Ruth and her mother were shoved off the train at Treblinka Station. There was shouting and shoving everywhere. People wanted to get off, escape the train. It was understandable, it was packed, people were collapsing and dying every few minutes and the soldiers didn’t care. They were laughing and drinking in another carriage. Not caring that merely hundreds of metres away innocent people were dying. Ruth felt her mother tug at her hand and pull her over to a bench where no one was sitting. She was shaking, barely holding it together, Ruth knew her mother better than anyone, except for maybe her father. Her father had been missing for weeks now. He’d simply gone to work one dreary Tuesday and never returned. For the first time in her life, Ruth liked being an only child. Her best friend at school, Debra, was one of six, the oldest of six. Her father went missing around the same time Ruth’s did, and her younger siblings were distraught. Her mother had to work, so Debra and often Ruth would look after them. It was an exhausting job, as all of Debra’s siblings were eight and under and Debra, being thirteen, was left to raise them. One of the Nazi guards was shouting in German, a language Ruth was fairly fluent in. Her mother however, was only able to speak Polish and Yiddish, a language Ruth didn’t understand. Ruth constantly had to translate all posters and radio announcements. Her mother downright refused to learn German. Every time Ruth so much as suggested it, her mother spat and started ranting in Polish, another language Ruth spoke well. Ruth knew her mother was really angry when she started swearing in Yiddish, a language Ruth didn’t know. The only word her mother taught her was ‘challah’, so she could buy bread rolls from the Jewish baker, and her mother definitely shouting ‘bread rolls’ at the newspaper on the ground. Ruth carefully listened in to the Nazi soldier and prepared to recount it to her mother when she read the sign hanging above his head. Treblinka. Wasn’t that a camp? A camp they took Jewish people to when they wanted to get rid of them? She had heard kids whispering about those types of places in school, she was being taken to a working camp, one where they would be maidservants to people, not to be killed! Her mother looked up at her expectantly, and all Ruth could do was nod and smile. Her mother smiled reassuringly and proceeded to stand up and get in the line that had started to form. Some people, who presumably couldn’t speak German, were talking and smiling, not aware of what may befall them in possibly a few hours. Others, like Ruth, were pale faced and constantly fidgeting. What made it worse was all the little children in the station, smiling and cuddling teddy bears or things like that. She could hear parents whispering to little children. Telling them it would be fine, that nothing was going to happen. That wasn’t true of course. They were headed towards a camp where Jewish people were taken to be killed. Ruth didn’t know how mind you, it could’ve been in a nice humane way, but knowing the Nazis, it was going to be horribly long and painful. She’d seen the Nazis from afar standing in front of a massive pit once. The pit was filled with blobby things she couldn’t quite make out. The officers laughed and spat at the pit and walked off. Ruth waited for a while until she ran down to the pit. She assumed that the blobs in the pit were sheep or some sort of livestock. But they weren’t sheep. They weren’t any type of animals. They were people, bruised, bashed and bloodied people. Ruth was slowly backing away, wanting to un-see what was lying in front of her, when something caught her eye. A symbol, smaller than her hand but big enough to see and, although it was covered in blood she could still see it. A star, a yellow star. And then they were everywhere, everyone was wearing them, and everyone was dead. She screamed and ran the entire way home, still seeing the mutilated bodies whenever she closed her eyes. She walked rather calmly through her front door, and saw her mother sitting at the dinner table knitting something and humming a waltz tune. If there was one person Ruth could rely on, it was her mother. She was so innocent and sweet. She was always kind to everyone, even when Ruth’s father would curse at the Nazi’s. She’d pat him on the back and smile, and almost instantly, he’d calm down. The same went for Ruth. She could’ve been drowning in her own tears, completely depressed, but in less than a minute, she’d be happy and smiling again. She just had that sort of effect on people. Ruth assumed she was making beanies or mittens, as she often did in this time of year. She was walking into the kitchen when her mother realised her arrival. She jumped right out of her chair and pulled Ruth in to a massive hug. Her mother started to talk about dinner, which was a lovely brisket, Ruth noticed something. The pieces of fabric on the table weren’t being made into beanies or mittens, or any sort of innocent accessory. They were cut short and had little symbols on them, little stars, yellow stars. That’s when Ruth realised who the people were, they were Jews, like her, and her mother. She panicked, they weren’t going to do that to them were they? They didn’t offend them; at least she didn’t think they had. Maybe someone heard her father talking about the Nazi’s. Were they next? She hoped not. Her mother looked at her quizzically, but Ruth just smiled. She wasn’t going to say anything to her mother about this, ever. She knew a fair bit of German so she did understand what they were saying. What else did she need to do to save her mother? She’d do anything and everything to keep her family together. Ruth was eleven years old when her childhood slipped away, and it never returned.
They were being huddled into a truck now. Ruth was panicking. She wanted to escape, she had to escape. She wasn’t going to a death camp, and neither was her mother. While Ruth was about to break down, the majority of people on the truck were calm, chatting away between themselves. Her mother was signing and calmly twiddling her fingers, little children were running around and playing, their parents were laughing merrily and joking among themselves. Ruth was the only one that knew of their imminent doom. Or maybe she wasn’t. In the corner of the room an old beared man looked terrified, he didn’t reply to any one talking to him and seemed to be praying. Ruth slowly inched her way over to him. He looked up at her and shook his head, attempting to shoo her.
“I know” she whispered quietly in Polish, deciding it was a language they would both understand. The man looked surprised, but shook his head again.
He looked her in the eyes and muttered “niemiecki”
German, he was speaking German.
More importantly, he was asking Ruth to speak German.
She was fluent in it of course, she was an extremely bright girl who was always the top in her class. She had only recently taken up learning foreign languages and was now able to speak German and a bit of English, both of which came in handy when news or information wasn’t in Polish. She looked at the man and nodded, so he proceeded to speak. He told her about his sons, who had been carted off and taken to a camp, very much like Treblinka, who were never seen again. It was the same with his daughters and grandchildren. He knew where they were taken, and knew the chances of survival for them were slim. He gave up on them eventually, after he searched and searched, asking multiple officials, who threatened to send him there too. In the end he gave up and intended to live out the rest of his days with his wife. However, due to his continually bugging the authorities, he was taken and put on the train, like Ruth and her mother. For good measure, the Nazis also killed his wife. He was distraught and wanted the Nazis to get it over and kill him. Ruth was astounded. She’d never met anyone who wanted to die, who didn’t care like that and welcomed the thought of death with open arms. It scared her. She didn’t want to lose her will to live like that. She was strong, and she was going to stay strong, for herself and her mother. The old man was about to speak again, when the truck suddenly stopped and the door opened, revealing menacing Nazi soldiers, all carrying guns.
