Hello Steemians,
We recently went for a trip to Poland, spending some time in Krakow. We decided to make the day trip to visit the Auschwitz and Birkenau concentration camps. It was a very emotional trip - I have been wanting to write about it for a few days but have struggled to try and put in into words. If your like me you most probably have some understanding of the holocaust and what happened, but visiting these camps made the atrocities much more ‘real’. Read ahead with caution!
As we entered Auschwitz I noticed all the buildings where the prisoner were kept, and barb wire fences everywhere. Living spaces were small, unhygienic and over crowded.
Polish jews were brought here being told that they were going to labour camps and would have a better life - however most of them realised quickly what was going on. We were told that the majority of the prisoners would live less than two months. During WW3 around 6 million jews were murdered in a number of horrendous ways such as gassing, gunshot executions, starvation and disease. What really drove home to me the magnitude of the holocaust was the displays of some of the jews things which had been kept - thousands of shoes, clothes and even human hair! Yes their hair was shaved and was planned to be used for making garments, and clothing. To think that each of these items once belonged to an innocent person who was most likely murdered was hard to take in.
I didn't know much about the second camp Birkenhau, which was nearby and held many more prisoners - and the biggest gas chambers. Prisoners were told before going to the gas chambers that they were going for a shower,and even given soap and towels - but they quickly realised this wasn't the case. Once inside the chambers (sometimes 70 more at a time), cyanide was dropped in through the roof and the jews would die a horrific death from internal suffocation which could take up to 20 minutes. So many jews were being murdered that they couldn't get rid of the bodies quick enough.
Its hard to see from the pictures, but Birkenhau was a massive place that housed thousands of innocent Jewish people
We were able to go inside one of the gas chambers in Auschwitz, but as you can see below the biggest gas chambers situated at Birkenhau were destroyed by the Nazis in an attempt to destroy any evidence
For those who weren't sent straight to the gas chambers at Birkenhau the living conditions were very rough and overcrowded. We were able to go in and see some of the living and sleeping conditions. Often there would be 6 or 7 people to a bed - and it wasnt much of a bed, often just wood and bricks. They would often have to share one blanket - that must have been horrible as Poland is not a very warm country.
Near the end of the trip our guide spoke a quote that hit home for me, and summed up the whole experience:
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." "Those that fail to learn from history, are doomed to repeat it."
Although it was a sad trip it is something I am really glad I did - it not only allows us to respect the loss of so many innocent individuals. It blows my mind how cruel humans can be, and I hope through education we can learn from our mistakes so such atrocities never happen again.
Thank you for reading