Noemi Guttfreund de Segev: A Rooted Consciousness

Noemi shares an important story about her adolescence in San Salvador.

But I do want to say something that’s very important that has to do with El Salvador in connection to the art therapy center. When I was twelve years old in El Salvador, I already had a very, very developed social conscience. Because of my parents, who had a social conscience, and because I didn’t know—I was always looking at the poor people and it really stuck—I was always feeling guilty in El Salvador that I had money, and these poor children didn’t have anything to eat and I’m eating at home—you know, I was very conscious of that.

So one day I was sitting on the stairs and a little girl came to me and she says, “Can you teach me how to, you know, how to write the letters?” So I started—I was glad to teach her. I started with an old book and she learned the letters. And then other children came. And soon enough, there were five or more children sitting around me. One of those days, my father came early home.

And he sees me teaching these children on the stairs of the house. So he says to me, “What are you doing?” I said, “I don’t know. For the last weeks I’ve been teaching them how to read and write. That’s what they want.” So he says to me, “You know something? I want you to think seriously about the following issue, but don’t give an answer now. Think it over. If you’re serious about it, I can help you—how do you say it… to set up a school in our garage. I’m in the Ministry of Education. I have an educational campaign. I can set up desks. I can bring you books. I can bring you a book on how to teach, say, in a systematic way.”

I wanted to tell him yes right away, but he had told me he had to think about it, and I had to look serious. So— (laughs)

I told him the following day that I really wanted to do it. So he set up a school. In two days, there were desks, there were books and everything. And I mean, the following week, we had twenty children. I was teaching twenty children how to read and write.

(And you were how old?)

Twelve. From the age of twelve to fourteen and a half, that’s what I did—and loved it. And the children really learned how to read and write, and basic arithmetic, you know? And we would also—then we would have recess and I would teach them songs. Miriam my sister also joined, then Dian Bymel joined. This was a very, very important part of my life, and I think it informed a part of my life, which also made me eventually create the art therapy center. I mean, that’s what gave me the idea that if you believe in something, you can create it. If there’s nothing there, then create it yourself.

(Did you hear from those kids again, later on?)

Oh, there was always contact. I remember—I don’t even know where I have a letter, but “Señorita Noemi,” you know? (laughs) A letter thanking me. There was one girl that came pregnant, fourteen, fifteen years old, that came pregnant to this class. Then later on she came—a year later when I came back from Buxton for vacation, she came to show me her baby. I would sometimes visit her home. Yeah, there was some contact after that when I would come back home. Then it stopped. I wouldn’t know now where to reach them.

(Do you speak about these experiences now with your husband or with your children?)

Oh, they know this story very, very well, because it’s a very meaningful story. I think it’s one of the most meaningful stories for me, this school, that I could do something. It was also I think something that sort of was caring for me in the sense that whatever my teachers didn’t do for me that was so boring, I could do differently. (laughs) So there was a lot of humor in the class. Whenever someone didn’t know how to learn the letter, I remember jumping, clowning around, doing fun stuff. And they all learned. I mean, it didn’t matter how average they were or low average. They all learned how to read and write.

(That’s an amazing story.)

By the way, I heard later on that in Cuba, one of the ways that they did alfabetización, how they taught everybody how to read and write was using adolescents. Adolescents went and talked to elderly people and all that. I think that adolescents can be very, very good teachers, because they’re very close to what school is all about, what they don’t get from teachers, or their wishes of how teachers would be. You have ideology.

(When you think of being a Jew in Salvador, do you have warm feelings about that identity? I assume that it might be challenging to grow up as a religious minority, but those are simply my thoughts….perhaps that does not even occur to you. I’m wondering about this...)

What I felt, it was like a big family. I liked the people in the Jewish community very much. Very warm, very authentic. I felt that we were a special community. I had seen other Jewish communities in Central America and I was impressed of how gossipy the people were and how important it was the way that you looked. And I found that in Salvador it was less like that. And I did a Bat Mitzvah, by the way. I thought to myself, “Why should only boys have a Bar Mitzvah?” So I made a revolution there. I went to the Rabbi and said—I really fought it out. I thought girls also should have Bat Mitzvah. I didn’t think I had ever heard of girls having Bat Mitzvah when I was in the United States. I just wanted the same rights as the boys.

(What did the Rabbi say—how did he react?)

It took time until they decided and gave their permission. And we studied. It wasn’t that we didn’t study. I did it with Kathi Geissmar, my best friend. We were the first Bat Mitzvah girls. (laughs)

(Amazing. What year was that, do you remember?)

’65? No. ’65 I was fifteen. But it was before I went to the States—maybe it was ’64?

(Were men and women still sitting separately at that point?)

Yes. Yes. I liked the old synagogue.

(Can you describe the old one?)

Yes. The old one was more of an older building. I don’t know, there was something homey, cozy about it. It didn’t have all these neon lights that the new synagogue has. When I go to the new synagogue now, I don’t feel the same feeling as I used to. It’s other faces, mostly. It doesn’t feel like a cozy place like it used to. There used to be all these fruit trees, I remember, for Yom Kippur. We would play around and say, “Oh, let’s go over there,” so that our mouth would get all juicy and we wouldn’t feel thirsty. “Oh, let’s go to the mango tree and look at the mango tree.” All these games, you know. But I like the Jewish community very much, no matter the synagogue.

(Do you ever feel that you want to go back?)

No. I feel very identified here. I feel freer here. I have more choices of different kinds of people and I’m not locked into, like I said, one strata.

Transcription by Sandy Adler, Adler Enterprises LLC