Krystyna

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Krystynas Story

• Theme

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ThemeBy Halina Ogonowska-Coates

• Kyrstynas Story is based on many different
  accounts of the events that affected the Polish
  people during World War II. Throughout the book
  we come to learn about the terrible hardships
  that were suffered and how the characters dealt
  with these situations along the way. There are
  many underlying ideas or themes in this story we
  are not just reading about a series of events, we
  are discovering how Krystyna and the people
  around her managed to survive.

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Suggested lay out of book
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Or

• Theme Example - Quote
• -
  
• -

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Theme 1. Loss

• Tata
• home in Baranowiczie
• I was born in Poland, beautiful Poland.
• I loved Mama but Tata was my hero. (p.2)

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family security. I felt the ebb and flow of
life and knew my place within it. (p.3)

• Marysia
• Feliks
• Aunty Danuta
• Mother

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her childhood and polishness

• it was like
• being dispossessed(p.22)

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Theme 2. Survival

• Survival

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..the walk/trek

• The fabric of our lives was sorted without a
  thought for those who would wear the clothes.
  (p.22)
• All I could see was the outlines of people with
  their belongings piled up around them. (p.24)

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the train ride to Siberia.a mass of living
bodies, a layer of wooden shelvesit was
suffocatingly close.(p.28)Life, death and
darkness mergedpeople were going insane. (p.41)
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the sledge journey to SiberiaIt was a long,
long nightpeople groaned aloud with the pain of
keeping their bodies upright (p.50)
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(No Transcript)
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Siberia (p.54)

• It was hard to live in this place where you were
  always hungry, always looking for food, where you
  were always frightened and nothing made sense any
  more. (p.54)

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and life in a labour campEvery week more and
more people diedday and night life dragged on.
(p.61)
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but most of allstarvationThe hunger dragged
you downthe need to eat tormented me (p.61)
Many people died of malnutrition. Their meagre daily diet consisted of a filthy, rat faeces-infested bowl of gruel and occasionally a tiny bit of hard black bread.

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Theme .3 Fear

• Krystyna lives in constant fear

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her imprisonment

• I was afraid that we would die in this
• dark damp cellar and that no one would care.
  (p.68)

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witnesses cruelty

• I was scared of the soldiers.
• They were rough and brutal.
• (p.64)

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and deathSick and dying people were lying
everywhere on the floorEveryone was thin and
dirty. (p.73)
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horrid conditions

• I watched the life ebb out
• of those around me and
• wondered if I would be
• next. (p.73)
• suspended between
• life and death(p.74)

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inhumanityWe lifted up my mother and put her
o a stack of corpses right beside the railway
line. Other bodies went on top of her. (p.76)
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uncertainty.we were a truck load of children
without a future. (p.83)I stood on the
deckwondering what would happen to us now.
(p.84)
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orphanage at Isfahan her words didnt really
reassure me and rumours spread Someone told me
that there were cannibals in New Zealand Great
big people with enormous mouths and blood
dripping from their jaws. p.89

• The girls who were accommodated in Home No 5 pose
  for the camera. Before the children moved to New
  Zealand and other places there were 17 of these
  Polish homes In Isfahan

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Theme 4. Adapting to new culture

• You will not be permitted to talk in Polish
  among yourselves.
• Her name is automatically changed from Krystyna
  to Christine.

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Wellington I thought that he looked like a
kind man even though I did not understand what he
was saying. (p.93)

• The Polish refugee children are welcomed on board
  the American troopship "General Randall" in
  Wellington Harbour on November 1, 1944, by Prime
  Minister Peter Fraser.

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Pahiatua Life at Pahiatua Camp settled down to
a regular pattern. (p.96)
 
 
 
 
 

• The welcoming party of New Zealand soldiers on
  the platform of Pahiatua Railway Station on
  November 2, 1944.  They helped the children with
  their luggage onto waiting army trucks that took
  them to their new home.

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Pahiatua CampWe stared at the New Zealanders
and they stared back at us (p.98-99)
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a new culture a new languageOur
classes were in Polish and although we had one
English lesson a week we knew very little about
our new country. (p.98)
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After the meat we had wobbly coloured puddings
that were sweet and empty. It was good to know
tht there would be something to eat tomorrow.
(p.96)

• different
• food

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Id try and hide in the toilets for hours.
Sometimes Id run past their cars shouting rudely
in Polish. (p.98)

• a new routine and rules
• I guess they wanted to see what we looked like
  but I hated being stared at. (p.98)

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Theme