Angel of Auschwitz (6 page)

Our flat lay on the second floor of an old stone-faced townhouse. The front parlor windows overlooked the street. Mother and I were in the kitchen, preparing the noonday meal. The aroma of fresh-baked bread mingled with the melodies of Mendelssohn as Sarah and Abraham played a duet, she on the flute, he with his violin. The harmony of music brought peace to our household.

Lulled by rhapsodies of love, we were unaware of the comings and goings of traffic on the street below. Suddenly, an alarm sounded in our hearts. We heard hurried footsteps pounding up the stairs, and then the iron men kicked down the door. As I ran to hide, a big bully grabbed me by the arm and pulled me down the steps and out to a waiting van. I was separated from my family and never saw any of them again.

They put me on a passenger train that was crowded with other Jews. The old coach car swayed to and fro and rattled down the tracks. Everyone sat in silence, with heads bowed, eyes downcast. All were contemplating their fate. I wondered what kind of lives they had been living. What were they leaving behind? Where were we going?

The brakes screeched and the old train jerked to a halt. One infinite second of sudden silence, and seven guards stormed onto the train. They poked us with the barrels of their rifles and kicked us as they forced us to disembark. We were assembled in an abandoned ryegrass field west of Kraków. They herded us together like farm animals, like cattle and sheep. We were forced to march through the night, across hard ground baked dry by the hot August sun. I tripped over rocks in my path, stumbled over brush, and was poked by thorns.

As the first rays of light shone over the horizon, we arrived at the main gate of the camp. Guard towers loomed menacingly overhead. The sight of twisted barbed wire made me cringe. The name of the camp was Auschwitz. I was twelve and a half years old, just entering puberty.

T
HEY HERDED US DOWN
dirt roads and through alleys, passing by rows of barracks and outbuildings until we reached a huge assembly hall. Here we waited and waited. As the hours passed by, my apprehension grew. I was filled with anxiety; my future was tenuous. How was I going to survive? The steel net of reality had captured my fleeting innocence. My cloistered childhood had ended. It already felt like I was living a horror story, and this was only the introduction. I knew I needed to learn how to fend for myself.

Exhausted from the long march through the night, I sat down on the hard floor. My feet hurt from sores and blisters. Leaning my back against the wall, I closed my eyes. I needed to rest, to gain strength for what lay ahead.

I must have dozed off. Suddenly, I heard the rustle of clothing and the scuffling of shoes as people began to move about. I quickly got up to get my bearings. I saw a short man holding a stack of papers that listed all of our names. As he barked out commands, his subordinates scurried around, dividing the crowd into small groups. I was ushered into a side room with forty or so other women and girls. There were no windows in the room, and the air was thick with the odor of sweating bodies.

We were ordered to disrobe. My tender young body was naked and exposed; I wanted to hide my awkward femininity. Hunching forward, I looked down in shame. I hid my rosebud breasts from lustful leers by crossing my arms over my chest. I stood alone in a crowd of strangers—women who would soon become my closest allies.

We placed our clothes in one pile, our shoes in another, our coats and hats in another. In one corner of the room was a square wooden bin. We were told to walk in a clockwise circle around the room, passing by the bin. As each woman or girl stood in front of the giant bin, she was ordered to put her jewelry and most precious possessions into it. Then our naked bodies were searched by the gorilla bullies; even our mouths, even our private parts.

I held back the tears when my turn came to stand in front of the bin. It was filled to overflowing with the treasures of each woman’s life.
I took the silver brooch given to me by my mother and gently placed it on top of the pile. I had cherished this brooch above all else since I was a little girl.

In times of trouble I sought solace from my silver brooch. At its center was an oval amethyst stone, radiating the violet ray. I believed that within this gem dwelt an innate intelligence. I spoke to the stone, asking for insight, for the revelation of the secrets of the universe. It became my sacred source of wisdom and guidance. I peered deeply into its essence as I held it in the sunlight. As I turned it around and around, its many facets sparkled light into my mind. As I attuned my energy to the emanations of the stone, my psychic gifts were enhanced, especially my ability to see into other realms. The brooch carried the vibration of my mother and my ancestral line of grandmothers who had passed it on for generations.

