by Elie Wiesel
“The yellow star? So what? It's not lethal…”
(Poor Father! Of what then did you die?)
But new edicts were already being issued. We no longer had the right to frequent restaurants or cafes, to travel by rail, to attend synagogue, to be on the streets after six o'clock in the evening.
Then came the ghettos.
TWO GHETTOS were created in Sighet. A large one in the center of town occupied four streets, and another smaller one extended over several alleyways on the outskirts of town. The street we lived on, Serpent Street, was in the first ghetto. We therefore could remain in our house. But, as it occupied a corner, the windows facing the street outside the ghetto had to be sealed. We gave some of our rooms to relatives who had been driven out of their homes.
Little by little life returned to “normal.” The barbed wire that encircled us like a wall did not fill us with real fear. In fact, we felt this was not a bad thing; we were entirely among ourselves. A small Jewish republic…A Jewish Council was appointed, as well as a Jewish police force, a welfare agency, a labor committee, a health agency—a whole governmental apparatus.
People thought this was a good thing. We would no longer have to look at all those hostile faces, endure those hate-filled stares. No more fear. No more anguish. We would live among Jews, among brothers…
Of course, there still were unpleasant moments. Every day, the Germans came looking for men to load coal into the military trains. Volunteers for this kind of work were few. But apart from that, the atmosphere was oddly peaceful and reassuring.
Most people thought that we would remain in the ghetto until the end of the war, until the arrival of the Red Army. Afterward everything would be as before. The ghetto was ruled by neither German nor Jew; it was ruled by delusion.
SOME TWO WEEKS before Shavuot. A sunny spring day, people strolled seemingly carefree through the crowded streets. They exchanged cheerful greetings. Children played games, rolling hazelnuts on the sidewalks. Some schoolmates and I were in Ezra Malik's garden studying a Talmudic treatise.
Night fell. Some twenty people had gathered in our courtyard. My father was sharing some anecdotes and holding forth on his opinion of the situation. He was a good storyteller.
Suddenly, the gate opened, and Stern, a former shopkeeper who now was a policeman, entered and took my father aside. Despite the growing darkness, I could see my father turn pale.
“What's wrong?” we asked.
“I don't know. I have been summoned to a special meeting of the Council. Something must have happened.”
The story he had interrupted would remain unfinished.
“I'm going right now,” he said. “I'll return as soon as possible. I'll tell you everything. Wait for me.”
We were ready to wait as long as necessary. The courtyard turned into something like an antechamber to an operating room. We stood, waiting for the door to open. Neighbors, hearing the ru- mors, had joined us. We stared at our watches. Time had slowed down. What was the meaning of such a long session?
“I have a bad feeling,” said my mother. “This afternoon I saw new faces in the ghetto. Two German officers, I believe they were Gestapo. Since we've been here, we have not seen a single of- ficer…”
It was close to midnight. Nobody felt like going to sleep, though some people briefly went to check on their homes. Others left but asked to be called as soon as my father returned.
At last, the door opened and he appeared. His face was drained of color. He was quickly surrounded.
“Tell us. Tell us what's happening! Say something…”
At that moment, we were so anxious to hear something en- couraging, a few words telling us that there was nothing to worry about, that the meeting had been routine, just a review of welfare and health problems…But one glance at my father's face left no doubt.
“The news is terrible,” he said at last. And then one word: “Transports.”
The ghetto was to be liquidated entirely. Departures were to take place street by street, starting the next day.
We wanted to know everything, every detail. We were stunned, yet we wanted to fully absorb the bitter news.
“Where will they take us?”
That was a secret. A secret for all, except one: the president of the Jewish Council. But he would not tell, or could not tell. The Gestapo had threatened to shoot him if he talked.
“There are rumors,” my father said, his voice breaking, “that we are being taken somewhere in Hungary to work in the brick factories. It seems that here, we are too close to the front…”
After a moment's silence, he added:
“Each of us will be allowed to bring his personal belong- ings. A backpack, some food, a few items of clothing. Nothing else.”
Again, heavy silence.
“Go and wake the neighbors,” said my father. “They must get ready…”
The shadows around me roused themselves as if from a deep sleep and left silently in every direction.
FOR A MOMENT, we remained alone. Suddenly Batia Reich, a relative who lived with us, entered the room: “Someone is knocking at the sealed window, the one that faces outside!”
It was only after the war that I found out who had knocked that night. It was an inspector of the Hungarian police, a friend of my father's. Before we entered the ghetto, he had told us, “Don't worry. I'll warn you if there is danger.” Had he been able to speak to us that night, we might still have been able to flee…But by the time we succeeded in opening the window, it was too late. There was nobody outside.
THE GHETTO was awake. One after the other, the lights were go- ing on behind the windows.
I went into the house of one of my father's friends. I woke the head of the household, a man with a gray beard and the gaze of a dreamer. His back was hunched over from untold nights spent studying.
