Day #6: Auschwitz

The trip is a bit more than half over now, I think. Leaving Berlin and coming to
Poland gave me a greater sense of the trip as a whole. Going to so many museums and memorials, there is a lot of repeated material. The important things are the differences. Like the amazingly meaningful architecture and design at the Jewish Museum in Berlin, and the various different focuses of museum panels, and the feeling of being in a bunker under the city, in a green, glowing, propaganda labyrinth. 

And then we come to Poland, where all of the museums discussed in detail, and see Auschwitz for ourselves. I was struck by the beauty of the landscape, and by the depth and magnitude of horror, and by the exhibit in building 27 that I'm sure others have posted about in detail. I had locked my emotions away, a bit, looking at the masses of hair and the baby clothes, and the hallway of shoes. I didn't push myself to consider the significance. I knew it would still be incomprehensible. 

Then, in building 27, there was music. We walked into a dark room, and saw various projections on the walls, of people in the 1920s and 30s going to concerts, and diving into lakes, and hugging each other, and dancing in their Sunday best, and I sobbed. 

I didn't cry again for most of the day, until after walking around the expanses of Birkenau (sometimes through the birches it is named) we sat in a circle in the building incoming inmates were disinfected in, and shared our thoughts with each other. Everyone was supportive and thoughtful, and emotional, and while we talked, there was a light rain. 

It was over by the time we went outside again. We walked around, and Ms. Freeman pointed out the disintegrating bricks on the barracks that are left standing. Birkenau is near the water level, and it floods easily. You can see the water line on the bricks. One more good flood, and those buildings could come down.

As we were walking back towards the main gate, along the train tracks, we noticed a faint rainbow. I wasn't sure at that point if or how I should interpret it, but writing this, I remembered: In the book of Genesis, a rainbow means never again. (Debbie J)

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Yesterday we went to Auschwitz. We had the best weather of the trip that day, a beautiful day at Auschwitz death camp. Luckily we arrived earlier than expected so we were able to get an early start on the tour. It makes the experience so much more powerful when there are less people. Later in the day, when we were in Birkenau it was pretty crowded at some points and it takes away from the experience a little. 

Anyways, the exhibitions in the barracks at Auschwitz are unbelievable. There is a block that is dedicated to evidence of the crimes and the amount of stuff they have is staggering. Especially when you consider it is only a fraction of what there was. They have pots, suitcases, children's toys, and worst of all, hair. That block is where most people, including my self got the most emotional. 

After lunch we went to Birkenau. The place is absolutely enormous, it had to be at least 50 football fields. Since there aren't any exhibitions in Birkenau it isn't as emotional as Auschwitz, that is until you get the field where a majority oft he ashes were dumped. The chaperones let everyone just wander off into the field to give people time to reflect for a while. I know that at least  for myself that was really helpful. I would say that it's was probably the most emotional day of my life because everything that we've studied about the holocaust has led up to this. To walk the same ground as the people who suffered there and to sit in the field where their ashes were dumped. Before going I was on the fence about whether we should preserve Auschwitz or let it crumble to the ground but now I firmly believe we should preserve it. There is no substitute for actually going there and seeing it in person, doesn't matter how many books you've read or movies you've watched. (Mike K)

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When I woke up yesterday morning, I really didn't know what I would be getting into. I kept on thinking about what mood I would be in all day and how I would feel when I walked into a place where over a million people lost their lives.

When we got off the bus and walked into Auschwitz 1, it wasn't how I imagined it to be. I saw the "Arbeit Macht Frei" sign, but I also saw beautiful, brick, military barracks, flowers, and fresh spring grass. I was expecting to see barbed wire, prison cells, cramped sleeping quarters, and gas chambers, and I did, but I also saw museums and droves of people. I guess that I never thought people would want to go to Auschwitz. In the museums, there were artifacts, like piles of hair, shoes, suitcases, and kitchenware. The pile of children's shoes was hard to look at, because everyone likes little kids and just imagining an innocent child, struggling to take off their shoes, before taking a bar of soap, and heading into a gas chamber, makes most people uneasy.

