with my face.

• 1:39:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:39:40Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:39:41Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. Wait, no, that's Brandon. That's Brandon.

• 1:39:46Speaker 03

  Oh, yeah. Brandon, we're talking about my...

• 1:39:48Speaker 02

  Cody's like, that's me.

• 1:39:49Speaker 03

  Even I'm confused. But yeah, that's, that's Brandon with my face.

• 1:39:54Speaker 06

  Wow.

• 1:39:54Speaker 03

  So that's my head with Brandon's face.

• 1:39:57Speaker 01

  Am I the only person who thinks that you don't look similar at all?

• 1:40:01Speaker 02

  I mean, when you do the face swap, the face swap's pretty.

• 1:40:04Speaker 01

  The face swap, that one I get.

• 1:40:06Speaker 02

  Even that one, I was like, wait.

• 1:40:08Speaker 06

  Certain picture, not so much, but you know, he's got some in there, he had me.

• 1:40:13Speaker 03

  I know.

• 1:40:14Speaker 02

  Yeah. The other one's better.

• 1:40:16Speaker 01

  We tricked Oma. Cody's gonna be over in Oma's camper with Nutella.

• 1:40:22Speaker 02

  Only if she has a vibrating bed.

• 1:40:26Speaker 02

  Oh, no.

• 1:40:31Speaker 06

  I enjoy you guys.

• 1:40:33Speaker 02

  I love you. Thank you so much. It's been a pleasure. Cody, you wanna close us out, you beautiful son of a gun?

• 1:40:39Speaker 06

  I hope I live a little longer so I can enjoy all you guys. I've been saying that, you know, I said, on my life was hard, you know? I had my grains for 25 years, you know, and had to take care of five kids, you know? My husband were always grown. Because, what is coughing?

• 1:41:02Speaker 02

  You said six kids. Is she the imaginary kid?

• 1:41:07Speaker 01

  She's making all sorts of confessions today.

• 1:41:10Speaker 02

  Five kids plus the other one.

• 1:41:14Speaker 01

  No, I'm sorry, continue.

• 1:41:16Speaker 06

  So I enjoy life a little bit. I'm grateful that I can live still on my own in my age, you know? That I'm grateful for. She wants me moving with her, I know, but as long as I can do for myself, I'm gonna be here.

• 1:41:34Speaker 06

  And I think everyone feels that way, don't you think?

• 1:41:38Speaker 01

  Yeah, no, you're in better shape than I will be in five years. So I, I think you're doing great.

• 1:41:46Speaker 06

  I try, I mean, I got my problems.

• 1:41:48Speaker 01

  You just turned 93, four days ago.

• 1:41:50Speaker 06

  Four days?

• 1:41:52Speaker 02

  Oh, happy belated birthday.

• 1:41:54Speaker 06

  One month or so.

• 1:41:56Speaker 02

  Happy belated Mother's Day, too.

• 1:41:58Speaker 06

  Did my grandson call me? No.

• 1:42:00Speaker 01

  I did.

• 1:42:01Speaker 02

  Oh, my.

• 1:42:02Speaker 01

  I absolutely did.

• 1:42:03Speaker 02

  God.

• 1:42:03Speaker 01

  I will pull up the receipt right now.

• 1:42:06Speaker 06

  Did he call?

• 1:42:08Speaker 01

  Look at that, look at that right here, hold on.

• 1:42:12Speaker 01

  I'm gonna pull that up, Sunday. We talked for 22 minutes.

• 1:42:16Speaker 06

  Don't.

• 1:42:19Speaker 01

  She wanted to yell at me.

• 1:42:25Speaker 01

  I can't believe I almost got shade for that.

• 1:42:28Speaker 02

  You did not leave a memory.

• 1:42:32Speaker 01

  Apparently, I'm sorry I bored you.

• 1:42:35Speaker 02

  Ugh. Hangs up.

• 1:42:40Speaker 02

  Just like, oh. Back to the vibrating bed. Cody calling.

• 1:42:47Speaker 03

  They all look the same. She's sort of said Brandon's calling again.

• 1:42:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, is that why you declined my first three calls?

• 1:42:58Speaker 03

  She's gonna smack the hell out of you, Brandon.

• 1:43:01Speaker 01

  She probably will. But seriously, Oma, thank you so much.

• 1:43:04Speaker 03

  Thank you, Oma.

• 1:43:05Speaker 02

  Thank you, thank you.

• 1:43:07Speaker 06

  You take care of yourself. Oh, all right. And I really enjoyed you guys, okay?

• 1:43:13Speaker 03

  We enjoyed hanging out with you.

• 1:43:15Speaker 02

  My pleasure. Thank you so, so much.

• 1:43:18Speaker 06

  I never thought I don't can do that. Talking to you, dude, she said you can't.

• 1:43:23Speaker 02

  Killed it.

• 1:43:24Speaker 01

  Amazing.

• 1:43:25Speaker 02

  Cody, you wanna close this out?

• 1:43:26Speaker 03

  We're gonna kill this one?

• 1:43:27Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:43:28Speaker 03

  Everyone, thank you for joining the Unsubscribe Podcast. I was joined today by Oma. Oma, Oma? Um, Oma? Oma, Oma, Oma. Oma. Brandon Herrera, Eli Double Tap, King Trout's here with us, and myself, Donut Operator. Thank you so much for joining the Unsubscribe Podcast.

• 1:43:46Speaker 02

  We love you.

• 1:43:48Speaker 06

  Thank you, guys.

• 1:43:49Speaker 03

  Thank you, thank you.

• 1:44:24Speaker 00

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