Summer Trip 2017: Day 9 - Trip to Auschwitz

We wanted the girls to experience going to Auschwitz.  In preparation for our trip we showed them the film Schindler's List and had some serious discussions. Polina means "girl from Poland" so on our trip to Central Europe we also wanted to get a chance for her to be where she was named after (besides being named in honor of my mom, Polly).  We woke up and ate breakfast and met the Stice family at their apartment and went to the bus station.  We bought tickets and had to wait for a bus for about 40 minutes.

Our bus ride took just over an hour and we arrived about 9:40.  We had to get tickets, but they were free.  We spent about two and a half hours at Auschwitz 1.  We went through the Polish section, the Red Army section, and all of the sections about the horrors of the camp system.  The girls were well-behaved and the gravity of the evil that had taken place there seemed to sink in.

Polish history of invasion and resistance

Prisoners

Eyeglasses collected from Jews

Kitchenware

Shoes

Outside the barracks

Fence and guard tower

Crematorium inside Auschwitz I

Camp from the outside

The day was very warm, so when we finished getting through the camp we took a short break to drink water.  Then we took the shuttle bus to Auschwitz II- Birkenau.  In the two times I'd been before, I hadn't ever been there.  If Auschwitz is sobering, then Birkenau is overwhelming.  The size of the camp is immense.  Much of it is just the chimneys where  the barracks stood.

Entrance to Birenau - train tracks leading through the entrance

Rows and rows of chimneys where barracks were located

Railcar, the type that Jews from all over Europe were shipped in.

The Germans had dynamited the gas chambers and ovens before the Soviets advanced in early 1945.  On the rubble of the killing area a memorial was built.  The memorial is simple, and consists of plaques, with a common saying in twenty languages: FOR EVER LET THIS PLACE BE A CRY OF DESPAIR AND A WARNING TO HUMANITY, WHERE THE NAZIS MURDERED ABOUT ONE AND A HALF MILLION MEN, WOMEN AND CHILDREN MAINLY JEWS FROM VARIOUS COUNTRIES OF EUROPE. AUSCHWITZ-BIRKENAU 1940-1945.

Russian version of the plaque

A Jewish group was reading names and singing songs at the memorial

Rubble left over from blowing up the gas chambers and crematoriums

Looking back over the camp from the memorial

The walk from the bus to the memorial and back was nearly two miles (a mile each way) which gives some scale to the size of the camp.  We finished at about 1:00 p.m. and took the shuttle back to Auschwitz I.  We ate at a little pizza place across the street, and then walked about a mile to the train station.  We bought tickets and got right on the train, which left about ten minutes later.  The train was a dedicated train between Oswiecim (the name of the town in Polish) and Krakow.  It was an older train, but was a nice adventure for the girls.  The adventure grew when we were told at a station about half way to Krakow that we had to get off the train and get on a bus.  We did that.  We assumed the bus would take us all the way to Krakow.  It did not - it only took us to another station further down the line (apparently there was construction on the tracks), and then we had to wait for another train.  We got back to Krakow a little after five, tired, but fine.

Walking to train station

On the train

Lexa and Papa

Waiting for the second train

We agreed to meet for dinner at 7:00 at a place that had been recommended by some friends of the Stices.  The name of the restaurant was U Babci Maliny (or At grandma Rasberry's).  The place was interesting, with decor like a peasant hut.  You ordered your food and then came and picked it up, but it was like home-made food.  We ordered, and the portions that came were huge.  The food was delicious and there was plenty of it.

Our huge dinner!

Ramona was funny and had an adventure with ordering.  She wanted to get a mix of Pirogi, so she ordered that.  Then she started naming types of Pirogi, assuming that she could choose the mix.  She ended up ordering 4 huge portions of pirogi - the mixed platter, plus full platters of the three types she named.  We teased her about that for the next few days, and they ate pirogi for breakfast for the next two days - and Lina took home a portion and ate them, too!

All of the food for Ramona!

It was a long, emotionally draining day.  But one that we hope the kids will remember for a long time.