Monday, February 14, 2011

Chapter 7 (pages 98-103): the Journey

Describe the train journey. How is it the same or different from the first train journey Elie and his father take?

13 comments:

  1. Wow. After reading this seemingly short chapter I seem to be struck with so many emotions and can see so many similarities and differences from this train and the first train ride. I noticed that on this train ride they dump the dead off as if they were containers of garbage; when in the first train ride everything was cultured,enthusiasm was high and death was so far away from every bodies mind. The first train ride was a cultured event of the moving of the Jews, while this train journey was the journey to the "end" as Elie puts it on page 98. The first train ride was as if a tour guide to the great concentration camps of the world compared to the savage, starving, and death filled pits of their journey to Buchenwald. Death crept inches closer every second Elie was on the train and Elie could feel it, but amazingly they survive another day and land the lucky few that survived.

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  2. Peter: The first train ride was more of a way to intimidate the Jews and make them fearful and submissive. By the time this second free train ride comes along, the remaining Jews are past being intimidated and afraid. They have been practically turned into savage beasts. They barely cling to their humanity. Their hunger, their crazed fear, have made them unfeeling to the others around them. They start to focus on THEIR hunger, THEIR fright, not what was right. They have become apathetic to death. During the first train ride, they never imagined the end of the tracks held death. Elie was confronted a lot by these feeling both here and before. He started sort of resenting his father and almost coming to the point of abandoning him. But he holds on to his self and what he knows is right. But in the end, it's a dog eat dog kind of world where the weak and compassionate don't survive, but the cunning and the cruel do.

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  3. So I was in the car reading chapter 7 and when I got to the second train ride I just looked around, I just thinking my goodness. I mean most people get tired of a few hours of just sitting in a car, but here they are in a packed train car for ten days with no food, no room, no roof, and people are just constantly dying. This was just madness! In the first train ride everyone was optimistic, they had their families, it was not snowing like crazy and people were not dying. During this whole trip they found a little joy from people dying, because that means more room for them. They became selfish, only worrying about their needs and how they would survive. The passengers of this train knew what was waiting for them at the final stop, a new camp.
    - Nancy Joykutty

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  4. On the first journey that Elie and his father take no one dies, and they have food. Plus its not snowing or freezing cold. On the second train ride one hundred people are placed on the cart. When they arrived at the new camp, only twelve were remaining. There was no roof to the cart so everything was covered in snow. If you died, they would throw you out on the side of the road. While going through a town some people threw bread into the cart. The prisoners would fight over the food. They were so desperate for something to eat they were killing each other for the little pieces of bread. They were going mad. Everyone started fighting and strangling each other. A son even killed his father for some food. On the train everyone had to look out for themselves.

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  5. It is very hard for me to sit in an open room, with air condition, on a comfy couch for more than an hour. Which makes it seem impossible for me to imagine a plethora of malnurished, uncleasned, sleep deprived, freezing human beings boundto a cattle car. It was an eye for an eye on this train trip. It did not matter if you were blood relatives or strangers there was only one objective: Survival. In one case a starving son killed his father for a piece of bread and in return he was slaughtered by those around him. Something as simple as bread was now scarcity. Evil people would throw bread at the prisoners just to spark more hatred and fighting among the Jews. The Jewish people had advanced past just hating the Germans, they began to turn against each other. The first train ride they were scared of what the future would hold and tried to lean on each other to make it through the unknown. Now the Jews are insane with hunger and willing to do anything to fill that void.
    -KeAmber Green

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  6. The ride on the train was the most unbelievably horrific event. By this point the remaining prisoners left on the train had begun to lose their minds. Most of them lost the will to survive, others would do anything to survive. The prisoners hadn't been fed in days, thus making them weak and desperate. Any time that food was dropped into the cattle cars, people would fight to the death to get it. It didn't matter if you had to fight your own flesh and blood, personal survival was the most important thing. A guy ended up killing his father for a small peice of bread, and for no purpose at all, as he was also killed when the others realized he had food. This ride on the train is very different from the one at the beginning. By now, people have gotten used to death, as it surrounds them daily. They have been exposed to so much madness and pain that they hardly have feelings anymore. The people are no longer concerned with sticking together and helping each other survive; they even begin to turn on one another. The ride on the train is described as a point when most everyone simply gave up, and hardly any of the Jews survived.

