Hermina Vlasopolos - April 9, 1984
Transferring to Another Camp
Mm-hm.
And uh, the other ones spoke Yiddish so, they did say that they speak German. And they, they separated us from the others and put us in a completely different shed. There was, you see this lager elder, the Blockältester this girl from, from Czechoslovakia who had been tortured so much she resented us that we, we escaped for three years. And she said, you know, now you came, you came to the end of it and you don't know what we went though and they really were angry uh, with us. In this shed it was a lager elder, a Blockältester, she was only seventeen. Alise was her name. I don't know her, I mean, you never knew the other name. She was a red-haired girl, not pretty, but very charming, very smart. She had such an organized, she was such a fantastic organizer, you know, she was a leader. I mean, she was only seventeen. I don't know she was thirteen when she arrived in the camp. And everything was going perfectly in her, in her shed. So we were there two transports, we were called...
Yeah.
...we transported it. What happened, they didn't let us out. They counted us in the shed and we didn't have any air. So we started to, to, to faint...
Mm-hm.
...because of lack of air. At least like this it drew us it out, you know, twice a day.
Mm-hm.
And uh, then they started to, to count us when the others were in. They brought the transport out because they didn't have any paper, they didn't know if the ones who set, would not exchange with...
Yeah.
...although we did, we did exchange with each other. Little by little the whole thing seemed to, to be a hoax because uh, nobody left. And I found some friends of mine from Nagyvárad. Five sister who were very, very energetic and also I don't know, people who knew how to, how to take life and so on. And they, they got them to, I mean to clean the, the toilets, the toilets were sheds, you know, also like four thousand people with cement. I mean, strips like this with holes in them...
Mm-hm.
...but they kept them very clean because they were afraid, you know, not to get an epidemic or something. So there were not lice in Auschwitz. There were lice in the other camps, but not in Auschwitz. And uh, they gave me a rag here which was written ??? and I, I was able to go through the camp without--we didn't, I didn't have papers, they couldn't find out if I belonged to that or not. The only thing helped me that I was able to wash myself, you know. When everybody was in I was allowed to go and get water, you know, and in between I could wash myself. And one day a girl from, from the shed came running and she said, "Transport is going away." Because we didn't have anything. Come out, you know. Out and they sent people away. And she said, "What should we do?" She was a very--I mean, I, I was also young...
Mm-hm.
...but she was a young kid. And uh, she said, they say that they take us to the ovens. I said, "I don't care. And I have been here for three months and I, I really don't care. If we go to the ovens, we go to the ovens, but this is not life." And I--she said, "Why should I die?" I said, "Look sweetheart, do what you want. I cannot tell you what to do. I have to think only for myself." So she came because I went, you know, and the other people who uh, who came--when they took us away they took us on the way to the ovens. I mean, the, the orchestra was playing like it was--and uh, she--I never forget. She turned around, she had very dark big eyes. She looked at me with her big eyes and I shrugged, I said, "You know, I cannot do anything." But they didn't take us, I mean, obviously they didn't take us to the ovens. They took us in another camp, which had it better because they were working in an ammunition factory in Auschwitz.
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