“Get up, sir, get up! You must ready yourself for the journey. Tomorrow you will be expelled, you and your family, you and all the other Jews. Where to? Please don't ask me, sir, don't ask ques- tions. God alone could answer you. For heaven's sake, get up…”
He had no idea what I was talking about. He probably thought I had lost my mind.
“What are you saying? Get ready for the journey? What jour- ney? Why? What is happening? Have you gone mad?”
Half asleep, he was staring at me, his eyes filled with terror, as though he expected me to burst out laughing and tell him to go back to bed. To sleep. To dream. That nothing had happened. It was all in jest…
My throat was dry and the words were choking me, paralyzing my lips. There was nothing else to say.
At last he understood. He got out of bed and began to dress, automatically. Then he went over to the bed where his wife lay sleeping and with infinite tenderness touched her forehead. She opened her eyes and it seemed to me that a smile crossed her lips. Then he went to wake his two children. They woke with a start, torn from their dreams. I fled.
Time went by quickly. It was already four o'clock in the morn- ing. My father was running right and left, exhausted, consoling friends, checking with the Jewish Council just in case the order had been rescinded. To the last moment, people clung to hope.
The women were boiling eggs, roasting meat, preparing cakes, sewing backpacks. The children were wandering about aimlessly, not knowing what to do with themselves to stay out of the way of the grown-ups.
Our backyard looked like a marketplace. Valuable objects, precious rugs, silver candlesticks, Bibles and other ritual objects were strewn over the dusty grounds—pitiful relics that seemed never to have had a home. All this under a magnificent blue sky.
By eight o'clock in the morning, weariness had settled into our veins, our limbs, our brains, like molten lead. I was in the midst of prayer when suddenly there was shouting in the streets. I quickly unwound my phylacteries and ran to the window. Hungarian po- lice had entered the ghetto and were yelling in the street nearby.
“All Jews, outside! Hurry!”
They wer
e followed by Jewish police, who, their voices break- ing, told us:
“The time has come…you must leave all this…”
The Hungarian police used their rifle butts, their clubs to indiscriminately strike old men and women, children and cripples.
One by one, the houses emptied and the streets filled with peo- ple carrying bundles. By ten o'clock, everyone was outside. The police were taking roll calls, once, twice, twenty times. The heat was oppressive. Sweat streamed from people's faces and bodies.
Children were crying for water.
Water! There was water close by inside the houses, the backyards, but it was forbidden to break rank.
“Water, Mother, I am thirsty!”
Some of the Jewish police surreptitiously went to fill a few jugs. My sisters and I were still allowed to move about, as we were destined for the last convoy, and so we helped as best we could.
AT LAST, at one o'clock in the afternoon came the signal to leave.
There was joy, yes, joy. People must have thought there could be no greater torment in God's hell than that of being stranded here, on the sidewalk, among the bundles, in the middle of the street under a blazing sun. Anything seemed preferable to that. They began to walk without another glance at the abandoned streets, the dead, empty houses, the gardens, the tombstones… On everyone's back, there was a sack. In everyone's eyes, tears and distress. Slowly, heavily, the procession advanced toward the gate of the ghetto.
And there I was, on the sidewalk, watching them file past, un- able to move. Here came the Chief Rabbi, hunched over, his face strange looking without a beard, a bundle on his back. His very presence in the procession was enough to make the scene seem surreal. It was like a page torn from a book, a historical novel, per- haps, dealing with the captivity in Babylon or the Spanish Inqui- sition.
They passed me by, one after the other, my teachers, my friends, the others, some of whom I had once feared, some of whom I had found ridiculous, all those whose lives I had shared for years. There they went, defeated, their bundles, their lives in tow, having left behind their homes, their childhood.
They passed me by, like beaten dogs, with never a glance in my direction. They must have envied me.
The procession disappeared around the corner. A few steps more and they were beyond the ghetto walls.
The street resembled fairgrounds deserted in haste. There was a little of everything: suitcases, briefcases, bags, knives, dishes, banknotes, papers, faded portraits. All the things one planned to take along and finally left behind. They had ceased to matter.
Open rooms everywhere. Gaping doors and windows looked out into the void. It all belonged to everyone since it no longer belonged to anyone. It was there for the taking. An open tomb.
A summer sun.
WE HAD SPENT the day without food. But we were not really hun- gry. We were exhausted.
My father had accompanied the deportees as far as the ghetto's gate. They first had been herded through the main syna- gogue, where they were thoroughly searched to make sure they were not carrying away gold, silver, or any other valuables. There had been incidents of hysteria and harsh blows.
“When will it be our turn?” I asked my father.
“The day after tomorrow. Unless…things work out. A mira- cle, perhaps…”
Where were the people being taken? Did anyone know yet? No, the secret was well kept.
Night had fallen. That evening, we went to bed early. My fa- ther said:
“Sleep peacefully, children. Nothing will happen until the day after tomorrow, Tuesday.”
Monday went by like a small summer cloud, like a dream in the first hours of dawn.
Intent on preparing our backpacks, on baking breads and cakes, we no longer thought about anything. The verdict had been delivered.
