It was important to me to go to Auschwitz and Auchwitz Birkenau during this trip to Europe. As I am Jewish, it is apart of my people's history, even though I have no direct family members that were actually involved in the Holocaust (all of my family was already in America by that point, but if you go to my more distant family there were those that weren't here).
Once back in high school, I had almost done a March of the Living tour with my youth group, which goes throughout Europe to the concentrations camps and then after a week of doing that goes to Israel for a week to celebrate the New Year there. I got myself pretty excited for it, but I can't remember why I didn't follow through. But I knew that one day I would go to Europe and I would see some camps (I also had the chance to see Sachenhausen outside of Berlin).
I didn't just pick Krakow for Auschwitz. I had picked it also because it was supposed to be a beautiful city filled with culture, have a lively night life, and there were supposed to be some good bagels there. When I was looking up hostels, I found one that set up daily tours Auschwitz, so based on that and other reviews I figured that this hostel was a good one.
The bus ride was over an hour long to Auschwitz. When we got there we were broken up to two groups (Don't worry, I got to stay with my friend, Jess) and we were assigned a tour guide. Because it was so crowded, we had headphones so that we could hear our guide. That was something I was very surprised with, how crowded it was. It was very quiet, but often hard to walk through the buildings and stairways because it was so packed.
Everyone gets hit differently, is what I'm told. Jess and I were both pretty effected by this one room that showed all of the hair that was cut off from the victims. It was behind this glass and it went on for too long. The other one that really got to me was the room that was filled with kitchen supplies that were taken from the Jewish people and other victims before entering Auschwitz. I know how many my house hold has, and we have a lot. Our's don't equal to the smallest percent of what was there! They had many different rooms filled with different belongings of the victims. They had these in "Canada Buildings," and they called them that because Canada was thought of as a good place.
After this part of the tour, we went over to Auschwitz Birkenau. Because it was bigger, we didn't need the headphones, and it wasn't as crowded. We went into some of the housing that still stood and then walked the way to the memorial, which is the only unchanged part of Auschwitz Birkenau (In Auschwitz there is a "main lobby") as it is a resting site for thousands of people. The walk was pretty long, it didn't look long but once I was walking that you notice that without good shoe that it's not an easy walk.
Something I couldn't get over was how it was such a beautiful day. It was late October, the sun was shining, and it was probably about 60 degrees fahrenheit (15-16 C was what we were getting at that time). I never think of the concentration camps to ever have a beautiful day, but when I think about it now, they probably had many sunny days with lovely weather. I think that was the saddest part and that part that will stay with me.
Kutna Hora isn't your typical spot to go to while traveling through Europe. And it was because of Contiki that I actually went here, and was pretty happy I did too!
