A SECRET UNRAVELS

The mystery unfolds 20 years after my mother’s death as I follow a trail of clues around the world to piece together the puzzle that was Tamar. Relatives caution me not to pry into family secrets. Undeterred, I grill a cousin in Israel who divulges my mom’s prewar name - Hela. I travel to her Polish hometown where I locate her birth record, revealing her Yiddish name, Alta Hendla (Hela for short) Hocherman.

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DAUGHTER / DETECTIVE

I juggle many roles on this scavenger hunt - daughter, detective, filmmaker, troublemaker, subject, narrator — appearing on-and off-screen, reaching thresholds I wasn’t meant to cross, yearning to connect with a mother who never let me in. When her name appears on the prisoners’ list of a camp I’ve never heard of, Gabersdorf, a women’s camp in Sudetenland, my search takes a startling turn.

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