Chapter 9 Kiss (the key to childhood)
Like most small towns, Molchin was populated by a variety of characters, many of whom lived on Himmel Street, and Lady Holtzpeffer was one of them.
And others:
* Rudy Steiner - The next-door neighbor boy who adores African-American athlete Jesse Owens.
* Mrs. Diller - staunch Aryan, owner of the corner shop.
*Tommy Muller – a child with chronic otitis media who had several surgeries.A pink scar ran across his cheek, often twitching.
* A man commonly called Pficus, who is good at cursing.Compared with him, Rosa Hubermann is almost a cultural person or a saint.
Generally speaking, poor people live on this street.Although Germany's economy developed rapidly under Hitler's rule, there were still ghettos. We have already mentioned that the house next door to the Hubermanns was rented to the Steiner family.They had six children, one of whom was the "famous" Rudy.Before long, he's Liesel's best friend, best friend, and seducer of her crimes.They met on the street.
A few days after Liesel had her first bath, Mom let her go out and play with the other kids.On Himmel Street, friendships are made outdoors, no matter what the weather is like outside.The children seldom visit other people's homes, because each family's house is very small and there is no space for them to move around.Plus, they get to play their favorite sport on the street - soccer, like a pro.They also formed their own team, with trash cans serving as goals. Being new, Liesel had to work as a keeper among the trash cans. (Tommy Muller finally freed, even though he was the stinkiest footballer ever on Himmel Street.) Everything was going well that day until Rudy Steiner was fouled by Tommy Muller in attack and the decisive moment came. "My God!" cried Tommy, his face contorted with despair, "what have I done?" All players on Rudy's side can take a free throw.Now, it's Rudy Steiner's turn to take on newcomer Liesel Meminger. He dropped the ball on a mound of dirty snow with complete confidence.After all, Rudy had hit 18 free throws, and even the opposing team thought Tommy Muller could sit on the sidelines.He never missed a shot.Whoever replaces Tommy this time will still score. This time, they also want Liesel to stay aside, and as you can imagine, she will protest.Rudy agreed. "Okay, okay," he said with a smile, "let her stay there." He was gearing up, eager to try. Now, the snow has stopped.They stepped on the ground one by one muddy footprints.Rudy shuffled over and kicked up, and Liesel leaned down and elbowed the ball away.She straightened up, grinning triumphantly.But what she saw next was a snowball flying straight towards her, hitting her in the face.The inside was full of mud, and the face was so hot that it hurt. "What do you think of this ball?" The boy laughed and ran to pick up the rolling football. "Pig," Liesel muttered.She quickly picked up the word she heard in her new home.
Incident": One night, he painted himself into a little black charcoal and ran several hundred meters around the town's stadium.
Sick or not, Rudy was destined to be Liesel's best friend.That snowball in the face was of course the beginning of their enduring friendship. Liesel started dating the Steiner family shortly after she started school.Rudy's mother, Barbara, asked Rudy to go to school with the girl, mainly because she had heard about the snowball.Rudy gladly accepted the assignment, willing to go to school with Liesel.He is not a boy who likes to keep a distance from girls at all.On the contrary, he likes girls very much, including Liesel (who has liked her since that Snowball).In truth, Rudy Steiner was a womanizing daredevil.Everyone's childhood will go through such a hazy period.He won't feel afraid of girls just because others are afraid of contacting the opposite sex. He is a man of his own mind.So Rudy has no problem with going to school with Liesel Meminger. On the way to school, he wanted to tell Liesel about some of the town's landmarks, or at least take a look at them.On the way, he told his younger siblings to shut up, but unfortunately his older siblings used the same words to teach him a lesson.His description of a small second-floor window in an apartment building piqued Liesel's interest. "That's Tommy Mueller's house," he said, realizing that Liesel wasn't thinking of that person. Lost in the market. It took three hours for them to find him. He was frozen and his ears hurt from the cold. After a while, the inside of his ear was infected and suppurated. The doctor moved him three or four times. The surgery broke the nerves in his face, so his face was always twitching." Liesel interjected: "His football stinks." "It's the kick that stinks the most." Next came Mrs. Diller's shop on the corner of Hamilton Street.
