Maus Blog #2

Nicolas Afonso
Maus
Art Spiegelman
Connection Captain

        

My Grandfather and Grandmother

         In these two chapters, we feel a deal of the intensity brought by Vladek's draft.  Because of the war, this can be compared to many other war stories.  To me, this reminds me of my family's history during WWII.  Like Vladek's brother, they also avoided being drafted.  My Great Grandparents had just recently moved from Germany and Switzerland all the way to Costa Rica.  They owned a large farm, and also were representatives for the Volkswagen car company in the country.  Because of Costa Rica's unision to the USA, Costa Rica declared war on Germany, Italy, and Japan in 1943.  It was close to the end of the war in Central America, fought by small quantities of German soldiers that set out to take over Central America, to attack the United States from a territorial front.  because of this, a blacklist, stating those habitant Costa Rica from Germany, to be deported back to Europe.  Luckily, my great grandmother was Swiss, and my grandparent scrambled to get his Swiss passport in time, due to the fact that Switzerland was not involved in the war.  Although they were able to stay, like Anne Frank, my young grandpa, and Great Grandmother had to go into hiding in their farm, in the outsides of San Jose, Costa Rica's largest city.  Even going to the supermarkets was an ordeal, and my family had to wear Swiss symbols, to prevent any suspicion by the Costa Rican government.  It took one year for my family to leave the farm and go back to the city.  I find this very relatable to Vladek's brother due to the fact that my family went through a quantity of things just to be able to continue their life in Costa Rica.  Although my family did not have to go through physical pain in order to achieve this, many things were lost during the hiding, such as the ownership of the Volkswagen "franchise" in Costa Rica.

        Not only that, but this entire book feels like a connection due to the fact that I am very curious about history, and ask my grandparents about their whole family history.  In fact, I even know the numbers to my grandmothers house from 1950,# 482.  This book reminds me of this because of the point that Art is asking his father about his history, similar to me asking my grandparents about theirs.  Although I am not writing a story on it, like Art, I am writing a blogpost on it, documenting history.