Holocaust survivor speaks on forgiveness
Kor lectured to more than 500 people at Schaeffer Auditorium on Nov. 12 about the horrific experiences of surviving nine months in the Auschwitz death camp. She shared the three life lessons she learned through all of her pain. These lessons are to never give up on yourself or your dreams, to judge people on their actions and character, and to forgive your worst enemy and all those who have hurt you.
After surviving Auschwitz, 50 years later in 1995, Kor forgave Dr. Josef Mengele, a Nazi doctor infamous for performing human experiments, particularly on twins—including Kor and her twin sister, Miriam.
Kor and her sister were 10 years old when they arrived in Auschwitz. Dressed in matching burgundy dresses, they were left with their mother, while their father and two older sisters were taken into a different direction in the crowd, never to be seen by Kor again.
As soon as the Germans discovered Kor and her sister were twins, their mother was pulled away in another direction.
“Our mother hoped as long as she could hold onto us, she could protect us,” said Kor.
Within 30 minutes, Kor no longer had a family other than her sister. They became part of a group of 1,500 sets of twins, from ages two to 16.
To identify the twins, a red “X” was placed on the back of their clothes.
When it was Kor’s turn to get her left arm tattooed, she decided to give them as much trouble as possible. Kor recalled telling her sister how she bit the Nazi guard.
Mengele performed experiments on Kor and her twin sister. Three times a week, the twins were placed in a room naked and measured for six to eight hours. They were also taken to a blood lab where two to three vials of blood were taken from their left arms, while five injections were given into their right arms.
“I never let death or fear into my mind during the nine months I was in Auschwitz,” Kor said. “I did everything in my power not to end up like a dead body on the floor.”
A few months into the experiments, Kor had a fever and was taken to the hospital. Mengele commented that since she was so young, she only had two weeks to live.
Deciding to do everything in her power to prove Mengele wrong, Kor made it a point to survive and reunite with her sister.
After two weeks, her fever broke, and in three weeks, her fever chart was normal. After that time, Kor was reunited with Miriam.
Kor realized that someone was trying to free the refugees when she saw an American flag on the wing of a plane. She knew of America because of the stamps on letters her family received from her aunt in Cleveland.
Auschwitz was liberated by the Russians in 1945, four days before her 11th birthday.
The sisters returned to their home in Romania, but all that remained of their possessions were a few crumpled photographs on the floor.
Kor later married another Holocaust survivor and moved to the United States. Her sister also married and lived in Israel.
Miriam died in June 1993 due to kidney cancer. The injections she received from Mengele stunted the growth of her kidneys, and they never grew past the size of a 10-year-old’s.
In 1995, Kor returned to Auschwitz with former Nazi doctor Hans Münch to celebrate the liberation. Münch was one of the doctors who aided Mengele, but Kor was able to forgive him. She said she will return to Auschwitz again in 2010.
Kor founded CANDLES (Children of Auschwitz Nazi Deadly Lab Experiments Survivors) Holocaust Museum and Education Center in Terre Haute, Ind.
KU’s Public Relations Club earned $500 for the organization by selling candles. They also presented Kor with 12 candles of different colors to represent the diversity of the Holocaust survivors.
Kor has given more than 3,000 speeches throughout the world and written two books, Surviving the Angel of Death and Echoes from Auschwitz.
“Anger and hate are seeds that germinate war,” said Kor. “Forgiveness is a seed for peace and we need lots of those seeds in the world.”
Share
