Voice/Vision Holocaust Survivor Oral History Archive

Esfir Lupyan - December 17, 2007

Mother's Forced Labor

And my mom, my mom should work like a slave in rail station, in rail station. So, every morning, every morning, womans--mother, mother--get together and they go like three in row, three in row, you know, womans and under, under conducting, conducting, the Germans they go to uh, station to work all day. So mom, they don't want to leave children, their children, they take with them. And I go with my mom every day until they forbid this. They say, "No more children, no more." So, I, I, I don't want to stay with, you know, stay without my mom.

So, where would you go with her each day?

The store... This is my mom.

To, to where? To do work?

Yeah, she work and I, I, I...

Where would you work?

Oh, in, in uh, train station. She, she floor work...

So, just cleaning?

She was like a slave, you know. She work in kitchen, she work... whatever they sent, uh...

And what did you do while she was working?

Uh, I hide under, under corner, under table. I remember we--two, three children--we find centrifuge far away. Centrifuge. It was broken centrifuge. Motor work, motor, but it was no... nobody, no, no shape. So, we sit in, in somebody's, you know, play with centrifuge. Whatever it was... Everything broken, everything good, you know.


© Board of Regents University of Michigan-Dearborn