Auschwitz, June 2018

The goal of my trip to Krakow wasn’t the city itself, the goal was a visit to Auschwitz. In the past I had already visited some former concentration camps, but never Auschwitz.

In Auschwitz I, the story of the camps, of the people that ended up in the camps is told. Names and faces are put on these people, personal items are shown. Auschwitz II (Birkenau), about 3 kilometer further down the road, is impressive by its size. It’s huge, even gigantic. A number of the barracks has been rebuild, both wooden and brick barracks, to give you an idea of the ‘living’ conditions. But from most barracks only the chimneys from the heating remain, two per barrack. And there are many chimneys, very many chimneys…

What’s unbelievable about Auschwitz is that the murder of people of flesh and blood was reduced to an industrial process. A chain of separate process steps, which had been optimized like in an industrial complex…

In one of the first buildings, the following appropriate quote is shown: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”

Eddy

PS: here are my pictures from Dachau, Buchenwald and Dora-Mittelbau.

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