‘Did you dream at night?’

Spontaneously, I would say no. But things were not always the same, everything changed depending on where we were.

In Auschwitz, we slept the short hours we were allowed as if we had been knocked out cold with a brick. Heavy and dreamless, it was a sleep that offered no rest.

In the labour camps, things were different. Though our sleeping hours were not longer, the dreams started coming. Usually, we dreamed that we were at home within the family circle, and waking up was very painful. I dreamed that I was taking a stroll in a sunny meadow, hand in hand with my father, and he was just telling me a story when the sharp wake-up light was turned on and Papa’s voice was exchanged for the harsh German Aufwachen, get up, schnell, quickly, raus, raus, out, out …

I tried to imagine that it was the dream that was reality, and that the daily toil was just a bad nightmare … I tried to keep my balance in the harsh reality with the help of my imagination.