B-10197

I could not believe my eyes when some days ago I saw a familiar face on TV. It was about a half a decade ago when I came across in my back-then neighborhood with an old man who had a story to tell. B-10197 was tattooed on his arm. He was an Auschwitz survivor.

Screen shot of the documentary. Courtesy of YLE.

Recently, Mayer Franck (1928-2012) crossed my mind quite often. I was wondering if his story had properly been documented in Finland, and whether he was still alive or not. The documentary movie on TV answered my first question, and Google the second.

What happened to Mayer is pretty unbelievable. Was it luck, persistence, God's will or what, but he survived and pulled through every twist and turn in the plot. Mayer was 11 years old when he was forced with his family to the Lodz ghetto in Poland. His father died (doctor refused to mend him if there was no pay in food - the family had none to give) and mother and two sisters were put on the first train to Auschwitz. Mayer escaped this scenario, hiding in a sewer. He never believed the stories that those who got on the train, were given a sack of potatoes and were headed for better conditions.

The ghetto was being emptied in quite a hurry, and at some point Mayer and a couple of his friends built a secret annex (much like the Frank family in Amsterdam). At daytime, they were hiding in the annex and at night searched the streets for food and cooked whatever they found on a small stove. One day when the Germans were searching their hiding place, one of the officers noticed the stove was warm. He noticed a hutch attached to the wall and pushed it aside, revealing the boys' hiding place. They were put on a train and sent to the place where "you must say goodbye to your wife and kids, everyone goes to heaven". It was summer of 1944.

Upon arriving at Auschwitz, Mayer was put in the line on the right. He was inspected, and sent to work. Every day at roll call, Mayer pinched his cheeks and stood on his toes, in order to appear healthy and sturdy. One day he was picked to go work for a German company to shovel sand. A hopeless task, especially when winter came and the ground froze.

In 1945, there came an order to evacuate the camp. Germans marched the prisoners, walking and walking for hours that felt like eternity. One morning, after the group spending the night in a barn, Mayer hid in the hays. There was a search and a poker brushed his back, but he dug his way deeper in the hays. Those who were found hiding in the barn, around 12 of them, were shot dead on the spot.

Mayer waited the whole day in the hay, and at night continued the journey on his own. A friendly old couple at a homestead accommodated him. The Totenkopf visited the house, but didn't capture him.

The war came to an end, and Mayer went to one of the Red Cross's camps. He had no ID, no photos, nothing. His whole family was dead. He returned back to the ghetto. A place that was buzzing with 250.000 people was now empty. Mayer went to live at an apartment that used to belong to a friend's family.

The family's late mother's brother, who lived in Helsinki, came to the ghetto looking for relatives. He found Mayer and took him to Finland. Mayer was 18 years old. In Finland, he kept working in fur business, a business he had learnt when working in the ghetto.

You would have never believed that this man had been through hell and lived to tell about it. He had a certain glimmer in his eyes, a smile, a positive attitude and always up for a chat. Sometimes he would offer sweets or chocolates, just out of kindness.

Mayer died on the 13th of May, 2012 in Finland. On that day, I was in Israel, preparing to go to Jerusalem. May he rest in peace.