Mrs. Diller wore a pair of thick glasses with a piercing, malevolent gaze.Her countenance would give up anyone who would try to steal something from her store.She was always guarding the store like a soldier, she spoke and even breathed "Heil, Hitler!" coldly, which also protected her store.The store itself is cold white and impersonal.It was more stately than the other houses on Himmel Street, and even the smaller houses huddled next to it seemed to owe it to them.Mrs. Diller presides over the seriousness, offering it as the only free service.She was born for her shop, and her shop was born for the Third Reich.Although rationing soon came into effect, her shop was able to privately sell certain hard-to-buy items, which she then donated to the Nazi Party.Above her usual seat hangs a framed photo of the Führer.If you walk into her shop and don't say "Heil, Hitler!", she won't serve you.As Rudy and the others passed the store, he reminded Liesel of the invulnerable eyes squinting at them from behind the store window. "You have to say 'Heil, Hitler' when you pass here," he warned her sternly, "unless you want to stay away." When they passed the store and Liesel looked back, those horrible eyes Still staring at the outside. Turning the corner, the muddy Munich Strasse (the main thoroughfare into and out of Molching) unfolds before you. Most of the time there will be a group of soldiers in training marching through the streets.Their military uniforms were crisp, their black boots dirty in the snow.The look on their faces was very focused. After the soldiers were out of sight, the Steiner children and Liesel walked past a few more shops and the grand town hall.The hall would later be blown up in half and lay in ruins.Several abandoned shops still had yellow stars and anti-Semitic signs outside.Going further down, you can see the striking church under the blue sky. The roof of the church is made of many tiles.The whole street was like a gray pipe—damp walkways, people hunched over in the cold wind, their feet clattering in the muddy water. Suddenly, Rudy pulled Liesel up and rushed to the front. He knocked on the tailor's window. If Liesel knew the words on the sign, she would know it was Rudy's father's shop.The tailor's shop wasn't open yet, but a man behind the counter was already busy arranging fabrics.He looked up and waved to them. "This is my dad," Rudy told her.They were soon filled with Steiner kids big and small, who were either waving at Papa, blowing a kiss, or just standing there and nodding hello (usually the older kids did) ).Then, they continued walking towards the landmark building closest to the school.
No one wanted to stop and take a look at this place, but everyone couldn't help but take a look.The road is shaped like a long broken arm, and there are several bruised houses on the road, with the Star of David painted on the door.Everyone stayed away from these houses like a leper.At least, they resembled infected wounds on German soil. "This is the road to the yellow star." Rudy said. Not far away, some people were walking.In the drizzle they wandered like ghosts under the leaden sky, as if they were not people but shadows. "Hurry up, you two," Kurt (the eldest son of the Steiner family) called to them, and Rudy and Liesel hurried towards him.
At school, Rudy used to come and hang out with Liesel during recess, and he didn't mind the other kids booing and laughing at Liesel's stupidity.At first he came to her, and after a while, when Liesel was no longer downcast, he would come again.However, he didn't do it without purpose.
After they got out of school in late April, Rudy and Liesel stood on Himmel Street as usual waiting for the football game to start.They were a little early, and the other kids hadn't come yet.They saw a foul-mouthed Pficus. "Look there," Rudy said, pointing at him.
"Hi, Pficus!" As the distant figure approached, Rudy began whistling. The old man immediately straightened up and began to add swear words that only a genius could come up with.No one knew his real name, but, if they remembered, it was never called.People only called him Pficus, because that's what people who whistled, and that's what the word "Pficus" means.He always liked to play a tune called "The Radetzky March," and all the boys in town would shout his name and play the same tune.At this time, Pficus will change his usual walking posture (bending, striding, hands behind the back of the raincoat), straighten up and prepare to curse.Next, his swearing will break all peace.
At this time, Liesel and Rudy also laughed at Pficus, like a conditioned reflex. "Pficus!" she echoed, quickly absorbing the cruelty of the children's childhood.Her whistle is terrible, who told her to play it without practice. He ran after them, yelling, at first "Son of a son of a bitch!", and then getting worse and worse.At first, he aimed only at Rudy, but soon opened fire on Liesel. "You little bitch!" he growled at her.This sentence stunned Liesel all of a sudden. "I've never seen you!" Pficus was the type to call a ten-year-old girl a whore.People said he and Mrs. Holtzpeffer were a match made in heaven. "Get over here!" These were the last words Rudy and Liesel heard him scold. They ran away quickly, and ran to the streets of Munich in one breath.
