Auschwitz and Birkenau Concentration Camps

"Work Makes You Free"

Prisoners believed the words "Work Makes You Free" as they passed under a sign entering Auschwitz concentration camp.  They did not know that 75% of them would walk directly from the trains into the gas chambers to be killed by the Germans.  1.1 million prisoners died in Auschwitz, 90% of them were Jews.
This was a solemn trip for the girls and me.
We toured both the Auschwitz and Birkenau Concentration Camps.  I'm glad we visited in the winter, when the earth is dead.  It's hard to imagine the horror that these places once were.  Grass has grown, floors swept, latrines emptied.  The smells of human waste and bodies burning, the cries of children starving and adults moaning in delirium, the wails of mothers without their children are all long gone.
Tour groups passed silently as each person was lost in their own thoughts, their own way of dealing with the cruelty of man.  Our guide led us through the statistics, history and process of the victims in the camps.  It all seemed like a blur of information until we came to one particular building.  The hallway was lined with photos of men on one side, women on the other.  The guide paused, her fingers trailed along the photos.  She paused to whisper a name, and age or a nationality.  Dressed in striped uniforms with an identifying triangle sewn on, eyes stared out, lost in hollow faces with no hope in them.  But a few people smiled--sweetly or defiantly.  Hitler would not win.  The Germans could not steal who they were.
Then we entered the rooms.  Piles of eye glasses, mounds of suitcases and mountains of human hair.  I read the names painted on the suitcases as I walked past.  Another way to remember that these were individuals.  The experience is overwhelming.  You think you can't go on.  You want to just sit down in the middle of the floor and cry.

Shoes collected before death

One foot in front of the other we walked passed the torture rooms, the yard where they shot the prisoners, the steal beam they hung them from.  The last thing was to walk into the gas chamber and through the crematorium.  We have seen this in movies, read about it in books.  It is another thing to walk inside and stand where so many innocent people were murdered.  Then we walked out.  The thought kept going through my head "I get to walk out, they never did."  It settled heavy in my heart.
We sat at dinner with our small tour group.  Elena asked the college girl across from us why she chose to visit Poland on her spring break.  "Because my Grandfather is a survivor of Auschwitz."  She didn't need to say anything more.  For everyone sitting there, the trip just got one step more personal.  We could reach out and touch a girl who had life because her five year old Grandfather was smuggled away to a convent to be protected by the nuns.
There is a quote in one of the buildings.  Do not forget or the same thing will happen to you.  The world is full of holocaust museums.  We are told not to forget, but have we?  Injustice saturates the world we live in.  It is something I have wanted to be a part of fighting.  I thought when we began this job that doors would open up to be more involved, to help in a greater manner.  But instead I have found that it is much harder.  It was so easy at home to find numerous organizations to volunteer with or individuals who needed help.  Overseas I don't speak the language, NGO's are difficult to find, programs don't want help and a slew of other difficulties have arisen.  I have done little although I have tried hard.  (It feels like such a lame excuse.)  But after this experience I feel that maybe I need to reevaluate.  Maybe I need a different tactic.  Because I can't forget.  I refuse to forget.

Birkenau

Train car prisoners arrived in

Warsaw

          After arriving in Warsaw on Saturday afternoon, we dropped our bags at the hotel and considered our options. Conscious of what little time we had in this city, we couldn't waste the afternoon. So we decided to head out into the Old Town and get a feel for Warsaw. The day before our trip, we had watched the movie "The Pianist" in preparation. The movie provided a bit of background to the city and the specific events throughout WWII that took place there. We learned that Warsaw had a Jewish population of 350,000 pre WWII, but by the end of 1945 it had been reduced to 11,500. Along with the Jewish population, the city of Warsaw had also suffered. So many bombs had rained down on the city, that it became the most destroyed city in world history. On a guided tour throughout the city, were shown picture after picture of comparisons from pre WWII destruction, post WWII destruction, and then the reconstructed city in person. It amazed me how closely they had replicated the destroyed buildings. Churches, castles and apartments had been put back together again brick by brick to once again resemble the original.

Aside from the constant fact that "yes, that was rebuilt after being destroyed", Old Town, Warsaw was quite pretty. Particularly in Old Town Market Square, the renewed buildings were vibrant and patterned. It did not disappoint me and I enjoyed the European feel.

Elena

The Chopin Museum - Warsaw, Poland

Before arriving in Poland, I did not know much about the pianist Frederic Chopin, except that I could play one of his Nocturnes on the piano.

As I discovered quite quickly upon arriving in Poland, Chopin was from Poland, and the Poles are very proud of sharing their nationality with him. You can find information about Chopin all over Warsaw—for example, there are 15 benches around the city dedicated to him; each bench plays one of his pieces and gives a little blurb of information about him.

The most interesting thing that I found out about Chopin in Poland is that he died and was buried in Paris...but his heart is in Poland. He was terrified about being buried alive, so he ordered that when he died, his heart should be cut out and brought to Poland. Now it is inside a pillar in a church in Warsaw which we visited.

Our last day in Poland, we visited the Chopin museum in Warsaw. It is in a beautiful building, the Ostrogski Palace. The Chopin Museum outlined the history of Chopin's life, and it contained various letters from Chopin to friends and family, many original manuscripts of his work, and multiple pictures and sculptures of him. My favorite parts of the museum were the manuscripts and the opportunity to listen to many of his pieces, which were so beautiful.

Though this trip to Poland was mainly about getting Polish Pottery and learning about the war, I loved learning about this amazing composer!

~Maddie