Agnieszka Mitak Second Draft

Agnieszka Mitak second draft

Every day people have a lot of things to do. Sometimes they don’t see other people around because they have busy lives, but if something bad happens, they are always brave people who help each other. I heard about somebody who was very brave and helped someone. He was my hero when I was a little girl, and he still is.

My grandparents lived with their two children in a small village in Poland seventy years ago. They had little farm and few animals. They were always very kind and helpful to other people. All their neighbors liked them very much. Their lives were peaceful and silent until 1939 when the Second War started.

The first two years of the war weren’t too bad for my grandfather and his family.

It was a very difficult time for everybody, but nothing dangerous or miserable happened to them. After that some strangers started to show up in the village. They were Jewish people who escaped from trains or from the town. All village inhabitants were scared.

They didn’t want to help them or even talk to them. People knew if German solders found out that they helped Jewish people, they would kill them and their families or all the village.

One day when my grandfather was walking home from the field, he saw his two children playing with some other child. He discovered soon that he was a Jewish child who escaped somehow from a train. My grandfather didn’t think too long. He decided to keep the child and raised him with his two girls. When my grandmother heard his decision, she tried to tell him that it wasn’t good idea, but finally she gave up. When the whole village discovered who was living with my grandparents, they got really mad and scared. Grandfather told them that if somebody asked them, they should say that the boy was his nephew.

After a few weeks German solders came to the village to get some food. My grandfather was working in the forest when a neighbor’s son came to warn him that

Germans were in his house. My grandfather threw everything he had in his hands and started to run to his house. When he reached his yard, he saw German soldier hitting the boy. My grandfather got very angry, but he knew that he had to calm down. He started to smile and spoke in a very polite way to the soldiers. He said to them that the little boy was his nephew whose parents died, and he was staying with them. They didn’t look convinced. Then my grandfather showed them the boy’s certificate of baptism and gave them a lot of food.

When the German soldiers left, my grandmother started to cry. The children were scared and happy at the same time. My grandfather gave a big huge to his wife and his three children.

I could listen to this story a thousand times when I was a little girl. I have learned a lot from my grandfather’s brave act. People should help each other even if other people don’t want to. We have to think about others around us. We have to try to help people.

Sometimes people are scared, but if somebody starts to help first, others start to copy. My grandfather showed me that we always have to try to do something for people around us.

We can’t just stay and watch helplessly somebody who needs our help. I regret only one thing that I never had a chance to meet my grandfather, who is a big hero to me.