As I parted with my silver brooch, the last physical connection with my mother was severed. Without the stone in my hands, I would need to learn how to find my own inner strength and spiritual power.

I
WAS ASSIGNED TO THE
women’s barracks number 12. As I opened the front door, I hesitated in the doorway, leaning against the door jam. After being out in the bright September sun, my eyes needed a moment to adjust to the darkness of the room.

I walked down the long central hallway, passing cot after cot on either side of me. Standing beside each cot was a woman. I could dimly see each face and form. These unknown women were to become my friends and sisters, whom I would share my life with. The floorboards creaked and sighed under my feet as I walked down the long hall. Rays of light peeked through cracks between the boards and through knotholes in the walls. When I reached the far corner of the room, I sat down on my cot. Above it was a small window, covered with dust and broken cobwebs. Stepping onto a small wooden crate I peered out the window, which faced barracks 14.

As I lay down, the cot sagged beneath me. Even so, I was grateful to be in a sheltered place and to have a bed to sleep on. I was worn and weary from the long journey and sleepless nights.

A
FTER A CATNAP
, I sat up on my cot. I instantly sensed that someone was staring at me. Turning around, I met the eyes of a woman in her late thirties. She sat down beside me and placed her right hand crosswise over my right hand in a symbolic gesture of greeting.

“I am Gretta Goldberger,” the woman introduced herself. “Welcome to Auschwitz.”

I was surprised to see her blond hair and fair skin. Obviously, not all prisoners were of Jewish descent. As she held my hand and looked deep into my eyes, her warm touch made me feel safe. She gave me hope that somehow I might be able to survive this madness. Maybe I had a future waiting for me after all.

Gretta told me her story: She was a political prisoner, accused of the crime
Landesverrat
(treason) for aiding an enemy of the state. Jews, gypsies, and other dark races were considered to be inferior. It was a crime to have a relationship with a person of an inferior race. It was a crime to hide a Jew in your home.

Gretta did not believe in God. She was an intellectual par excellence. Gretta called herself a moralist and considered herself a philosopher. She zealously lived her life according to guiding moral principles. Fundamental to her ideology was the precept that all people were equal, including children, criminals, crazy people, and imbeciles. Even though we were of different skin colors, races, and creeds, we all belonged to one human family. It was the duty of the strong to protect the weak and helpless. Her green eyes flashed fire as she pontificated on the responsibilities of a moralist.

Beneath her fierce facade lay a broken heart. Muffled sobs during the night alerted me to Gretta’s secret grief. When she was arrested her only son, Konrad, had been taken from her arms. He was just five years old. She had no idea of his fate.

M
Y FIRST NIGHT AT
the camp I was awakened by the feeling of sharp pricks across my neck and face. In the quiet of the night I heard little feet running and scurrying and the sounds of scratching and chewing. I realized that the field mice had made comfortable nests in the pilings under the building. They scampered across my face, climbed up the walls, and ran along the rafters.

I
WAS AWAKENED FROM A
dream by the creaking of wagon wheels rolling along the alley. To take a look at the scene I stretched on my tiptoes from my bed and peered out the dusty barracks window. Parked outside was a long flat wooden cart drawn by a very tired-looking horse. Strewn across the deck of the cart were corpses still warm from life, twisted and disheveled, arms hanging over the sides, their mouths gaping open.

In the mornings just after dawn, the death carts rolled through the camp. Soldiers went from barracks to barracks, gathering up the bodies of those who had passed over during the night. The old cart creaked and swayed as the feeble horse pulled the weight. Prisoners working as gravediggers waited alongside the edges of the open trenches. When the cart stopped they tossed the bodies into the pit, lives thrown away without a prayer.

I
DID NOT NEED TO
ask for directions to the latrines; my nose led me to them. The foul stench of excrement was carried on the wind. Approaching closer, it became harder to breathe. It was a hot day in September, and the air was pregnant with spores and microbes.

