I have studied the Holocaust and visited many memorials. In 1990 in Los Angeles I visit the Holocaust Museum there when I was at UCLA taking a Jewish History class. At that museum we spoke with a holocaust survivor which was a most memorable and impactful experience. Yad Vashem in Israel I visited with my two daughters which was so powerful. Dachau around 25 years ago and most recently the Holocaust Museum in Washington DC. But, I have always wanted to come to Auschwitz, to pay my respects to the 1,100,000 people who were murdered here and to try and have a better understanding of it all. I have read many books which depict stories of survivors who passed through here and most recently the story of German Jew who had immigrated to Holland but passed through Auschwitz, as told in the book Sam and I have been reading this month, Parrallel Journeys.
We boarded a train early from Kraków for the 2 hour train ride, which seems the appropriate way to come to Auschwitz since all prisoners had come by rail. We visited two of the 3 Auschwitz camps. The first had been a former Polish barracks for their military but the Germans had come in and claimed them as a prisoner camps for Poles. The first prisoners at Auschwitz were Polish political prisoners. Germans wanted to kill and did kill the majority of those that were intelligent and were leaders here in Poland. I learned today 6 million Polish people were killed in WW II, the same number of Jews, 6 million. Eventually more than 90% of the people killed at Aushwitz, 1,000,000, were Jews. It was the largest and most devastating of the German's concentration/extermination camps with 5 gas chambers which the largest would take 2000 people at one time and then bodies were moved to the crematorium. When they couldn't keep up for the large number of Hungarian Jews that were moved here, they had open pits in the woods where they could cremate bodies faster. They wanted to hide the evidences of their mass slaughters and used the pits of human ashes as fertilizer in the fields.
We walked through brick barracks which were made from bricks of Polish homes that had been taken over when the Germans came there and destroyed their homes and used the bricks to build barracks for prisoners. These would hold up to 700 people per barrack. The wooden barracks would hold around 300 prisoners. Those in the barracks were the ones that weren't immediately gassed, the other 25% of people that came here, but had potential to work the fields, factories, maintain the area, do the work of cremation, and other awful jobs.
We had a guided tour which took around 4 hours. Our guide was very informative and spoke for over three and one half hours. I left with hardly any questions, she had answered them all. She walked us through Auschwitz 1 which explained what happened when people came here, where they came from and then how the selection process went, what happened with all their possessions since they were led to believe they were just being transplanted for a better life. They brought clothes and kitchenware and there were rooms that displayed these things as well as thousands of eye glasses and children's shoes,... We were taken to the basement of one building where a prisoners prison for those that got into trouble. These rooms were where people were forced to crawl in and stand for hours and not sleep and then others that were suffocating chambers, hanging gallows and areas where people were just lined up and shot. Just terrifying really.
In Aushwitz 2 we walked the largest concentration camp which housed four of the crematoriums and gas chambers. We stood where I have seen photos where people were divided as they got off the train, first by sex and age and then by health. Those that seem healthy and strong they werevused in the work camps, 75% of everyone that got off the trains were sent straight to the gas chambers. Life was horrific for those that were chosen to work. The conditions they lived in were horrific and there was so much disease, dehydration, starvation, malnutrition that in the barracks thousands died.
When the war was nearing end and the Red Army, Russians, discovered the camp and there were only 7000 left of the 90,000 that had been there at one time. That wasn't the end of their hell either. They were literally starving to death, they had no way to get "home" and no home to return to and then the effort to find family.
My greatest impression and thought was how could so many Germans work at these camps? How could there have been this many people which were so evil and had no regard for human life? How? People have to have a conscience even when they fear others... Mustn't they? I have never understood racism or bigotry or how we judge others by the color of their skin or religion or ethnicity. We are each individuals, we may come from different groups, places, faiths but doesn't our uniqueness make things and life so much more interesting, as long as we are respectful of our differences.
