From Zero to Infinity and Back

In February 2021 the Russian Army invaded Ukraine. Was this the same Red Army which liberated Auschwitz 1945? At a distance of more than 70 years the past rushed to replace the present while the evil switched its incarnation, embodied in previous heroes. Adrian Barbu’s father was a hero.

His parents have their origins in what used to be Austria before it became Romania in 1920 subject to the dismantling of the Austrian empire at the end of WWI. Twenty years later the russians took over per ultimatum and the agreement between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. Only one year later the Romanian administration was back but this time together with the German allies. At the end of the war the same land became once more Soviet Union and simultaneously the Socialist Republic of Ukraine. In 1991 the territory became part of an independent Ukraine, but Adrian’s parents have already left long ago. One does not need to move in order to become “a wandering Jew”, the environment spins per its own dynamic as per wars and treaties.

In his memories from “Zero to infinity and back” Adrian tells stories and tries to decipher a puzzle of his family’s past before he takes over with his own existence. For once, life is on the move between countries and horizons. From Czernowitz to Bucharest, from Israel to Aachen, from Vienna to Fontainebleau, from Geneva to Miami to mention just a few. Wandering and discovering became fate and passion in search of freedom. The young man gives a sense of his determination and leaves the reader to imagine what follows once the stories end while he is in his twenties but offers several hints for next steps.