"Come on," said Rudy, as soon as they had recovered, "here." He took her to Hubert Oval, where the Jesse Owens incident took place.They stood there with their hands in their trouser pockets.The runway stretches out in front of you.There is only one thing to do here.Rudy began to use the aggressive method: "Let's run a few hundred meters, I bet you can't outrun me." Liesel would not be fooled. "I bet I can win." "What do you bet on, little sow? Do you have any money?" "Of course not. Do you have any?" "No." But Rudy had an idea that only a boy in love can come up with. "If I win, I'll kiss you." He squatted down and began to roll up his trousers. Liesel, alarmed, wants to call back the bet. "Why do you want to kiss me? I'm so dirty." "Me too." Rudy didn't think being dirty would affect this matter, both of them hadn't showered for a while. She thought about it as she looked at her opponent's slender legs.Those legs were about the same as hers, and there was no way he could beat her.So, she nodded solemnly, and it was decided. "Kiss me if you win. But if I win, I won't be goalie when I play football." Rudy thought about it. "Okay, it's fair." The two of them shook hands to seal an agreement. The sky was gloomy, and dense raindrops began to fall. The runway is actually muddier than it looks. The two contestants are ready. Rudy threw a rock into the air for a starting pistol.As soon as the stone hit the ground, they ran away. "I can't see the finish line," Liesel complained. "Then I can see it?" Rudy asked back. The stone fell into the mud. They ran close together, shoving each other as they ran to give themselves the lead.The mud crackled under their feet.About twenty meters from the finish line, they slipped and fell. "My mother!" Rudy screamed loudly, "I'm covered in shit!" "It's not shit," Liesel corrected him, "it's mud." Although she felt a bit like shit, too.Five meters from the finish line, they fell again. "It counts as a draw." Rudy grinned, narrowing his slender blue eyes in thought, his face smeared with mud. "If it's a tie, can I still kiss you?" "Don't even dream about it." Liesel got up and patted the mud on her clothes. "I won't let you be the goalkeeper either." "To hell with your keeper." When they got back to Himmel Street, Rudy said, "Liesel, someday you're going to try to kiss me." But Liesel knew. she swears. As long as Rudy and herself were alive, she would never kiss the filthy stupid pig, especially not on this day.They had nothing to do, so they planned to go home.She looked down at the mud on her clothes and realized clearly: "She's going to kill me." She, of course, refers to Rosa Hubermann, the one called Mama.Indeed, Rosa almost killed Liesel. The word "gilt" always came with punishment, and Mom almost turned her into a pile of mincemeat.
Notes:
Generally speaking, poor people live on this street.Although Germany's economy developed rapidly under Hitler's rule, there were still ghettos. We have already mentioned that the house next door to the Hubermanns was rented to the Steiner family.They had six children, one of whom was the "famous" Rudy.Before long, he's Liesel's best friend, best friend, and seducer of her crimes.They met on the street.
A few days after Liesel had her first bath, Mom let her go out and play with the other kids.On Himmel Street, friendships are made outdoors, no matter what the weather is like outside.The children seldom visit other people's homes, because each family's house is very small and there is no space for them to move around.Plus, they get to play their favorite sport on the street - soccer, like a pro.They also formed their own team, with trash cans serving as goals. Being new, Liesel had to work as a keeper among the trash cans. (Tommy Muller finally freed, even though he was the stinkiest footballer ever on Himmel Street.) Everything was going well that day until Rudy Steiner was fouled by Tommy Muller in attack and the decisive moment came. "My God!" cried Tommy, his face contorted with despair, "what have I done?" All players on Rudy's side can take a free throw.Now, it's Rudy Steiner's turn to take on newcomer Liesel Meminger. He dropped the ball on a mound of dirty snow with complete confidence.After all, Rudy had hit 18 free throws, and even the opposing team thought Tommy Muller could sit on the sidelines.He never missed a shot.Whoever replaces Tommy this time will still score. This time, they also want Liesel to stay aside, and as you can imagine, she will protest.Rudy agreed. "Okay, okay," he said with a smile, "let her stay there." He was gearing up, eager to try. Now, the snow has stopped.They stepped on the ground one by one muddy footprints.Rudy shuffled over and kicked up, and Liesel leaned down and elbowed the ball away.She straightened up, grinning triumphantly.But what she saw next was a snowball flying straight towards her, hitting her in the face.The inside was full of mud, and the face was so hot that it hurt. "What do you think of this ball?" The boy laughed and ran to pick up the rolling football. "Pig," Liesel muttered.She quickly picked up the word she heard in her new home.
