Please note: Parental discretion is advised, as this series of articles may be too disturbing or graphic for children.
Olga did a lot of thinking. Other than the all-important zahlappel, and getting the morning tea, lunch soup, and then evening supper (bread and a few meager grams of margarine), she had nothing else to do. Cleaning the barracks was really the only work available. Olga thought she had become more mature since her arrival. Slowly, the reality of Auschwitz was sinking in with each day.
One day, the block supervisor noticed her sitting alone, crying.
“What is wrong with you?” she demanded to know. Olga felt a little sheepish at her sensitivity, but told her she was just thinking if she would ever see her father again. The blockowa began to laugh and said to Olga in a scornful voice filled with venom. “Look at that,” she said pointing to the ever-billowing smokestack on top of what they referred to as the “bakery.” “That is where your father is; he went up in smoke. Don’t you know that everyone sent to the left was immediately gassed and incinerated?”
Olga had been told this before, but she refused to believe it. Now, though, after weeks in Auschwitz, it was tough to deny it. Her father was probably gone!
The whole name of Auschwitz was a farce. Olga was in Birkenau, not in Auschwitz. Upon arrival and the first selection, some were sent to Auschwitz to become slave laborers in the German war effort in one of many munitions factories located along the main Auschwitz camp. In 1943, Birkenau was turned into a “vernichtungslager,” an extermination camp. Most were killed upon arrival; only very few were allowed to live. In reality, the Nazis meant to kill all of them. But for propaganda purposes, they kept thousands alive, but in limbo, while they murdered millions of others. Inmates in Birkenau were also frequently selected for gassing. Pistol shots rang out daily, dispatching those who displeased the Germans. The only reprieve was if one worked.
The makeshift buildings (originally built as stables) were haphazardly put together by Russian prisoners of war in 1941, before they, too, were exterminated. The barracks, built on top of marshland, were always damp.
Many of the barracks had no windows. They also had no heating or plumbing. As such, the wooden huts were unfit for human habitation. When it rained, the roofs routinely leaked onto the dirt floor, and because there was no drainage, the rain created pools of mud. The barracks were made with 18 stalls to house 52 horses on both sides of a long walkway down the middle of the hut. Two of the stalls were earmarked for the barracks supervisors, or blockowas, and they were situated outside the main barracks hall but still inside the barracks. The other 16 stalls were reconstructed with three level bunks, or kioas. Each level was like a long and deep shelf that could fit over ten women at times, although they were never intended to hold that many. The shelves were made of wooden planks or slabs of wood with some space between the planks. They were not sturdy.
After 1943, there were some improvements made to some of the barracks, with windows and a toilet and plumbing installed. Originally intended for 500 people, 800–1,000 were often jammed into them, depending on the needs of the camp, dictated by the number of arriving prisoners. The barracks were so overcrowded that not everyone got even the sliver of space in one of the kioas. Many women had to make do on the floor in the walkway between the bunks.
At first, no bedding was provided and they slept on the wooden planks. Sometime later, some straw or a thin mattress and a dirty and smelly blanket were given, one to all the women in the kioa. During the night, fights routinely broke out. Due to space shortage, they all had to sleep on their sides. If a woman wanted to change position, they all had to accommodate her and change. Going out to the latrine and coming back meant that one would invariably step on someone, eliciting much shouting and cursing. Often when one left, she came back to discover her spot was gone.
At times, one of the slabs would collapse and come crashing down on the slab underneath. If it was the top slab, all three slabs would collapse, often resulting in arms and ribs broken. Much screaming would ensue as the women tumbled out of their bunks. The commotion would attract the attention of the blockowa, who would run into the barracks, cursing and swinging her stick toward anyone she could reach. In the morning, serious punishment from the Germans would ensue for “unruly behavior.”
It appeared to many that all the regulations, the harsh and cruel rules, were invented only as a method to break the spirit of the Jews and ultimately to exterminate them. Perhaps, many thought, they were only kept alive to mask the real purpose of Birkenau: the mass extermination of the constantly arriving daily transports.
One day, there was an unexpected zahlappel. While standing outside Block 7, Shushanka, the blockowa, counted out 200 women. No one could guess the purpose. From previous experience with selections, this did not bode well. Olga was among the 200 selected. Shushanka told them, “You are dead to Block 7. From now on, you go to block 5.” All 200 of them were transferred and placed under the supervision of the Block 5 blockelteste, Renata.
The position of blockelteste or blockowa was one that many volunteered for. It gave them a higher food ration and allowed them to be in charge. The downside was that one needed to become cruel and abusive toward their fellow inmates. For some this was easy. But not all blockeltestes were cruel. Some managed to retain a sense of humanity even among their degrading conditions.
Olga had no idea what type of blockelteste Renata was, and so she anxiously filed into Block 5.
