Oh Happy Day

Chapter 7: A Good Day
On the journal that I wrote on chapter 6, I stated that there was barely anything to be thankful of in Primo Levi’s situation. I honestly thought it is impossible to be thankful in a concentration camp where one is not even treated as a human—more like an animal. However, Levi says chapter 7 that some people were actually thankful of some things, as spring neared and the weather was less harsh. It surprised me that the people in the concentration camps were happy and optimistic in a sense; Levi said that “we were able to think of [their] mothers and wives, which usually does not happen. For a few hours we can be unhappy in the manner of free men.” A Greek called Felicio who knew Levi even said to him, ‘L'année prochaine à la maison!” which means in French, “Next year we are at home!” It made me glad that the prisoners were able to have a day of relief from the hardships and torture they face everyday at the camps.
One of the lines in the books, however, struck me. It had a simile that compared machines to the people in the camps, which was so accurate and realistic that I was amazed. It says, “the only things alive [in Buna] are machines and slaves – and the former are more alive than the latter.” This line explicitly contradicts the mood of the chapter, which is generally happy and optimistic, but it described the status of the prisoners very well; the slaves represented them, and even machines looked more alive then these people. While the chapter provided a temporary haven from the general discouraged mood of the book, it included a description of the truth of the camps in this line.
I felt happy for the prisoners, who were able to escape at least for a few moments the treacherous conditions they were in by enjoying the sun and the additional food supplies they had. I also realized the power of words, which was shown in the simile described above.