It was fascinating to learn about the Poles from our polish guide and how they were considered a "lesser race" and an inferior people who were meant to be the slaves of the Germans. They have been a people that have been so downtrodden, without a home - much like the Jews for many years. Maybe that is why there were more Jews in Poland than any other part of Europe. Hitler annihilated nearly half of the Jews in Europe, maybe the only promise he ever kept
Where does that kind of hate and fear come from? I believe it must actually come more from ourselves and our own insecurities. If we are confident in who we are, we can then allow others to be who they are. Ultimately I believe it comes down to gospel principles of faith, hope and charity and if we don't exercise charity than we have nothing. Love thy neighbor as thyself. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. How did a generation forget this? That is why we must remember.
We boarded a train early from Kraków for the 2 hour train ride, which seems the appropriate way to come to Auschwitz since all prisoners had come by rail. We visited two of the 3 Auschwitz camps. The first had been a former Polish barracks for their military but the Germans had come in and claimed them as a prisoner camps for Poles. The first prisoners at Auschwitz were Polish political prisoners. Germans wanted to kill and did kill the majority of those that were intelligent and were leaders here in Poland. I learned today 6 million Polish people were killed in WW II, the same number of Jews, 6 million. Eventually more than 90% of the people killed at Aushwitz, 1,000,000, were Jews. It was the largest and most devastating of the German's concentration/extermination camps with 5 gas chambers which the largest would take 2000 people at one time and then bodies were moved to the crematorium. When they couldn't keep up for the large number of Hungarian Jews that were moved here, they had open pits in the woods where they could cremate bodies faster. They wanted to hide the evidences of their mass slaughters and used the pits of human ashes as fertilizer in the fields.
We walked through brick barracks which were made from bricks of Polish homes that had been taken over when the Germans came there and destroyed their homes and used the bricks to build barracks for prisoners. These would hold up to 700 people per barrack. The wooden barracks would hold around 300 prisoners. Those in the barracks were the ones that weren't immediately gassed, the other 25% of people that came here, but had potential to work the fields, factories, maintain the area, do the work of cremation, and other awful jobs.
We had a guided tour which took around 4 hours. Our guide was very informative and spoke for over three and one half hours. I left with hardly any questions, she had answered them all. She walked us through Auschwitz 1 which explained what happened when people came here, where they came from and then how the selection process went, what happened with all their possessions since they were led to believe they were just being transplanted for a better life. They brought clothes and kitchenware and there were rooms that displayed these things as well as thousands of eye glasses and children's shoes,... We were taken to the basement of one building where a prisoners prison for those that got into trouble. These rooms were where people were forced to crawl in and stand for hours and not sleep and then others that were suffocating chambers, hanging gallows and areas where people were just lined up and shot. Just terrifying really.
In Aushwitz 2 we walked the largest concentration camp which housed four of the crematoriums and gas chambers. We stood where I have seen photos where people were divided as they got off the train, first by sex and age and then by health. Those that seem healthy and strong they werevused in the work camps, 75% of everyone that got off the trains were sent straight to the gas chambers. Life was horrific for those that were chosen to work. The conditions they lived in were horrific and there was so much disease, dehydration, starvation, malnutrition that in the barracks thousands died.
When the war was nearing end and the Red Army, Russians, discovered the camp and there were only 7000 left of the 90,000 that had been there at one time. That wasn't the end of their hell either. They were literally starving to death, they had no way to get "home" and no home to return to and then the effort to find family.
My greatest impression and thought was how could so many Germans work at these camps? How could there have been this many people which were so evil and had no regard for human life? How? People have to have a conscience even when they fear others... Mustn't they? I have never understood racism or bigotry or how we judge others by the color of their skin or religion or ethnicity. We are each individuals, we may come from different groups, places, faiths but doesn't our uniqueness make things and life so much more interesting, as long as we are respectful of our differences.
It was fascinating to learn about the Poles from our polish guide and how they were considered a "lesser race" and an inferior people who were meant to be the slaves of the Germans. They have been a people that have been so downtrodden, without a home - much like the Jews for many years. Maybe that is why there were more Jews in Poland than any other part of Europe. Hitler annihilated nearly half of the Jews in Europe, maybe the only promise he ever kept
Where does that kind of hate and fear come from? I believe it must actually come more from ourselves and our own insecurities. If we are confident in who we are, we can then allow others to be who they are. Ultimately I believe it comes down to gospel principles of faith, hope and charity and if we don't exercise charity than we have nothing. Love thy neighbor as thyself. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. How did a generation forget this? That is why we must remember.
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