Renata was apparently among the more decent ones and she welcomed the 200 “newbies” with genuine warmth and affection. Olga felt welcome. As they moved into the block, they immediately scattered to find a spot on the floor to lie on. As they had been added to the barracks’ population, all the kioas were already taken by the Barracks 5 inhabitants.
The only space was the walkway, separating the two sides of the barracks. Olga managed to find a spot and everything was OK. But the veterans mentioned that in the rain, Barracks 5 was one of the worst to get flooded, especially the walkways. Not good news.
One afternoon a few days later, a major storm broke out. Sure enough, the rain poured in from the ceiling, and the walkway was flooded and covered with mud. Olga and the others jumped up and scattered in every direction for shelter in neighboring barracks.
After the downpour stopped, they went back to Barracks 5 and looked for their spots. But their spots were now completely covered with mud.
Where would she lie down now, she wondered? Then she noticed that some of the more resourceful women went outside and found wooden slabs or planks or abandoned broken doors and brought the debris inside. They put them onto the walkway floor and lay on top of them.
Three of her block-mates were from Dombovar and arrived together with Olga. They, too, were among the 200 selected and were in the same predicament. One of them instructed Olga to go outside and look for a similar door or plank. Olga went, but by the time she had regained her senses to find such a floor covering, there was none to be found. So she came back into the barracks and went over to her three friends. “There was nothing left,” she informed them.
Olga noticed that the three were very comfortably lying on their door and had plenty of room for her as well. But they didn’t offer and Olga wouldn’t ask. Realizing Olga’s predicament, they suggested that she go outside to room number one, and speak with Edith, the blockowa, about finding her a spot. Olga went into the outer room to speak with Edith. She told Edith that in the springtime she had contracted pneumonia and was very worried about sleeping on the wet and muddy floor. Getting sick here was a death sentence.
Edith looked at Olga with great affection and told her, “Wait here, sweetheart.” She was a Hungarian Jewish woman who managed to stay together with her elderly mother. Her mother, an elegant older lady, had a spot near the window, as her daughter took care of her. Something about the lady resonated with Mengele, who allowed her to live despite her age. Edith had volunteered for the position of blockelteste in order to get an extra ration of food. This is how Edith kept her mother alive.
The barracks were very noisy with everyone settling in after the storm. Edith went inside and began to rearrange some of the women. “Here, move over, you have some more room there,” she said to a few. And “move in a little more to make room for others.” The women began to shout, protesting that there was no room and that it was impossible. The commotion was terrible. After standing there for almost half an hour, Olga despaired and lost all hope that Edith would be able to make any room for her. She silently turned around and returned to the walkway. She lay down to sleep on the wet floor.
Olga was devastated. The last few months in Birkenau had finally taken their toll. She closed her eyes as a deep and bitter hopelessness overcame her.
“Al-mighty G-d, I pray to you daily for strength and sustenance. I pray for continued courage to survive this. I also pray that you send my father strength and courage, so he, too, can survive. I pray that after the war, I can take care of my aging father, he who was my friend and mentor, my teacher, with whom I could discuss poetry, politics, anything and everything. I want to live for my father to return to Hungary after this nightmare ends, to be there for him in his old age. But now I know I will never survive. I will never get home, and my father will have no one to look after him. Who will take care of him without me? Who will be there to support him without me?”
(As my mother told me this part of her story, she paused and became thoughtful. She sighed deeply before continuing.)
Suddenly, Olga sensed two manly arms lifting her a few feet off the floor, holding her. But she didn’t feel the arms touching her and she saw no one attached to the arms. She seemed to levitate in the air. The feeling of despair was replaced by a feeling of euphoria that was all the more intense, coming after the earlier sadness. As she floated in air, the words of one of her favorite Hungarian poets, Ady Endre, came to her:
“When they abandoned me and my spirit became an unbearable burden
Quietly and unexpectedly, G-d came to embrace me
He did not appear amid trumpets, but with a silent, real embrace
Not in a beautiful, fiery morning … but in a hostile, brooding night.”
Suddenly, the door opened and she heard a voice call out, “Girls, who among you is Olga Elek?”
Olga rose and answered, “Here I am, Edith.” Edith took Olga by the hand and led her into the main room where a dry spot was waiting for her. Gently, she helped her onto her spot and covered her with a blanket. Olga was so overcome by her kindness that she didn’t have the presence of mind to even thank her.
Olga often thought back to this experience. She could never explain it to others or to herself. She just knew that it happened.
Dr. Alex Sternberg authored the forthcoming book “Recipes from Auschwitz – My Parents’ Story of the Murder of Hungarian Jewry.” He is a lifelong student of Jewish history, focusing on development of Zionism and the Holocaust. He is presently teaching graduate studies and is active in several pro-Israel organizations. He is a retired research doctor in children’s pulmonary health and a master karate instructor.