Incident": One night, he painted himself into a little black charcoal and ran several hundred meters around the town's stadium.
Sick or not, Rudy was destined to be Liesel's best friend.That snowball in the face was of course the beginning of their enduring friendship. Liesel started dating the Steiner family shortly after she started school.Rudy's mother, Barbara, asked Rudy to go to school with the girl, mainly because she had heard about the snowball.Rudy gladly accepted the assignment, willing to go to school with Liesel.He is not a boy who likes to keep a distance from girls at all.On the contrary, he likes girls very much, including Liesel (who has liked her since that Snowball).In truth, Rudy Steiner was a womanizing daredevil.Everyone's childhood will go through such a hazy period.He won't feel afraid of girls just because others are afraid of contacting the opposite sex. He is a man of his own mind.So Rudy has no problem with going to school with Liesel Meminger. On the way to school, he wanted to tell Liesel about some of the town's landmarks, or at least take a look at them.On the way, he told his younger siblings to shut up, but unfortunately his older siblings used the same words to teach him a lesson.His description of a small second-floor window in an apartment building piqued Liesel's interest. "That's Tommy Mueller's house," he said, realizing that Liesel wasn't thinking of that person. Lost in the market. It took three hours for them to find him. He was frozen and his ears hurt from the cold. After a while, the inside of his ear was infected and suppurated. The doctor moved him three or four times. The surgery broke the nerves in his face, so his face was always twitching." Liesel interjected: "His football stinks." "It's the kick that stinks the most." Next came Mrs. Diller's shop on the corner of Hamilton Street.
Mrs. Diller wore a pair of thick glasses with a piercing, malevolent gaze.Her countenance would give up anyone who would try to steal something from her store.She was always guarding the store like a soldier, she spoke and even breathed "Heil, Hitler!" coldly, which also protected her store.The store itself is cold white and impersonal.It was more stately than the other houses on Himmel Street, and even the smaller houses huddled next to it seemed to owe it to them.Mrs. Diller presides over the seriousness, offering it as the only free service.She was born for her shop, and her shop was born for the Third Reich.Although rationing soon came into effect, her shop was able to privately sell certain hard-to-buy items, which she then donated to the Nazi Party.Above her usual seat hangs a framed photo of the Führer.If you walk into her shop and don't say "Heil, Hitler!", she won't serve you.As Rudy and the others passed the store, he reminded Liesel of the invulnerable eyes squinting at them from behind the store window. "You have to say 'Heil, Hitler' when you pass here," he warned her sternly, "unless you want to stay away." When they passed the store and Liesel looked back, those horrible eyes Still staring at the outside. Turning the corner, the muddy Munich Strasse (the main thoroughfare into and out of Molching) unfolds before you. Most of the time there will be a group of soldiers in training marching through the streets.Their military uniforms were crisp, their black boots dirty in the snow.The look on their faces was very focused. After the soldiers were out of sight, the Steiner children and Liesel walked past a few more shops and the grand town hall.The hall would later be blown up in half and lay in ruins.Several abandoned shops still had yellow stars and anti-Semitic signs outside.Going further down, you can see the striking church under the blue sky. The roof of the church is made of many tiles.The whole street was like a gray pipe—damp walkways, people hunched over in the cold wind, their feet clattering in the muddy water. Suddenly, Rudy pulled Liesel up and rushed to the front. He knocked on the tailor's window. If Liesel knew the words on the sign, she would know it was Rudy's father's shop.The tailor's shop wasn't open yet, but a man behind the counter was already busy arranging fabrics.He looked up and waved to them. "This is my dad," Rudy told her.They were soon filled with Steiner kids big and small, who were either waving at Papa, blowing a kiss, or just standing there and nodding hello (usually the older kids did) ).Then, they continued walking towards the landmark building closest to the school.
No one wanted to stop and take a look at this place, but everyone couldn't help but take a look.The road is shaped like a long broken arm, and there are several bruised houses on the road, with the Star of David painted on the door.Everyone stayed away from these houses like a leper.At least, they resembled infected wounds on German soil. "This is the road to the yellow star." Rudy said. Not far away, some people were walking.In the drizzle they wandered like ghosts under the leaden sky, as if they were not people but shadows. "Hurry up, you two," Kurt (the eldest son of the Steiner family) called to them, and Rudy and Liesel hurried towards him.
