Participant:We got used to standing in line at seven o’clock in the morning, at twelve noon, and again at seven o’clock in the evening. We stood in a long queue with a plate in our hand into which they ladled a little warmed-up water with a salty or coffee flavor. Or else they gave us a few potatoes. We got used to sleeping without a bed, to saluting every uniform, not walk on the sidewalks and then again to walk on the sidewalks. We got used to undeserved slaps, blows, and executions. We got accustomed to seeing piled-up coffins full of corpses, to seeing the sick amidst the dirt and filth, and to seeing helpless doctors. We got used to the fact that from time to time, one thousand unhappy souls would come here and that, from time to time, another thousand unhappy souls would go away­….

-From the prose of fifteen year-old Peter Fischl, who perished in Auschwitz in 1944


haggadah Section: -- Exodus Story