    - Katie Darmofal

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  7. The second train ride was so much worst than the first. In the first, there was at the very least little food, people were being optimistic and they wanted their family to stay with them. Then on the second train ride there was no food or water, they were in there for ten days and the Jews would do anything to survive. It was all about survival. People were throwing their on family members "under the bus". It was unbelievable. They, the Jews, were losing their humanity. Just a few bites of bread they would do anything for. Also, in the first train ride, the Jews were oblivious to the future. They had no idea what was in store for them. Now, they know what its like to be tortured, laughed at because of their fears, and starving.
    -Bria

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  8. This train journey was much more harsh and harder to live through than the first. The first train ride that Elie was on was in a covered cart. There were more men and most of them lived through the journey. In the second train journey, Elie and his father are still together and alive, but the cart is uncovered now. This journey is during the winter and since they're in Germany, it's snowing terribly and is very cold. The Nazis did not permit them to have anything more than a single blanket with them, and they weren't fed for 10 days. The only time that they were given any kind of nourishment was near the end of the journey when the soldiers would throw a piece of stale bread into the carts and would watch them all fight over it. Sadly the soldiers did this for fun. They would watch people argue and kill each other over mere crumbs. Most of them were dead anyways, because of the cold, but the remainders were still fighting and killing each other. A son even killed his father for his bread. The father had planned on giving the son the bread anyways but didn't listen. Once his father was dead, he was attacked for the bread and he also died. His father's death was meaningless because of what he did. The second train ride was much worse because of this, the conditions and circumstances.

    ~~Yolanda

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  9. The train ride was a lot different; the first ride was filled with lots of people just that the last train ride they took. The first ride they were with their family, and close friends they knew, the last one was full with people they spend time and sharing food with, they were like a close family. The first ride they were all together and couldn’t fit, some of them died because it was too hot, and crowed However, the last train ride they took they could fit, there was even space for 50 more. They were so skinny, and weak that they could not feel anything, and they would not mind how long the train was.

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  10. The train journey is extremely difficult. During the train ride Elie’s father almost died and for a minute Elie thought him to be dead. When that feeling that his dad was dead Elie felt as if there was nothing more to live for. The conditions in the train are much more crowded and people within it begin to kill each other for a piece of bread. The two that killed each other for the bread were father and son. I was astounded to see what extreme conditions that these people were summited to could do to them. The first train journey was calmer, but that was before they had to live through concentration camps. On the first train people cared more about each other, meanwhile in the other train it was every man for himself to try to survive. Elie surviving the train ride was very lucky considering the amount of people dying for different conditions.

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  11. The train journey they had in winter and the first train journey Elie and his father was very different. In winter the prisoners were thinking just about death and food. There were hundred men in one car, everyone was so skinny. Everyone was very hungry that when someone threw a piece of bread in their car, everyone would be fighting over one piece of bread. Many died in this cold journey and they were thrown out the train. In the first train journey Elie and his father had, was very different. 80 people were in one car, which was very difficult to breath. Jewelry was taken away from the Jews, and they were threatened not to escape or else they were all to get shot. Many people in the train were confused, scared and worried. They had no idea where they were going.

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  12. The train journey from Burma to Buchenwald was very harsh compared to first train ride Elie and his father had. During this journey, I was harder to live because it was winter time, and the people were weaker than before. They were no longer with their families, and they had no luggage to depend on. At the beginning of this train ride, there were 100 passengers, but the ride ended with only 12 passengers surviving in it. Throughout the ride, dead people were thrown out to make space for those who were still living. On this trip, the prisoners had no more strength, food, or love to be able to support the horrible ride and survive. During the first train ride, Elie and his father were still strong because that trip was the very beginning of everything, but this trip was almost at the end of everything, when the prisoners had nothing but hunger left in them.

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  13. This journey was much, much worse. For one, the last train ride, he had his entire family and his friends with him. This time, his father was the only person he had left. Next, he was much healthier and much happier the last train ride, for obvious reasons. He did not have to keep himself and his father alive the last train ride, but this time around, he had to make sure that they were both still alive and made the journey safely. This train ride, the people had no humanity, they were hardly human. In fact, they were only human physically. The last train ride, Elie was not yet a prisoner, not technically. This train ride, there was no hope, no optimism for a better tommorow. The second train ride was in hell, the first was the ride TO hell.

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