That evening, our mother made us go to bed early. To con- serve our strength, she said.
It was to be the last night spent in our house.
I was up at dawn. I wanted to have time to pray before leaving.
My father had risen before all of us, to seek information in town. He returned around eight o'clock. Good news: we were not leaving town today; we were only moving to the small ghetto. That is where we were to wait for the last transport. We would be the last to leave.
At nine o'clock, the previous Sunday's scenes were repeated. Policemen wielding clubs were shouting:
“All Jews outside!”
We were ready. I went out first. I did not want to look at my parents' faces. I did not want to break into tears. We remained sit- ting in the middle of the street, like the others two days earlier. The same hellish sun. The same thirst. Only there was no one left to bring us water.
I looked at my house in which I had spent years seeking my God, fasting to hasten the coming of the Messiah, imagining what my life would be like later. Yet I felt little sadness. My mind was empty.
“Get up! Roll call!”
We stood. We were counted. We sat down. We got up again. Over and over. We waited impatiently to be taken away. What were they waiting for? Finally, the order came:
“Forward! March!”
My father was crying. It was the first time I saw him cry. I had never thought it possible. As for my mother, she was walking, her face a mask, without a word, deep in thought. I looked at my lit- tle sister, Tzipora, her blond hair neatly combed, her red coat over her arm: a little girl of seven. On her back a bag too heavy for her. She was clenching her teeth; she already knew it was useless to complain. Here and there, the police were lashing out with their clubs: “Faster!” I had no strength left. The journey had just be- gun and I already felt so weak…
“Faster! Faster! Move, you lazy good-for-nothings!” the Hungarian police were screaming.
That was when I began to hate them, and my hatred remains our only link today. They were our first oppressors. They were the first faces of hell and death.
They ordered us to run. We began to run. Who would have thought that we were so strong? From behind their windows, from behind their shutters, our fellow citizens watched as we passed.
We finally arrived at our destination. Throwing down our bun- dles, we dropped to the ground:
“Oh God, Master of the Universe, in your infinite compassion, have mercy on us…
” THE SMALL GHETTO. Only three days ago, people were living here. People who owned the things we were using now. They had been expelled. And we had already forgotten all about them.
The chaos was even greater here than in the large ghetto. Its inhabitants evidently had been caught by surprise. I visited the rooms that had been occupied by my Uncle Mendel's family. On the table, a half-finished bowl of soup. A platter of dough waiting to be baked. Everywhere on the floor there were books. Had my uncle meant to take them along?
We settled in. (What a word!) I went looking for wood, my sisters lit a fire. Despite her fatigue, my mother began to prepare a meal.
We cannot give up, we cannot give up, she kept repeating.
People's morale was not so bad: we were beginning to get used to the situation. There were those who even voiced optimism. The Germans were running out of time to expel us, they argued… Tragically for those who had already been deported, it would be too late. As for us, chances were that we would be allowed to go on with our miserable little lives until the end of the war.
The ghetto was not guarded. One could enter and leave as one pleased. Maria, our former maid, came to see us. Sobbing, she begged us to come with her to her village where she had prepared a safe shelter.
My father wouldn't hear of it. He told me and my big sisters, "If you wish, go there. I shall stay here with your mother and the little one…
Naturally, we refused to be separated.
* * * * *
NIGHT. No one was praying for the night to pass quickly. The stars were but sparks of the immense conflagration that was con- suming us. Were this conflagration to be extinguished one day, nothing would be left in the sky but extinct stars a
nd unseeing eyes.
There was nothing else to do but to go to bed, in the beds of those who had moved on. We needed to rest, to gather our strength.
At daybreak, the gloom had lifted. The mood was more confi- dent. There were those who said:
“Who knows, they may be sending us away for our own good. The front is getting closer, we shall soon hear the guns. And then surely the civilian population will be evacuated…”
“They worry lest we join the partisans…”
“As far as I'm concerned, this whole business of deportation is nothing but a big farce. Don't laugh. They just want to steal our valuables and jewelry. They know that it has all been buried and that they will have to dig to find it; so much easier to do when the owners are on vacation…”
On vacation!
This kind of talk that nobody believed helped pass the time. The few days we spent here went by pleasantly enough, in rela- tive calm. People rather got along. There no longer was any dis- tinction between rich and poor, notables and the others; we were all people condemned to the same fate—still unknown.
SATURDAY, the day of rest, was the day chosen for our expulsion.
The night before, we had sat down to the traditional Friday night meal. We had said the customary blessings over the bread and the wine and swallowed the food in silence. We sensed that we were gathered around the familial table for the last time. I spent that night going over memories and ideas and was unable to fall asleep.
At dawn, we were in the street, ready to leave. This time, there were no Hungarian police. It had been agreed that the Jewish Council would handle everything by itself.
Our convoy headed toward the main synagogue. The town seemed deserted. But behind the shutters, our friends of yester- day were probably waiting for the moment when they could loot our homes.
