Pg. 97-end

Elie was close to losing his father on the train ride over. Elie forced his father, who in turn forced himself to come back from his unconsciousness. Even now, the Jews treat their own people as the Nazis do. They "Grabbed him by the head and feet and threw him from the wagon, like a sack of flour." These were Jewish volunteers!! They receive no food as they live off the snow. The Germans throw bread at them only to watch the spectacles unfold around them.

Now Elie watches his father losing strength and life. He wines for help and food, but can no longer help himself. No doctors help and he becomes worse and worse. He is also reminded of the survival of the fittest in concentration camps, but he still helps his father. When his father did pass due to the beating of guards, Elie can not weep at all. He can only think to himself "I'm free".

It is horrible to see the transformation of the Jews during this time. They treat each other with no respect, ignoring the community. A son kills his father for a crumb of bread, and it only gets worse. The Blockalteste reminds Elie "Don't forget that you are in a concentration camp. In this place, it is every man for himself, and you cannot think of others. Each of us lives and dies alone." Even though this goes completely against Jewish belief, the Jews act like this. They refuse to be another statistic for future people to see.

pg. 86-97

The death march begins and the German captors let the Jews know that the weak will not survive. If anyone pauses for a second, they are shot down on the spot. Elie must continue running even with his wounded foot. Fear is the only thing that drives most of the Jews. Elie lives for his father, and his father lives for him (that is what drives them to stay alive). Elie must see one of his friends leave after he gets a stomach cramp is forced to stop.

Eventually they are able to stop and rest. Elie and his father take turns watching each other as they rest in the snow because "It's dangerous to fall asleep in snow. One falls asleep forever." Once more they are forced to march again, however even the Nazis begin to slow down. They don't even send out threats anymore. They eventually made it to Geiwitz, which they were kept hostage without food or drink for three days. After this the Germans made another selection, which Elie and his father snuck through, and they were sent on the way in cattle cars.

Up to this point in the book, the treatment of the Jews in this chapter didn't surprise me. It is scary to think how just hearing about the treatment in the book can harden a person's emotions toward the Nazis. I can only imagine how the Jews who actually went through it felt. It is sad to see the transformation of a friendly people to cold, people without emotion.

Pg. 66- 85

What an awful way to spend the Jewish New Year. It says ''On the eve of Rosh Hashanah, the last day of that cursed year, the entire camp was agitated and everyone of us felt the tension." During the pray Elie can't help but curse at God for what his people are going through. He refuses to say the prayer at first but reluctantly prays near the end. He can only wonder how other biblical stories had God save those oppressed. But now, they are alone, seperated from God.

"The SS offered us a beautiful present for the new year." After making it through all of that oppression, the Jews couldn't help but speak in that kind of cold sarcasm. Today they would have an examination of the prisoners and decide which ones were unfit to do work. Elie's father was one of those victims. But in the end, he passed the second selection and managed to stay alive. After hard work throughout the months, Elie goes to the infirmary and gets his foot operated on. Now he will be able to try it out on one of the death marches due to the approaching Red Army.

I probably wouldn't have been able to say that prayer either to God. It seems there is no God with them during that time. Also, it takes courage to be able to watch your father be selected like that. Even though he did make it through, it seems nerve racking to go through life after that. How could anyone survive through all of this? And if you become sick, it would not be wise to show off the luxurious of the infirmary.

Pg. 47-65

Elie and his other companions have been moved to Buna, which is a far better predicament than Auschwitz. the inmates agree on this saying "Buna is a very good camp. One can hold one's own here." And they were right, the work was far more easier at Buna than at the previous camps. The time in the camps has affected everyone in everywhere. When Elie was forced to get the gold crown out of his mouth, he had enough courage to extend the time limit. I do not believe he would have done something like this in Auschwitz.

Elie has been fortunate enough to be able to stay with his father throughout all of this. Even Elie says he is lucky through all of this. The Germans at this camp seem to be a little nicer than those from other camps. But only a little. They still do things that benefit them and hurt the prisoners at the same time.

It is amazing how people could with stand all this stuff that is happening. Elie got 25 lashes for laughing at one of the Germans in charge for his selfishness. But he takes with strength and stays strong. The same goes for those condemned to death in the camp. Each stayed strong in front of their companions. YOu do not want to show weakness to these people.

Pg. 29-46

Elie and his father have successfully made it through the first part of their stay in Auschwitz, which is making sure he looks useful. No longer do you hear of optimism from the group and a few days in the camp, Elie has already become less humane. The first thing he saw was corpses of young children being thrown into fires and after seeing that he becomes far more emotionless.

The people are losing track of time. They do jobs all day for their captors and simply try to stay alive during all of this. They meet a relative from Antwerp named Stein. Elie told him that his family was fine to make him feel better. After this, Stein watched over him and gave him some of his portions to keep him alive. When an transport from Antwerp comes though, Stein hears the real news and is never seen from again.

This is awful treatment and demoralizing for the Jews undergoing these kinds of conditions. This is probably one reason the Germans did this. No one in their right minds could do this kind of stuff to another human. The germans would try and Dehumanize them. Then they weren't killing humans. This was probably the only way they could do such crimes. Even through all of this they still have faith in God. Akiba Drumer says "God is testing us. He wants to see whether we are capable of overcoming our base instincts, of killing the Satan within ourselves." (pg. 45) This shows strong faith.