Man’s Search for Meaning (English)
Introduction
This story is about the daily experience of an ordinary prisoner. It does not focus much on the great horrors that occurred during the war. Many books have been written on them. This story is about the daily suffering of a man who lost everything, even his identity. It tells about the struggle to keep an idea of one’s self, in spite of all the cruelty in a concentration camp.
This is about the nameless prisoners who were treated as nothing but a number. They lost all dignity and were often called pigs. We were no heroes or martyrs. We were just skin and bones who struggled not only for bread, but also to remain human.To study psychology requires detachment. However, an outsider would not understand the suffering of a prisoner in a concentration camp.I intended to publish this book anonymously, revealing only my prison number. I realized that more people would read the story if I had the courage to present myself.
I did not serve as a psychiatrist in the camp. In the last weeks before liberation, I only tended to the sick prisoners. I spent three years in prison. Most of the time, I worked on railway lines. I was laying and digging tracks.One day, I dug a tunnel on my own. I was rewarded with premium coupons that Christmas of 1944. I had twelve coupons. They could be exchanged for twelve cigarettes or twelve soups. We were sold as slaves to construction firms. The firms paid the concentration camp a small price per head. For three years, I became nothing more than number 119,104.
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Phase One: Admission to Camp
I had observed three phases of psychological reactions for prisoners in the camp. The first phase was his admission, the second was routine and the third was liberation. When a prisoner arrived at camp, he was overwhelmed with shock.We had travelled for days in a train. Our carriage was full. Only the top part provided some space for air. There were eighty men huddled in each coach. We all thought that we were being brought as forced labor to Poland.
We were filled with fear when we realized that our train had stopped at Auschwitz.Auschwitz meant crematoriums and gas chambers. Soon enough, we saw the watch towers, barbed-wire fences and long rows of prisoners. Our carriage doors were opened. Prisoners wearing striped uniforms entered. They had shaved heads, but they look well fed. They directed us to a shed.These special prisoners, called Capos, acted as guards. They were never hungry, unlike the normal prisoners. Some of them fared better inside camp than they had their entire life. Most Capos were more violent than the actual SS men.
We were made to fit in a shed for 200 men. There are 1,500 total passengers on our train. Most of us were still hoping that we would be safe.We were instructed to leave all our belongings on the train. We were made to form two lines, one line for men and one line for women. There was an officer who inspected each of us. He would point us to the left or to the right. Most of us were pointed to the left.
Our destiny was sealed by that single gesture. Someone whispered to me that those pointed to the right would be assigned for work. Those pointed to the left were the ones who looked sick and incapable. When it was my turn, I tried my best to look smart and strong. The man standing in front of me moved me to the right.Left meant death. That became the immediate fate of 90% of us. In the next hours, they were directed from the station to the crematorium. The building had a huge door where the word “bath” was written in different European languages Upon entering, each prisoner was given a small soap, but no water flowed from the showers.
I only found out the truth that evening, I asked another prisoner where my colleague had been sent. He was directed to the left. The man pointed his finger to the chimney. He said, “That's where your friend is, floating up to Heaven.” He was burnt alive because the Germans thought he was too weak to do any useful work here in the camp.Those of us pointed to the right were escorted by guards. They commanded us to run towards the cleansing station. We passed along the barbed wires surrounding the camp, which were electric. The guards inspected us closely. They had their eyes on our watches and jewelry.
There was a blanket where we had to throw our remaining possessions. Some of us begged to keep a medal or wedding ring for sentimental value, but none of us were spared.A guard shouted at us to remove all our clothes within 2 minutes. Only shoes shall remain.Right there, in our line, we all stripped naked. Those who kept their belts were whipped by the guards.We entered a room where we were shaved. We were unable to recognize ourselves with all the hair on our bodies removed. Then we lined up for the showers. It was a relief when water really came out of the sprays.
I only had my glasses and not a single hair on my body. We were made to face our own nakedness. We had no clothes, no possessions, not even hair to cover us up. All of us stood wet in the open air. All of us were wondering what would happen next.
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Phase Two: Routine and Apathy
That night, I shared an eight-foot board with eight other men. We slept side by side with only two blankets to cover all of us. It is not true when a man says, “I cannot sleep without this or that.” We slept crowded, and escaped pain for the next few hours.We went without brushing our teeth. We did not change our clothes for several months. We had nothing to wear but rags. We did not take a bath. Our hands were wounded from work and they went untreated. Dostoevsky was right when saying that man can get used to anything.
Almost everyone thought of committing suicide, of running into the electric wires. We were always in danger of being brought to the gas chambers, where people were burnt alive. It was often that we got beatings by the guards. We were feeling hopeless. We could be taken by death anytime. There was another doctor, my colleague, who escaped his hut to visit mine. He arrived in Auschwitz weeks earlier than us. He told us, “If you want to stay alive, there is only one way: look fit for work.” There were prisoners who looked sick, down, and miserable. Eventually, they would be sent to the gas chambers. These prisoners were called “Moslems.
Our life in the concentration camp was defined by apathy. When we arrived at camp, we felt an intense longing for home and loved ones. We were disgusted by the things we saw. As we moved on from admission to routine, we all started to feel nothing.Our first reaction to Auschwitz was normal. “An abnormal reaction to an abnormal situation is normal behavior.” As days went by, we were engulfed by apathy.The uniforms we wore were worse than the clothes of a scarecrow. We stayed in the huts as a group. Anyone caught going to other huts was punished. It is where we ate, slept, and excreted our wastes. In between our huts was pure filth.
The new prisoners were assigned to the worst task, to clear the latrines and sewage. It could not be avoided; they would be splashed in the face with excrement. Any attempt to wipe it off meant a blow from the Capos.There were often punishment parades for prisoners.They would march for hours around camp while being beaten by the guards. A 12-year-old boy was forced to stand in the snow for hours. With no shoes to fit, his toes suffered from frostbite and gangrene.Every day we encountered suffering and death. We could not feel pity, horror, or disgust. Instead, we were filled with apathy. Nothing could move us anymore.
I once stayed in a hut with prisoners who suffered from typhus. Their symptoms were extremely high fever and delirium. I watched many of them die around me. After each death, the other prisoners would swarm the body. One would take the corpse’s coat, another would take his shoes, and someone else would eat his leftovers. Only two hours had passed since I talked to that dead man. I watched the commotion while supping on my soup.
We got beatings from the guards as they pleased. I was working on the railway tracks when there was a snowstorm. I leaned on my shovel for a minute to rest. A guard saw me and thought that I was slacking off. He picked up a stone and threw it at me. I felt like I was a farm animal.I once got two blows on the head because the man behind me was not following the line. On these occasions, it was not the beating that was painful. What hurt the most was the insult, the injustice, and the lack of reason.
All of us prisoners suffered from edema due to overwork. It was a condition where the legs and feet were swollen. We could not bend our legs because of stretched skin. We could not tie our shoes because of our huge feet. Yet, we marched and worked under heavy snowfall. It was often that one prisoner would slip on the ice and the others would stumble over them. The guard would not waste time and hit us with the butt of his rifle.
The guards would tell us that normal laborers accomplished a lot more work than we did in a shorter time. But normal laborers didn’t get by on a small piece of bread and thin soup every day. They didn’t long for loved ones who may already be dead. They did not get beatings every now and then.