I am really hung up on the emptying of the bucket as described in chapter five. In this chapter, Levi is describing how the typical nights are in his post-Ka-Be life. The dreams he described were anguishing enough, but then he goes on to explain what happens to those who are awake in the night. The last person to utilize the bucket in the night before it's full has to empty it. When they are walking to empty it, typically the contents of the bucket will spill out onto their feet at least once because it's so full and so heavy. This means that they have to go back to sleep with human excrement on their feet. They sleep head to toe in their bunks, so not only will one person have human excrement on their feet, but someone will now have to sleep with human excrement right next to their face.
All I could picture during this was the boy named Schlome that Levi met in chapter two who spoke to him with kindness and gave him his first and last hug for a very long time. I saw him having to carry the heavy bucket and it spilling onto his bare feet, and how deeply anxious and distressed he would feel knowing that his bunkmate would have to endure the stench when he returned. He could not stop to clean himself because he would be beaten for it. There would be tension between himself and the man he shares his bunk with. Neither would likely rest for the remainder of the night.
This is when my regularly scheduled cry break began.
I cannot imagine being treated like this. I cannot fathom treating so many people like this on purpose for years at a time. This entire scenario is so beyond my imagination. And yet, it happened, and it happened to millions of people and it happened for years.
The art in the bathroom of the man who is behaving incorrectly with the "strong Semitic nose" also stood out to me. It wasn't enough to put the Jewish people into a camp where they were starved and covered in the bodily fluids of strangers and made to stand cold and naked on wounded feet for hours at a time. They also had to put paintings on the walls to remind them that their ethnicity or their religion makes them somehow worthy of this disrespect. I cannot fathom what kind of person would make the executive decision to do something like this.
The only thing that I can think to say about this is to treat people with kindness. Our world has seen far too much cruelty for us to be okay with anything else.
rachael & breanna
All I could picture during this was the boy named Schlome that Levi met in chapter two who spoke to him with kindness and gave him his first and last hug for a very long time. I saw him having to carry the heavy bucket and it spilling onto his bare feet, and how deeply anxious and distressed he would feel knowing that his bunkmate would have to endure the stench when he returned. He could not stop to clean himself because he would be beaten for it. There would be tension between himself and the man he shares his bunk with. Neither would likely rest for the remainder of the night.
This is when my regularly scheduled cry break began.
I cannot imagine being treated like this. I cannot fathom treating so many people like this on purpose for years at a time. This entire scenario is so beyond my imagination. And yet, it happened, and it happened to millions of people and it happened for years.
The art in the bathroom of the man who is behaving incorrectly with the "strong Semitic nose" also stood out to me. It wasn't enough to put the Jewish people into a camp where they were starved and covered in the bodily fluids of strangers and made to stand cold and naked on wounded feet for hours at a time. They also had to put paintings on the walls to remind them that their ethnicity or their religion makes them somehow worthy of this disrespect. I cannot fathom what kind of person would make the executive decision to do something like this.
The only thing that I can think to say about this is to treat people with kindness. Our world has seen far too much cruelty for us to be okay with anything else.
rachael & breanna
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