Oskar Schindler's Enamelware Factory

If you have not watched the movie "Schindler's List," I highly recommend it. It is a great movie about a man who saved many lives, but it also is an excellent portrayal of what happened during the Holocaust. Schindler's Factory still exists very close to the Jewish Ghetto in Krakow. It is not a working factory anymore, but is now a museum depicting German Occupation. I have been to many museums, but this one, by far, is the best. The museums designer deserves an award. From the moment you walk in, you feel like you have been transported back in time. It is set up like a visual timeline of WWII from beginning to end. You track through the exhibits on sensory overload and each room is small, so you feel like you were a part of the history of each stage. I loved it and want to come back and bring my sons.
The museum is not about Schindler at all. It is about what Jews had to endure and tries very hard to make you feel like you are walking in a victims footsteps. Schindler was definitely a hero...true savior.

Entrance gate...the gateway to life for many survivors

My niece, Katie. Love this girl and glad to share this experience with her.

Nazi war paraphenalia

You had to walk through a maze of these flags, signaling the Nazis were in power.

Awesome exhibit. It was a school room and a recording was playing of the sounds of desks moving and people speaking. There was a plaque on the wall displaying the speech told to Jewish college students who were arrested for continuing to go to class.

A copy of Hitler's Mein Kampf

Jewish treasures the Nazis raided and stole

One small room in the ghetto that held many families in one room

When the Jews had to go to the train station for deportation to the concentration camps, their stuff was left in piles on the train platform because the SS wouldn't let them bring it.

Nazi propaganda

Weapons and artillery

The factory from the outside

Desk where papers were stamped. Notice the swastika tiles....

Krakow's Jewish Quarter and Ghetto

On our last day in Krakow, we went to the main square and found a tour guide to take us in a large, golf cart around the city to see sites related to WWII and Wawel Castle. Our guide's name was Paul. He was born and raised in Krakow and was an engineering student at the university in Krakow. Giving tours was his summer job. He was the sweetest thing and was so knowledgeable about Krakow. It was wonderful because he spoke perfect English and also had a grandfather who survived Auschwitz. His grandfather was about 85 years old, still alive and rode his bike everyday. If we would have had more time, I would have loved to have met him. Paul's grandfather was not Jewish. He was sent to Auschwitz because his grandfather's father was caught helping and hiding Jews. Paul told us the Nazis did not send his great-grandfather to Auschwitz for hiding Jews, but his entire family instead. Just one more way to emotionally terrorize and control people. He said his grandfather was a survivor because he was sent so close to the end of the war. It was such an interesting story! We were hoping to find stories like that one.
Paul took us to see the synagogues and told us the Jewish Quarter was the center of culture for Krakow. He said it was the best place to eat and enjoy an evening in Krakow because the prices were so reasonable and all the young people in the city come during the evenings to enjoy music, food, and drink. He showed us where the gate was erected at one time to control Jews going in and out of the Ghetto. He took us deep into the Ghetto and showed us where Schindler's Jews would travel back and forth through a tunnel to work in the factory that saved their lives. I will post more about Schindler's Factory in my next post. It is time for me to head off to bed because we have to catch an EARLY bus to Munich in the morning!

Jewish synagogue gate

Famous car in Poland. They have a contest every year to see how many adults they can stuff into it. 16 is the record.

Interesting...Paul told us the bottom floor is a bank and the second floor is a house of prostitution.

Jewish restaurant that practices Kosher

Beauty and make-up heiress Helena Rubinstein was born in this building

Jewish synagogue

St. Joseph's Church was used by the Nazis to store ammunition and weapons during the war

Memorial to Krakow Jews. The chairs symbolize and the belongings left behind when Jews boarded the trains. This was a gestapo headquarter and processing station when the Jews boarded the train.

Memorial and train station where the Krakow Jews boarded the train to go to Auschwitz. Paul told us many public executions were held here.

These small chairs represent the children

Deep into the Jewish Ghetto. Katie and I saw bullet holes in the walls.

Ghetto wall erected by the Nazis to separate the Jews from the Poles. If the Poles were caught throwing food over the wall, the sentence was death right on the spot. Notice the top of the wall. The Nazis purposefully made it look like headstones to remind the Jews of what would happen to them if they did not cooperate.

The streets have been black topped in the Ghetto, but every now and then, you can see the original street peeking through.

This is the pharmacy of Tadeusz Pankiewicz. He was a Polish Catholic pharmacist and refused the Nazis offer to relocate out of the ghetto. He was a hero. This pharmacy is directly across from the "chairs memorial." This pharmacist risked his life to save many Jews in the Ghetto by hiding them from deportation and giving them life-saving medicines to keep them alive because disease was rampant within the ghetto. He would also give mother's tranquilizer to give to their children so their children would sleep during Nazis raids and not be scared.

