Schlepping Through The Alps

Sam Apple, who I picture as a kind of nebbish, nerdy type from New York City, heads off to Austria to find out how people living there in the 2000's feel about anti-Semitism and Jewish people.

Apple meets Hans Breuer, an Austrian shepherd, who is performing Yiddish folk songs and showing a slide presentation of sheep herding in the Alps, in a classroom at NYU.  He is intrigued and decides to leave his personal troubles behind in New York and apprentice with Hans herding sheep and understand how this young man has become the modern day "Wandering Jew".

This book follows Sam Apple has he tries to uncover the anti-Semitism he is positive is still prevalent in Austria today as he interviews the citizens of Vienna and other people Sam introduces him to as they travel the countryside with 625 sheep.  Apple also interviews Hans and the people in his life to find out how a young half Jewish shepherd came to sing Yiddish folk songs as he wanders the hills.
This is both a look back at the history of Austria during World War Two and how far this generation is disconnected from their history.

Apple is searching for answers as he interviews Austrians sitting at a cafe about their feelings about Jews, the war and the concentration camps.  Over and over he is told that one, the average person was unaware of what was happening in the camps, and two, that being born after the war, they have done nothing wrong and are not responsible for what happened during the war.  Apple begins to wonder to himself, "Although I remained firm in my belief that Austria had a long way to go before the country would be  ready to move on, I hadn't stopped to think exactly what it would take to satisfy me.  Certainly Austria can't mull over it's war crimes forever.  Vienna now had a beautiful memorial to the Jewish victims of the Nazis; a new settlement had just been reached with the Jewish community on reparations for slave laborers; and the Austrian public schools now teach about the Holocaust and take students on trips to concentration camps.  What, exactly, would the Austrians have to do before the country would be off the hook in my mind?"


Interestingly, Apple also wonders why Jews who had either escaped Austria during the war or had lived through the horrific camps during the war, came back to Austria to live after the war.  Apple wonders if they have regretted those decisions over the years or if they feel they are welcome in the country today.  He interviews a petite elderly woman, who was in England during the war and came back and worked at a Communist newspaper after the war, "I thought they were waiting for us to come home and build a new Austria.  But I was wrong.  Nobody wanted us.  Nobody helped us find a job or a flat.  It wasn't about being Jewish or Communist.  They just thought we were on the wrong side."  They thought the Jews had been on the side of the enemy.  The woman explains there was a new "we" feeling and the refugees disturbed this feeling.

Sam Apple grows as a person as he travels with Hans, his wife, his mistress and Han's sons, living the way of life of a shepherd.  He matures and learns about himself during this experience also.  He reminisces about growing up with his grandmother, Bashy.  He explores his relationships with women and why they don't workout or last.  Like a boy on his Bar Mitzvah journey, Apple returns to New York, a man.