In seventh grade I had a really great history teacher named Mrs. Sullivan.  During the course of our discussion of World War II, she was really animated and you could tell that she really liked teaching this part of history.  One day when we walked into class she had the film projector set up.  Now, whenever we saw the film projector we prayed it was a film that was long enough for us not to do any work.  We saw it as goof off time.  What twelve year old wouldn't? However, there was no goofing off while watching this film, it was actual footage of Nazi concentration camps filmed by Allied Forces.  Some of the footage was actually retrieved from some of the Nazis' own private film collection.  It was absolutely horrific! There was no editing out the gory parts or anything.  Of course this was back in the days when "experts" didn't interfere with the school system so students were allowed to learn about the horrors of real life and not the watered down version they're fed today.  The anti-drug film we saw in sixth grade called "Dead is Dead" was banned by the school board for being to graphic.  *rolls eyes*. 

Anyway, as I saw the skeletal men and women in black and white striped uniforms, I noticed the numbers tattooed on their forearms. I remember my entire body went numb.  I immediately thought of Oskar. I couldn't believe that nice man I met experienced such horror.  I managed to make it through class without wigging out, but when I got home I went into my room and bawled my eyes out.  I couldn't sleep for a week without seeing his face and the faces of the other people I saw in the film.  Did Oskar face that type of cruelty?  Was he my age when he was in the concentration camp? Did his family make it out?  I was truly traumatized.  I don't think it was the footage, although very disturbing, that caused this reaction. I think that it was the fact that I connected that horror to an actual human being -- a very nice man who was probably the same age I was at the time when he was in a concentration camp.

Because of Oskar, I have the hardest time watching movies or reading books about the Holocaust. It took me a while to get the image of the girl in the red coat out of my head after I saw Schindler's List.  I wouldn't read or watch Sophie's Choice and I just can't bring myself to watch The Boy in the Striped Pajamas.  I have watched movies about slavery and segregation that have pissed me off royally, but they never invoke the type of reaction I get whenever I see things about the Holocaust.  Isn't it amazing how a total stranger can have such a impact in our lives? Oskar, wherever you are, you are more than just a number!