One more word

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Obviously, we have returned home. I cannot believe how quickly one month can pass. I am still pinching myself in wonder of all we have seen and done. It has been such a wonderful experience - an opportunity not to have missed. This last entry may be difficult for some to read so be forewarned that it is not for everyone. I have learned so much on this trip and this was the most difficult lesson of all.

The one event that continues to haunt me is the time spent in Auschwitz and Birkenau. I don't know that the world will ever come to terms, if that is even slightly possible, with the history of that time. I know that it will certainly never leave me. There were several facts that I learned that I doubt I have ever heard about it. I write this more for myself as I feel compelled to do so.

Auschwitz was established in 1940 for the Polish political prisoners. Originally it was to be an instrument of terror and extermination of Poles. Then, it evolved into a place for others from the rest of Europe - mainly Jews. The town in which it was constructed was evacuated of its citizens except for a small population used to service the camp. There is a wall dedicated to some of the Polish people who helped those held in the camps. The location was chosen primarily because it could be easily expanded and it was a main railroad junction. Birkenau was constructed in 1941; it is located 3 kilometers from Auschwitz. Auschwitz maintains a series of brick buildings that now house huge glass enclosed displays of what remains of that nightmare. Thousands of shoes (adult and then child), thousands of hairbrushes and personal care items, thousands of toys, suitcases, it just goes on and on. There is one room that holds thousands of crutches, canes, glasses, prosthetics (one was a ladies constructed so that the wooden foot would mirror her intact leg in high heels), and braces - these were the first to be immediately exterminated. I have been to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. This museum was different. We walked under the sign that translates into 'Work brings Freedom' which the prisoners passed through everyday to go to their assigned labor. There is no accurate count of the numbers of Jews because the majority were killed in the gas chambers immediately on arrival without registration and without identification.

I could never understand why the Jews went in the boxcars so passively. I had forgotten the times. The Jews had been isolated in the ghettos. With the depression, work was scarce. They had been promised "resettlement" and jobs. In particular Jews from Greece and Hungary were deceived as the Nazis even sold them non-existent plots of land, farms, shops or offered them work in fictitious factories. For this reason the deportees always brought their most valuable possessions with them. When the Hungarians got off the train at Birkenau, the women and children were immediately led to what they were told were showers after the long trip. They were immediately exterminated in the crematorium. Some had traveled as far as 1500 miles to meet this end traveling 7 to 10 days in boxcars. I had always heard of the fake shower heads but there were none in either of these camps. They were gas chambers.

The prisoner's uniforms were marked according to the reason for their arrests. The reasons included being Jews, political prisoners, gypsies, prisoners regarded as antisocial, Jehovas' Witnesses, homosexuals, and criminals. According to the camp history, initially the prisoners were photographed in 3 poses, from 1943 they were tattooed. In the history presented there, KL Auschwitz was the only Nazi camp where the inmates were labelled by tattooing. They stopped taking the photos due the the expense.

In Birkenau, a row of wooden buildings once used as stables (each for 52 horses) then as barracks for the Jews (each holding up to 1000 Jews) still stand. The rows that continue contain the foundations and single chimneys of each barracks and they go on beyond where the eye can see. The wooden structures were on one side of the railroad tracks and on the other side of the tracks are the brick barracks for women which stand in rows again farther than the eye can see. Over 100,000 people were held here in an area of 425 acres in 1944. There are over 300 buildings. The conditions are too difficult to describe.

At the end of the barracks area, there remains the ruins of two crematoriums. On one side of a crematorium is a stagnant pond. It seemed so odd to be there. Then we were informed that in this pond are the ashes of some of those who were cremated. It is a very sacred place. There is a large memorial between the crematoriums for the holocaust victims. The Nazis had tried to blow up and destroy the buildings and the evidence before the Allied Forces arrived. These ruins remain untouched and the evidence is clearly visible through the debris.

While we were there, there was a group of Jewish teenagers under the guidance of, we assumed, their rabbi. He lectured them in Hebrew at the memorial. As they left the area, they began singing Hebrew hymms. It seemed the perfect tribute to those lost and to the resilience of the human spirit in the face of face of man's inhumanity to man.

I continue to ask myself why we are unable to hold onto the lessons of the past. There is so much to learn and so much to remember.

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