Day 2 of this journey was overwhelming and upsetting beyond words or pictures. While the essence of this journey is to experience this place and that time for myself, I could say nothing and post no pictures out of respect. Or, as I am here to do, I can try and retell the snippets for this place and some of the horrors that happened here so it will not be forgotten, denied or repeated.
For those that don’t know, Auschwitz is a collective name for a series of camps and today we visited two of them.
The first was the death camp where the overall objective was the annihilation and systematic extermination of as many Jews as possible from 1940 to 1945. When the Nazis arrived they took over this collection of stables and army barracks and built more barracks and gas chambers and crematoria. In 1941 they add a train track to speed up the process as they were having to bring prisoners in from the local train station.
The stark reality that so much destruction took place here hits you from the moment you arrive. Whether it is sunny - or raining - or even if it were thick snow (which thankfully it was not) this is a bleak landscape of huts and ruined buildings and rusty barbed wire fences.
What we learned was all about the dehumanisation of the people who arrived, reducing them from individuals with a history and family, a distinct look to determine if they were wealthy, if they were from a large family, who they may have been named after or any other trait that made them the person them had arrived as. Within minutes they would have been stripped of everything - their material belongings, including their clothes and their hair or spectacles or walking aids. What remained was a physical body, sometimes replaced by a number. Often just discarded with immediate murder in the gas chambers. They were reduced to ashes in minutes. Others were able to avoid the worst outcome for a few days or weeks perhaps but at Birkenau that was the inevitable outcome.
We did meet Arek, 94 years old, who was one of the incredibly small number who somehow avoided death. And from him we heard first hand what had happened - to his friends and relatives - but not to him. Talking to us from one of the cold and windy barracks where up to 1000 people slept - 8 to a bed. After hearing his story, he turned to us and said with a sense of humour he has somehow retained “do you like my bedroom?”
It was impossible to imagine how he survived mentally let alone physically. No regular sustenance and the harshest of conditions and treatment. And the sobering realisation that this happened with the support of Jewish prisoners who were too afraid to refuse to help. And they had that guilt to live with, while others may have had guilt of survival to live with too. So many emotions to comprehend.
The second half of the day was spent at Auschwitz - the concentration camp. This was originally a series of one story Polish army blocks that the Nazis converted to two storey buildings to house the many Jews who were selected to help their war effort. Conditions were only slightly better - and only for as long as you were useful or remained in favour. It is here we walked beneath the Arbeit Mach Frei sign that so many people will be familiar with. The key difference is that we walked out of that camp and are not condemned to a life of atrocity. The false hope that this sign prompted was the first of many deceptions that Nazis tricked their victims to believe.
To try to encapsulate what I felt is impossible. The sheer magnitude and scale of the operation was immense. The dehumanisation was degrading to a level I hope never to see or hear repeating itself again - on any scale.
But the two immediate thoughts I walk away with are firstly that I fulfilled a duty to come and hear stories of what happened because there are so many other stories that I will never hear - of things that didn’t turn out with a happy ending. Of lives cut short but not just through tragedy that I relate to today - but brought about because of the most unimaginable tragedy and depravity that we can hardly comprehend. And the other thought that stuck with me is the need to make sure this doesn’t happen again - not just to Jewish people for whom antisemitism is still a factor and does appear to be rearing it’s ugly head once more - but also for any other. I know on my own I can’t prevent that. But by participating in this programme, by sharing my story, one voice talking to another and then someone else deciding to come and see the same sights so they will share the story in the future, perhaps, perhaps, we can prevent some thing on this scale - or even less, happening in the future.
Tonight is Yom Hashoah - the Jewish day of remeberance for the victims of the Holocaust. And tomorrow is our march where we walk from the work camp (Auschwitz) to the death camp (Birkenau) in the footsteps of those who were no longer useful. In memory. And in celebration that today we can thrive and will.
For now. As much as I didn't know them, 27 Spungin's that perished at this time. Just some of the 4 Million who have been identified so far. Only 2 million more to identify and never forget.
