Hermina Vlasopolos - April 9, 1984
Arrival at Auschwitz
[interruption in interview]
"... that the old people and children would be taken by trucks, the distance to the camp being too long for them to hike. And we believed them. Summer nights are short. After awhile the rain stopped. Dawn appeared pink, purple and serene over those places of hate and pain. Following the convoy of our fellow sufferers we arrived at the enormous gate. At the top of the gate there was an invitation for then this world to fol--two foot tall description in gothic letters.: "Leave all hope behind ye who enter here." After a long hike we reached some barracks and were pushed inside. Then we were ordered to strip. While we were standing there naked, not knowing what to expect next, the famous Dr. Mengele came in. At the time we didn't know who he was and didn't know anything about his horrifying reputation. We were embarrassed, but it didn't seem to bother him at all to speak to naked women. And he delivered the speech to us, today you will stop to be human beings, henceforth you'll be nothing than animals with a number. After a shower you'll get camp clothes and a number. Take good care of it. You have to wear it for the rest of your lives. He left and the Nazi women were hard at work. Before the shower without soap or towels, they shaved everybody's head and body. After the so-called shower we were given some rags at random. People who asked about their loved ones were told they had already taken their showers. When we came out we hardly recognized each other with our shaved heads and those disgusting rags. Our transformation had begun. We walked again for miles and finally arrived at the shed. It was henceforth to be our shelter. One of us was more restless and more frightened than the others. She was pregnant and that fact had escaped the scrutiny of the Nazi's eyes. The place was a terrible crime, but the Nazis had laden waste to the area. There wasn't a tree in sight or a leaf, a bird, not even a fly. When it wasn't raining the sky became our only friend. In that ferocious, in that ferocious struggle for survival the humans became inhuman and even former friends became sometimes worse than enemies. The almost unreal colors of the sky at dawn warmed my heart and gave me hope. I used to watch the sky to count the clouds and even started to ask it questions. By the arrangement of the clouds or by the special color of the very dawn, I thought to receive an answer. And nowadays the sky has for me greater significance than for other people. But when the sky was sad and it was raining copiously for days, the soil became so clay that our feet used to sink in our ankles, to our ankles in the slippery red mud. It wasn't raining only outside, the roofs weren't waterproof and we were wet and cold inside too.
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