As I sat down in the stall, wasps and horseflies somersaulted around my half-naked body. Rats ran to and fro beneath the floorboards. Flies walked on the feces, then crawled across my face. I watched a fly with big green eyes as it walked down the wall. It landed on the end of my nose and looked me in the eyes.

“Welcome to Auschwitz,” proclaimed the fearless fly. “Spread your wings. Hear this message:
Rise above! Rise above!
”

The fly knew what I needed to learn: I must rise above to survive the struggle of the days to come. I decided to learn from the example of the fly. He seemed to be happy even though his life would be short. Even if my life were cut short, I was determined that it would still have meaning and value.

Lurking in the shadows, black-and-yellow spiders hid in the dark recesses of the stall, waiting to pounce on their prey. They were predators like the Nazis as they attacked innocent victims and ate them alive. Their yellow bellies grew fat as they devoured black beetles, green-eyed flies, and brown wasps. I admired the spiders for their cunning, for the carefully crafted webs they designed to catch the unwary. Like the Nazis, they were experts in the art of deception.

I admired the rats for their strong stomachs. They fed on garbage and putrid flesh. The rats thrived and multiplied in sordid conditions that made people sick.

The creatures that inhabited the latrines were masters of survival. They had many lessons to teach me about life and death.

T
HE NEXT MORNING
, I squatted under the eaves of my barracks, chewing on a crust of hard bread. From the anonymous mass of people in the yard in front of me emerged an old grandmother, making a beeline in my direction. She walked toward me bent forward, wearing a frayed gray shawl wrapped around her hunched shoulders.

“Don’t eat all of that bread!” She scolded me in a sharp tone. “Tear off a piece and save it. Wrap it in your handkerchief and keep it in a hiding place. When there is no food, then you will not starve.” After this curt greeting, the Old Mother moved even closer. She peered at me through squinted eyes, straining to see me since she wore no eyeglasses. Her lined face showed years of struggle. Her eyes had been blinded from the pain she had witnessed.

“You are the new girl to barracks number 12. The bed where you now sleep is where the girl child Janas died three nights past. She was age three, shortchanged of her life. The child died from cholera. The drinking water is unclean.”

Hearing this warning from the old woman, all of my instincts went on alert. I felt a rush of adrenalin, and my heart beat faster. I must be wary of unseen dangers. The same fate could befall me.

B
EHIND A FENCE OF
barbed wire my people were held captive, their souls crying out for freedom. Waiting in limbo they watched the wheel of fortune spin out of control.

The shockwaves of my arrival sent me reeling. The consequences of becoming a prisoner at Auschwitz were beyond the limits of my understanding. My very survival was at stake. I needed to get my bearings, to make a survey of the camp. A quick reconnaissance would give me some perspective. The rhythmic motion of walking would calm my mind and help me think more clearly.

The ground felt hot under my blistered feet. A sudden wind stirred up the dirt and blew it into my eyes. A long hard road lay ahead of me. I didn’t know what to expect. As I walked through the sea of strangers, my heart broke open. I saw the scars of war on the faces of young children. I saw women weep and old men pray. Each person had their own story to tell, their unique destiny to meet.

A
S
I
TURNED THE
corner of a stone-gray building, I came upon a young girl sitting on her haunches. Holding a pointed stick in her hand, she was drawing pictures in the dirt. In this way she entertained her imagination. Dreams and fantasies fed her soul.

The artist girl looked up at me: a freckled face, then an elfin grin. Her front tooth was broken off at an angle. Her hair was straight and sandy brown. Jezra stood up to greet me. Placing her palms together in prayer position, she bowed her head and then lifted it in salutation.

She was so very thin, so pale, yet her spirit danced like a fairy princess. She appeared like a playful woodland sprite from the nether realms of make-believe. Amidst the desolation and deprivation, her inner life sustained her. Surely this child had mastered the art of survival. Her creativity was the wellspring of her strength, attuning her mind to a higher plane.