Jewish Ghetto

Ghetto building

Day 2: Auschwitz/Birkenau

 

 

I could write a book about visiting Auschwitz. I won't. I will try and keep it brief, but I could fill pages. I found the best article I have ever read about the place while researching it before I left and will leave most of the details about what happened to the article. I recommend you read it before reading my post. I will only speak of my experience.
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/Can-Auschwitz-Be-Saved.html?c=y&page=1

Why visit? Why would anyone want to come here and see it? The answer for anyone is quite personal and different according to who you ask. My answer is...because everyone should. Everyone should witness what happens when we are not tolerant of one another and feel we are far superior to anyone else. I wanted to see it for myself and not what people write in books. It truly stands as a testament to the loss of humanity. It is also a reminder to "never forget." Anne Frank wrote something about (and I am paraphrasing) being the example for the world. If she had to endure all the suffering to serve as an example to the world, then so be it and her suffering would not be in vain.
I also wanted to see what real heroes look like...what courage in the face of death looks like. The victims are true heroes. There were several parts of the extermination camp where, out of respect for the victims, we could not take pictures. The entire place gripped me to my soul, but two places had a huge impact on me. See, my perspective and view of the Holocaust is from a mother's point of view. I can't help but put myself in the mindset of one of the mother's of the Holocaust. Your children are your life. The total reason for existence. It is nature and I can't remove myself from it. I can't imagine having my child ripped out of my arms, not knowing if I would ever see them again. Not knowing where they were going or what kind of treatment they would endure. They may as well have killed me right then. In one room, I had to force myself to look at the face of a child walking hand in hand with his mother to board a train. It was very emotional.
The second place I will never forget is the room of hair. The hair was behind glass and towered over me. It was all the hair the Nazis cut off the prisoners and saved by the tons. When the camp was liberated, they found 7 tons of it in bound bundles. The average head only has a few grams of hair. This was evidence of the masses of people who were held at Auschwitz and most likely exterminated, though some survived. It was so eerie. All the artifacts we had viewed up to that point were belongings...just objects. This was them. There were all colors of hair and you could make out braids. It was completely visceral and I felt as if I was invading privacy. Almost disrespecting them by being there. The Nazis used the hair to make uniforms and netting for the German soldiers in the way you would make textiles from cotton. Horrific doesn't even come close to describe it.
Our tour guide spoke only Polish and her translator was a girl who rode on the bus with us from Krakow and made sure everyone was accounted for and in the right place. I believe they were short-handed at Auschwitz because it was so crowded and the poor girl was not prepared to serve as a translator. Unfortunately, the translator did not have a great command of the English language, so we did not get the best experience as far as guides. I told Sheila, "I think our guide is getting a great lesson and education about Auschwitz today." The Polish lady would talk and talk and then the translator would give us a few simple sentences. Thankfully, I was well-read and there was English translation on all the plaques. What we missed was the emotion from the guide, the stories within stories and all the details not put on the plaques.
In the end, it was a place I will never forget and by that, I have accomplished the lesson Jewish victims wanted from visitors. The moral to the tragedy....love one another.

Both sides are full of shoes. They count them by the ten thousands.

Combs, brushes, and shaving equipment

Room full of combs, brushes, and shaving equipment

Living conditions the first week

Conditions after it was open a while

I found this so appalling. It was on the wall of the mass wash basin room. Really?

Death by firing squad. Notice the bricked and boarded up windows. Hearing it was better than seeing it?

Public hangings to scare people into submission

Roll call area. There was a guard tower at each end and public executions were regular if the count was off.

At first prisoners were hung here, but this eventually was the site where Rudolf Hess, the camp commander, was hung.

Gas chamber and crematorium

gas chamber

Crematorium was to the right and shared a wall with the gas chamber. Prisoners did all the work.

A plaque was set for all the languages spoken of prisoners at the camp. This was the English one and was separate because there were no English speaking victims.

Gas chamber and crematorium at Birkenau. 2,000 prisoners at once were lead through those steps, gassed, and burned for a total of about 1.5  million killed total for Auschwitz and Birkenau combined. The Nazis burned and blew up the buildings in 1945 to hide the evidence.

Pond behind the crematorium where the ashes were dumped

Women's bunkhouse at Birkenau. Hundreds of women were cramped into one bunkhouse.

Ditch being dug by prisoners

The ditch today

Mass toilets