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(Ref: 9499)
The Oberscharführer decided that because we're Jewish we don't have Christmas holidays anyway and the best way to celebrate for him was to do a roll call. So he herded everybody into one room and he wanted to keep his records straight in some way or another and he sort of called people, everyone with a name beginning A, B or C in alphabetical order more or less. Now Hungarian names are pronounced so that the surname is said first and the Christian names after, my name was Weiss Judith and not Judith Weiss, the German way is of course the way it is in English. He of course wanted us to say our names in the German way, which is not very difficult, but when people are confused, frightened and very hungry and sick. Every time someone made a mistake and said their name as you would say it in Hungarian he started all over again. We were standing there the whole of Christmas without food, he was sitting there, he had his dinner, he had his drinks right in front of us and we had to stand to attention, people fainted, people were sick and there was no end to this. Every time somebody said something wrong, not the way he wanted it we had to go back to A. My name starts with a W, I was standing there two whole days and a night. I seem to remember I think that was just about the worst time.