THE ASK ME ANYTHING thread on Reddit.com has thrown up some interesting guest posters in its time. We’ve seen everyone from Barack Obama to a very sound Irish garda take to the site to answer any question put to them.

Users of the site often make requests for AMA posters – or suggest one. One user – who calls himself ‘donutdude’ – posted a ‘selfie’ his fit-looking 90-year-old grandfather made of himself in the gym:

donutdude/Reddit

It was so popular, especially when it emerged that the grandfather, Emery Jacoby, was a survivor of the Auschwitz and Dachau concentration camps, that a request was made for him to come on an AMA thread.

His grandson had written:

he’s up at 5:30 every morning and goes to the gym. i’ve found many bizarre homemade exercise contraptions around his apartment as well.

he was in a labor camp during the holocaust and i think that had a big impact on him. he befriended one of the guards because he was able to do the work faster than anyone else. that’s how he ended up escaping-the guard told him he was going to turn his back for a minute. my grandpa realized why he said it when he saw a motorcycle with keys on the seat. he took the opportunity and left. he has always kept in good shape because it saved his life, i guess.

His grandson posted answers from his grandfather to some of the AMA questions here.

Here is a small selection:

How old were you when you were in the labor camp?

I was taken away when I was 20 years old. My sisters were 22 and 23. They both survived. My parents were 47 and 49-I never saw them again after they were taken.

If you could re-live one moment, what moment would it be?

The day the war ended. It was at that moment I saw life continuing instead of ending. Without that moment I could not have married my wife!

What technology is around today that you thought you’d never live to see? Or what technology has surprised you the most?

• Read the full AMA thread with Emery Jacoby here.

This is Emery Jacoby speaking three years ago to an elementary school in Newark, New Jersey. He gives a strong account of his cruel journey and experiences in the Auschwitz and Dachau concentration camps:

via John O/Youtube

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