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Teo Shen/Yakub Yaphet (Theo Yaffe nee Schön ) was a 17-year-old in 1934 when he went on a trip around Yugoslavia with his two friends Sandor Switzer (later Aleksander "Shani" Sharon) and Erich Elisha Samlaich , a then renown musical scholar and composer who died in Jasenovac concentration camp in Croatia in 1941. From Yad Vashem; ERICH SAMLAIC Erich Samlaic was born in Srem, Poland in 1913 to Emanuel and Maria. He was a מנצח מקהלה יהודית and married to Laura nee Blau. Prior to WWII he lived in Zemun, Yugoslavia. During the war he was in Zagreb, Yugoslavia.
Erich was murdered in the Shoah.
This information is based on a Page of Testimony (displayed here) submitted by his sister-in-law, Lea Klopper. http://claude.torres1.perso.sfr.fr/GhettosCamps/Camps/Yougoslavie/S...
Teo Shen grew up in an upper-middle-class Jewish family in Zemun, Belgrade. His father, Arnold Shen was a doctor and playwright. His mother was an actress and socialite and they were beloved by the Jewish community.
Teo was an early Zionist pioneer and emigrated to Israel in 1938. He died in 1995 on Kibbutz Mizra.
His daughter is Keren (Wexler?) and grandson Liron Keren.
His travelogue, found in an antique shop in Jerusalem was written in Serbo-Croatian and details his summer trip with his friends in 1934. He encounters refugees from Anschluss Austria, has fun with the ladies, and observed the then-gay nightlife of Sarajevo.
Jasna and Maia are working on translating (Jasna) and bringing this project to life with the help of Teo's family and honor the memory of his friends too from recreating the music of Samlaich and interviewing his family and scholars.