Later on, we went to Auschwitz-Birkenau and walked in the field of ashes, where some of those kids lie, along with their families. When Ms Freeman releases us into the large field, I walked out to the middle and said an Our Father and a Hail Mary, because those are the two prayers I say at my grandmother's grave, and at that moment, I looked around and realized that it wasn't just a Jewish burial ground, but a burial ground for all to remember and empathize.

The ground was soft and covered in flowers, like a new grave, and although the Holocaust ended almost 70 years ago, this was definitely symbolic for something. As much as we like to think that the Holocaust is just a horrible event of the past, similar genocides are occurring today, and until we can keep people from oppressing other people, for being who they are, the ground will never harden up again.

Throughout this trip, Ms Freeman has asked us if memorials have a shelf-life, and they definitely do, but now I see what that shelf-life is. Some memorials are ineffective, others are very powerful, but all stand for something and until that something no longer affects society, the memorial has to stand. (Bill H)

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Rebirth.

It's not supposed to be beautiful. 
I'm not supposed to see smiling faces and fluttering families unloading from their cars happy to spend the day together. 
I'm not supposed to turn to the person next to me and say 
"Wow that field is gorgeous"...

I walked into Auschwitz feeling these things. 
Feeling very confused about the friction created by the collisions of my feelings of utter terror and my feelings of awe at the sheer beauty 
in some spots. 
There seemed to be something inherently wrong, disrespectful even, with saying "This place is beautiful"...

But then again. 
Maybe I am walking away grateful that a place that has witnessed so much evil can turn over and become beautiful again...  (-Hannah M.)

 

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It's been a day after having visited Auschwitz I and II. I still have no idea of what to say about how I feel about visiting it. All I know is that I never want to return but it was very important for us to go there. Over 1 million innocent people were murdered within the confines of that fenced off plot of Hell, including 200,000 children, an entire generation lost. We've read so much about the holocaust, seen so many documentaries, but nothing compares going to the place where it happened. Knowing that I was looking into the ruins where thousands of innocent people were gassed, tricked into there death, just brought me to tears. But it truly was important for us to see it, because all of us care so incredibly much, and I know that after seeing that, everyone on this trip is going to do something amazing with their lives to make sure a place like Auschwitz never exists again. (Daniel W)

Today was such a remarkable day. It's crazy to spend a day in Auschwitz after learning about it for years in a classroom. Going through the barracks and the seeing the ruins...sitting in the field. Someone said that she didn't want to spend her time here trying to understand why this all happened, and is realized that that was what I was doing. All day I tried it process what was going on and think that someone had stood where I was standing. 

But thinking this way still didn't click for me. But when I had seen the room with the forks and spoons and pots..it hit me. I used a fork at lunch. I know my family probably just had a home cooked meal using a pot. 

Standing in that room, I forgot I was in auchwitz. I was overwhelmed with trying to become cohesive.

All I could think about was how all those families were stripped literally everything, of daily things. It's not just their homes, or jobs, things as simple as forks were taken away from them. For me, it just really put things into perspective. And it was just as interesting to see what everyone else had to say, and slowly, I had come to grasp what had happened on the plot of land better than ever before. Something all struck us, but we were moved in the same way. 

Especially sitting in that field...my friend and I sat in a silence, as did several other people, but there was conversation in the air. Just seeing each other in the distance, listening to the birds and the bugs...everyone was saying the same thing in complete silence.  (Rakabe A.)

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Pure Emotion
Our minds often process phrases, statistics and expressions regarding masses of people as being one thing: one hundred men. A legion. A million people. Very rarely are we able to dissect these masses of people as being comprised of unique individuals with many loved ones, like us. Taking this facing history class we were exposed to many shocking facts and statistics that gave us immense knowledge about genocides around the world, especially the Holocaust. However, today in Auschwitz, Poland, my knowledge about the holocaust not only expanded, but became real. Today was the day that I no longer processed these facts about masses of people as , but understood them these facts and statistics no longer were about the masses of people in my head, but became about the individuals. 

Entering the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, I had already felt something indescribable. Despite the sunny 60 degree weather, I had a strange feeling in the pit of my stomach and there were shivers up and down my spine. As the tour of the camp began and the weather got nicer, the concentration camp looked more and more beautiful. (Minas)

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