Anna Cheszes was born in Poland, likely in 1940; she is uncertain of her birthday given the circumstances of her early life, but based on her faked baptismal certificate she celebrates it on June 8. Based on information she has learned, Anna believes that she was born Pola Kaplan, and she was raised as Anna Strzelczyk.  In May 1943, her biological mother Dora Kaplan was able to smuggle a women’s gold watch out of the Bialystok ghetto for the daughter she had given up, Pola. Later, Pola’s rescuer, Madzia Strzelczyk, visited Anna and gave her the watch as a high school graduation gift, but with no explanation. Anna only learned the truth about her birth and the watch only after Madzia’s death in 1972.  Anna’s natural father, whose full name she never knew, is believed to have worked as a printer in Bialystok. He was killed when the Germans burned down the Great Synagogue in Bialystok on the second day of the occupation. Pola and her mother, Dora Kaplan, were soon forced to relocate to the Bialystok ghetto. When Pola was three years old, her mother arranged for Michal Kempinski, a Jewish electrician hiding on the Aryan side, to smuggle Pola out of the ghetto. Michal was married to a Pole, Helena Strzelczyk, and he took Pola to the home of his brother-in-law, Tadeusz Strzelczyk. Michal helped to secure false papers for Pola, including a baptismal certificate. Pola was renamed Anna and raised by Tadeusz Strzelczyk and his Jewish wife, Madzia, as their own child. Following the German occupation of Bialystok in 1941, Tadeusz was rounded-up and sent to Germany for slave labor, and Madzia, as a Jew, was forced into the ghetto. Madzia escaped the ghetto in the fall of 1942. After 22 months of forced labor, Tadeusz returned to Bialystok in May 1943. Tadeusz gave Madzia the baptismal certificate of his sister, and Madzia used her sister-in-law’s name for the rest of the war. Tadeusz brought Madzia and Anna to the village of Kowale, near Bialystok, where they lived as Polish Christians. They survived the war in the country. Anna’s natural mother, Dora Kaplan, did not survive, and after the war, Madzia and Tadeusz continued to care for Anna. Anna remained in Poland until 1967, when she left for France. From there she continued on to the United States, and finally settled in Canada in 1986. Crestwood students visited Anna at Baycrest in December 2024, where they recorded her story for this project.