Meet Celia Kener, the woman who survived the Holocaust

Celia Kener told her story to Jake Nevins, the New York Times Magazine's editorial fellow

I was very excited about an upcoming ballet recital, which happened to be taking place the day the Germans invaded. The recital was cancelled, and I was extremely upset about it. More than that, my father was drafted into the Russian Army on that same day, and my mother and I didn’t know if we would ever see him again. But we were still in our own home in Lvov; we had not yet been forced into the ghetto. When I went outside to play a few days later, my friends not only stayed away and pointed at me, but