Page 16 - HaMizrachi 1 Chicago Edition

Ordinary

Heroes One-Way Ticket

achel and Judith I too approached the sauerkraut barrel.
(Yehudit) Flohr were Judith couldn’t move and I wanted to bring
R two young Hungarian her something, but at that very moment, Agi and Miklos (left), and Rachel and Mena (right) on their wedding day
sisters who survived Auschwitz and someone accidentally pushed me and I fell Perhaps I would have ended it all there.
Bergen-Belsen. Rachel takes up the
story from the day of the liberation: into the barrel! I can laugh now but it was Who knows how many like me finished
disgusting. Somehow I got out though and like that? How many were slain by despair
made my way to Judith with the cabbage in even though their bodies were still there –
… My sister was still on her feet. I my hands. battered, scarred and depressed?
remember the spark in her eyes, the joy, as
she said to me, “The British are here! The “Look Judith! Food! We’re free! We’ll get to A little later, the British carried me to one
Germans are fleeing!” Eretz Yisrael!” of their makeshift field hospitals. I shuffled
along and suddenly keeled over. That was
I was on all fours by then. I weighed 25 But Judith replied, “Rachel, I’m about the end. I knew it. I heard one of the doctors
kilos and couldn’t hold myself up any to die, but you will definitely get there. say to a colleague, “Why did they bring her
more. I was just too weak. But at last I Promise me you won’t go anywhere else. here? She won’t hold out till morning.”
could believe we might get out of there. Eretz Yisrael is our country.”
We would live! We would reach Eretz Hospital in Sweden A Belgian doctor
Yisrael! The two of us. Together. As we had I refused to take her seriously. I was the came and asked me if I wanted to go to
been until that day. If we had reached this weak one. The idea of her dying was not a hospital in Sweden, where they could
moment and nothing had separated us – an option at all. It couldn’t happen because give me proper treatment. They couldn’t
what could separate us now? I couldn’t cope with it. It couldn’t happen treat me properly in Bergen-Belsen and
because if one of us was going to die, it I couldn’t return to Hungary in the state I
However, it quickly became clear that the would definitely be me, not her. was in. I told him I didn’t want to go back
very compassion, mercy, and the will to to Hungary anyway.
save us was the final nail in so many of our On the morning of April 20th 1945, I tried
coffins. to wake her up. Lying there in Belsen, I met Agi (Agnes)
Biro, and we became firm friends. She was
After the British had entered the camp, “Judith!” the only person I felt close to then and we
they broke open the food storerooms and decided we would stick together.
handed out tins of preserves to anyone who “Judith, they’ve come to take us out of
asked. They also opened a huge barrel of here! We’re being liberated!” They put us on a boat and we sailed
sauerkraut and the camp was now full of to Sweden.The locals met us at the port
people walking around munching cabbage. Silence. and gave us milk chocolate. That was the
first time we had ever seen milk chocolate
For an instant it seemed like the moment Judith, who had kept her portions of food but we didn’t eat it. We feared we would
of deliverance had arrived, but only for an for me, who had carried me through the never see it again so we hid it under our
instant… death march… Judith, my wonderful, pillows.
considerate, strong sister... Judith…
Our digestive systems – which for so Deep down we were still prisoners.
long had not been asked to digest more Alone Without Judith, I had no one in
than a few crumbs a day, and sometimes the whole wide world. For the next four weeks, Agi and I lay side
not even that – couldn’t take these foods. by side and our relationship deepened. I
People who had survived the hunger No one would even look for me. was suffering from heart failure, and my
could not cope with the new abundance, lungs were in a bad way. But I received
and so many died. And I didn’t have the slightest sliver of good treatment and gradually began to
strength to carry on without her. gain weight.

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