Monday, July 25, 2011

Auschwitz

I don't really know what to say about Auschwitz except that it is a truly terrible place. There are buildings and buildings there that were used to house prisoners, perform experiments, and all sorts of gruesome things. I won't get into it because it makes me sick. What is weird is that it is so close to where we are staying. Finding out by our taxi ride, it is only about 40 minutes away. Can you imagine living here during the war and having the holocaust happen pretty much in your backyard? eh. Anyway, here are some pics.







This is the main entrance. Come to find out, the Arbeit Macht Frei sign isn't the original one. The original one was stolen a few years ago. It was later found, cut into a few pieces. It is thought that someone from the Nazi party was interested in it, so some thugs stole it for them. It is still being repaired.



There are rows and rows of these buildings that were used for horrible things. You go inside some of them to see living conditions and things. In a couple, there are things that were stolen from the Jews like glasses, pots and pans, shoes, prosthetic body parts, toys, luggage, etc. There were tens of thousands of things. There was a room that had human hair that was cut off. There was so much of it and it was sickening. The saddest were the little kid shoes and toys. Seriously, I don't understand the mindset that would enable someone to be so cruel.



The public hangings were here. You had to walk by it in order to go to where roll call was held everyday.

This is just a view of the fencing around the camp. There are two electified barbed wire fences here.


To brighten up this post, here is Calem. This is on our bus ride from the main camp to Auschwitz II- Birkenau. He makes me smile.




Auschwitz II - Birkenau. This camp was set up a few years later as an extention. The main camp felt like a prison, this just felt like a death camp...which it was.




These are part of the train tracks that came directly into the camp. The train tracks lead all the way down to the gas rooms and the crematorium. A lot of people were taken right from the train to be gassed.

By the gas chambers and crematorium, there is a big memorial for all those who died here. It is a kind of weird looking memorial. Here Calem is next to part of it.


I guess I don't regret going and seeing what it was like and having the experience, but I wouldn't ever go again.

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