Why we visited Auschwitz.
This is not my typical blog post.
But it is an important one. It is a sensitive one. And it is one that I hope provokes thought and emotion. I hope my words fully capture my experience so that if you do not have the opportunity to visit these grounds, you still understand. I hope that you will understand why we felt it not only important, but also necessary to take a step into a place where a countless many others took their last. This post was hard for me to write. So hard that it has taken me months to finish.
I have started
and stopped.
And started and stopped.
and so on.
While we visited, I recorded notes so that I could reflect and write from a genuine place. But each time I reviewed them I questioned myself. Am I allowed to have emotions as strong as I do. Do my opinions or feelings even matter. The last thing this is about is ME. But. I have come to realize that speaking to my experience is more important than my worry about how it will be received. or whether the timing is right.
So here it is.
Why we decided to
and what we experienced on our visit to
Auschwitz
and why you should visit too.
On a recent trip to Krakow [a city definitely worth visiting and one that took me by total surprise] we had the opportunity to tour Auschwitz. Obviously, this kind of day-trip is not one that may be on most traditional 'bucket lists' but we knew it was a place we might never be near to or have the opportunity to visit again.
It was a beautiful day. And the bright, shining sun seemed in extreme juxtaposition to our surroundings and the events that occurred here. Auschwitz - Birkenau were the largest of the Nazi concentration and extermination camps, where Polish Jews and political prisoners were transported under false pretenses of relocation. It is located just about an hour outside of Krakow, Poland.
More than 1.1 million men, women and children lost their lives here.
Shortly after the camps were liberated, the grounds became a memorial and museum. At first I questioned whether a place like this should be considered a 'museum'...
... How would its victims feel knowing that tourists would be walking the grounds that ultimately became their graves?
My question was answered very early on in our visit. We walked through the memorial in a tour group, with an informative, well-spoken tour guide that continuously reminded us to reflect, to put ourselves in the shoes of the innocents whose stories were being told. I learned that approximately 1000 survivors remained at Auschwitz following its liberation. Because they remained displaced, they resided in administrative buildings and actually became the preparers and protectors of various documents and photos found here. These survivors helped with the creation of this very museum which opened just 2 years after the camp's liberation. This put me at ease - at least as much as I was ever going to be in such a heart and gut wrenching place.
It affirmed for me that these survivors, the witnesses, felt it important that their stories be told. And that we listen to them and pass down their messages and lessons.
I read a lot of WWII fiction and I have always had an interest in WWII. When I was about 8 or 9 years old, at my request, my family visited the Children's Holocaust Museum in Washington DC. And when we planned a trip to Krakow, my husband and I sort of innately knew and agreed with very little conversation that it would be the right thing to do to visit Auschwitz. I felt that if I could sit in my warm, comfortable house, curled up in a chair reading a novel based on these atrocities ... I should show my respect for those that survived. And for those that endured this place for as long as they were allowed to live.
I should have the courage to face it.
Our trip to Krakow was planned by one of my husband's coworkers, Janusz. He is a native Polish citizen. And his grandfather, a political prisoner, survived just 1 month at Auschwitz.
Janusz encouraged us to visit Auschwitz. He has visited a number of times and has brought new people with him each time. He has an incredibly personal connection to the devastation that was Auschwitz, yet continues to walk through it. Why. Because it is important. Janusz encouraged us to recognize that in order to truly understand this and learn from it, one must see it.
Especially as an American in our Post-World War II era, it is easy to feel kind of disconnected. Sure, there are movies and books and college courses that help us to learn, but apart from my interest in the historical happenings leading to the Jewish Holocaust, I personally have felt removed from it. It almost feels like it happened in the dark ages. But it didn't. In the relative context of time, 70-80 years wasn't even another lifetime ago. Living in Europe and seeing more of the WWII cities and monuments in person has made it all feel more real. And visiting Auschwitz helped me to feel even more connected to the history.
Our trip to Krakow was a family trip. We didn't have a babysitter [though Janusz did become quite the baby whisperer]. So we brought our then 16 month old baby along. There were not other babies there. Seemingly no one even under the age of 13. And having Asher there, felt strange, but also made this experience even more emotional. There was a moment where my husband was carrying our baby and walked past a photo of a Jewish mother holding her baby while standing in a sorting line. That mother, without any idea of what was about to happen in the coming minutes or days or months.
That moment hit me. Hard.
After already enduring so much. Their lives destroyed, many actually had hope that this forced transportation to Auschwitz might allow their families to remain in one place, together. When, in reality, if they were lucky and most were not, all they got was a chance to say goodbye. As I looked at that photo, then back to my family, I couldn't keep myself from crying. I imagined how that mother felt & thought about the inhumanity of it all.
To be so terrified, but feel so hopeless and helpless all at once....is there even a word for that feeling?
If you visit the Auschwitz-Birkenau museum & memorial you will walk the narrow aisles of the barracks, you will see what remains of victims' personal items, you will view the wreckage of the gas chambers, you will pay your respects at the still-standing Death Wall at Block 11 and you will likely feel emotional enough to cry. You will feel heavy, you will feel drained. But you will walk away and you will understand.
This trip felt and continues to feel important to me. Regardless of my politics or yours...we are in a time where these lessons feel relevant. And maybe they should be relearned. Hatred, ignorance, and apathy undeniably separate us and serve to perpetuate evils as large as the Holocaust, as small as a passing judgmental glance and every evil in between.
My expat experience has been a blessing to my life in so many ways. I have traveled to places I never knew I would see and have been able to live and learn new cultures. But I think the part that has surprised me most is the connection I have made with people from different countries from different backgrounds with different beliefs and customs and ideas. Most of the people I meet and talk with are moms. And despite all of these obvious differences we end up discussing things like diapers and toys and ... being tired.
My experience visiting the Auschwitz memorial kind of brought all of this full circle for me. If we can look beyond our obvious or visible differences we come to more fully understand that we are all just people. Trying to do our best. Trying to take care of our families. And we have so much more in common than meets the eye.
Experiencing this place in person forced me to see. It forced me to understand beyond what the works of a historical fiction novel can. When you're literally there, standing there, it's unavoidable. You sort of travel back in time and imagine yourself there which makes the reality of what happened set in. My mind went a thousand places back and forth from past to present. I walked away, but this experience has stayed with me.
That is why I felt it important to share it with you. I am not a perfect person. I am not a political figure. I am not even an activist. I am not a teacher or a novelist or anyone important. And I know that I have so much more to learn...
But seeing Auschwitz connected the past to my present. And I just felt pressed to share. I believe that we must take every eye-opening and world-expanding opportunity that comes our way. Even if (and maybe especially if) we feel uncertain about or fearful of it. Because the more we see, the more life-stories we hear, the more we understand. And I feel like the world could use a little more understanding.
Because human connection is the antithesis to hate.
ever yours,
lindsey
PS Thank you for reading! I welcome your thoughts, your reactions and your comments. And if you'd like to learn more about the museum, you can visit their web site here: Auschwitz-Birkenau.
