Our Visit to Auschwitz

Introduction

Christian was all wrapped up under his covers in the Krakow Holiday Inn ready to go to sleep. He was having trouble closing his eyes - tossing and turning. Like most millennials he grabbed his smartphone.

Christian lightly researched the Auschwitz-Birkenau Nazi Concentration/Death camp that him and Josh were visiting the following day. Surfing the web, skimming wikipedia article to wikipedia article. His rationale: immerse himself in the atrocious reality of the holocaust that destroyed and devastated many lives.

Josh said hearing first hand accounts is still one thing, but when you’re looking at actual luggage and actual belongings of the people you can see exactly how much they were forced to give up. What I found most meaningful, that somebody who didn’t have a Jewish background may not have picked up on was how these people were stripped of their religious identity and personal identity.

The next morning was the early bus ride to the camp.

The Trip to Auschwitz - Christian's take

Christian has no personal connection to Auschwitz but was genuinely interested and disgusted like most rational humans.

Cold wind pushed the thick snow as we left the bus. We awaited for our tour guide to take us around what many people described as "hell on earth." Josh and Christian were in separate groups. First on the tour was Auschwitz I, which was once Polish military barracks turned concentration, extermination camp.

Haunting and chilling - because spectators almost 80 years know the final destination of the prisoners - the sign read 'Arbeit Macht Frei.' Nazi's promised that the prisoners "work will set them free" right when they entered through the gates of Auschwitz I. Unfortunately and sadly many never made it out.

Sickening to see the mockery of the people that were kept between these walls. A select few Polish political prisoners, who arrived quite early in the camp's history, formed an orchestra for the third reich. Most importantly to the structure of the camp, the orchestra was required to play when the prisoners passed so the step-by-step was orderly and mannerly.

This struck Christian. It was slave-like and ridiculing. These people weren't soldiers with status by any means. More like puppets for the reich. This made Christian's gut wrench.

The place was something you see on Ghost Hunters. The camp was dark, gloomy and mysterious. The mud cracked under your boots as you walked from block to block. Christian was fascinated by the documents. So meticulous and in order, all for such horrific acts.

It is worthy to note that Professor Hatcher asked why the German's kept records of every little detail at the camps. The tour guide responded along the lines of "it was just German nature."

As frightening as it sounds - she's right. German's are meticulous and careful. German's also have a long national history of following and carrying through orders precociously, precisely and efficiently.

Wikipedia articles from the night before stuck out in Christian's mind when we entered the room with the Zyklon B gas. I was curious if it was manufactured by a third-party company, so I asked our tour guide. I mentally recorded her response.

"It was made by a third party company" she said, obviously paraphrasing. "They were tried for making chemicals for deadly purposes after the war, and many executives faced persecution"

Well, Christian did some more research about this afterwards. Gas chambers, gas that was used and the process by which gassing was instituted by the means of the "Final Solution." I came across a rather incriminating quote, by SS doctor Johann Kremer.

"shouting and screaming of the victims could be heard through the opening and it was clear that they fought for their lives" - Johann Kremer

It stuck out to me and made Christian feel devastated. The long, brutal road came to a deadly conclusion. The strides to live and move forward were put to a halt by senseless acts of mass murder.

What really struck Christian, was the size of Birkenau. He wrote down on a guidebook he bought:

"The size of this camp is bigger than I ever imagined. For miles and miles, tall brick chimneys are seen on both the right and left. It's on thing to watch on the TV rolled into your middle school classroom - but it is completely different to stand in the middle of this massive hell."

The Trip to Auschwitz - Josh's take

To me Auschwitz to me had a very personal connection because I have two grandparents  who were survivors. While neither of them were at Auschwitz or Birkenau my Grandfather was forced into a labor camp and had friends who were forced into Auschwitz. Seeing pictures of all of the people who were imprisoned and forced into labor or killed on the wall just made me think of all the families that were torn apart and people who never got to live a full life. I’ve heard many different peoples stories at different concentration camps, and there’s always one similarity between all of them; they say they’re lucky that they were the ones who survived and feel obligated to share their story with the next generation.

I kind of understand what they mean by lucky, but I always thought that there was a certain amount of doing to avoid the fate that probably seemed inevitable to many. After visiting a camp, you can really understand how there were only a lucky handful of survivors.

There was a display case with a sign that read “Jewish prayer shawls taken from people who arrived.” The name of those “shawls” is Tallit and it is supposed to be worn every time you pray morning and night. You say a prayer before putting it on and after you take it off. It is nothing more than a piece of cloth with knots in the bottom and a simple design. Nazis wouldn’t allow people to show even the slightest sign of their faith. They aren’t particularly valuable, however there is a very specific way you need to make them and they are easily identifiable. 

Also, walking into the actual gas chamber at Auschwitz made me sick, I could feel all of the color leaving my face and my legs froze right when we walked in and saw the nozzles where gas was pumped in on the ceilings. Going into the next room with the crematorium actually made me sick, I couldn’t stand in there for more than a minute thinking about how other forced laborers went in and dragged the bodies out one by one. Going there is very important though, eventually there will come a day where the only proof that this happened is pictures and distant memories, which in it of itself is horrifying because nobody should forget what not only Jewish people went through. Anybody who opposed the Third Reich was sent to a camp and I think that sometimes gets lost when we think about just the number of people who had to experience these horrific, scarring conditions.