At school, Rudy used to come and hang out with Liesel during recess, and he didn't mind the other kids booing and laughing at Liesel's stupidity.At first he came to her, and after a while, when Liesel was no longer downcast, he would come again.However, he didn't do it without purpose.
After they got out of school in late April, Rudy and Liesel stood on Himmel Street as usual waiting for the football game to start.They were a little early, and the other kids hadn't come yet.They saw a foul-mouthed Pficus. "Look there," Rudy said, pointing at him.
"Hi, Pficus!" As the distant figure approached, Rudy began whistling. The old man immediately straightened up and began to add swear words that only a genius could come up with.No one knew his real name, but, if they remembered, it was never called.People only called him Pficus, because that's what people who whistled, and that's what the word "Pficus" means.He always liked to play a tune called "The Radetzky March," and all the boys in town would shout his name and play the same tune.At this time, Pficus will change his usual walking posture (bending, striding, hands behind the back of the raincoat), straighten up and prepare to curse.Next, his swearing will break all peace.
At this time, Liesel and Rudy also laughed at Pficus, like a conditioned reflex. "Pficus!" she echoed, quickly absorbing the cruelty of the children's childhood.Her whistle is terrible, who told her to play it without practice. He ran after them, yelling, at first "Son of a son of a bitch!", and then getting worse and worse.At first, he aimed only at Rudy, but soon opened fire on Liesel. "You little bitch!" he growled at her.This sentence stunned Liesel all of a sudden. "I've never seen you!" Pficus was the type to call a ten-year-old girl a whore.People said he and Mrs. Holtzpeffer were a match made in heaven. "Get over here!" These were the last words Rudy and Liesel heard him scold. They ran away quickly, and ran to the streets of Munich in one breath.
"Come on," said Rudy, as soon as they had recovered, "here." He took her to Hubert Oval, where the Jesse Owens incident took place.They stood there with their hands in their trouser pockets.The runway stretches out in front of you.There is only one thing to do here.Rudy began to use the aggressive method: "Let's run a few hundred meters, I bet you can't outrun me." Liesel would not be fooled. "I bet I can win." "What do you bet on, little sow? Do you have any money?" "Of course not. Do you have any?" "No." But Rudy had an idea that only a boy in love can come up with. "If I win, I'll kiss you." He squatted down and began to roll up his trousers. Liesel, alarmed, wants to call back the bet. "Why do you want to kiss me? I'm so dirty." "Me too." Rudy didn't think being dirty would affect this matter, both of them hadn't showered for a while. She thought about it as she looked at her opponent's slender legs.Those legs were about the same as hers, and there was no way he could beat her.So, she nodded solemnly, and it was decided. "Kiss me if you win. But if I win, I won't be goalie when I play football." Rudy thought about it. "Okay, it's fair." The two of them shook hands to seal an agreement. The sky was gloomy, and dense raindrops began to fall. The runway is actually muddier than it looks. The two contestants are ready. Rudy threw a rock into the air for a starting pistol.As soon as the stone hit the ground, they ran away. "I can't see the finish line," Liesel complained. "Then I can see it?" Rudy asked back. The stone fell into the mud. They ran close together, shoving each other as they ran to give themselves the lead.The mud crackled under their feet.About twenty meters from the finish line, they slipped and fell. "My mother!" Rudy screamed loudly, "I'm covered in shit!" "It's not shit," Liesel corrected him, "it's mud." Although she felt a bit like shit, too.Five meters from the finish line, they fell again. "It counts as a draw." Rudy grinned, narrowing his slender blue eyes in thought, his face smeared with mud. "If it's a tie, can I still kiss you?" "Don't even dream about it." Liesel got up and patted the mud on her clothes. "I won't let you be the goalkeeper either." "To hell with your keeper." When they got back to Himmel Street, Rudy said, "Liesel, someday you're going to try to kiss me." But Liesel knew. she swears. As long as Rudy and herself were alive, she would never kiss the filthy stupid pig, especially not on this day.They had nothing to do, so they planned to go home.She looked down at the mud on her clothes and realized clearly: "She's going to kill me." She, of course, refers to Rosa Hubermann, the one called Mama.Indeed, Rosa almost killed Liesel. The word "gilt" always came with punishment, and Mom almost turned her into a pile of mincemeat.
Notes: