What you are looking at here is an area between the large buildings you saw in the previous pictures. To your right was the building that dealt with punishment. (as if these people needed anymore) As you look at the picture the dark stone is the place where they would shoot people for whatever reasons. The Nazis obviously needed a material that could handle the the stress of the frequent executions better than brick. Yet as you are draw closer to the wall you see hundreds of pock marks in the wall. You run your hand over the marks and you are shocked at the effect they have. I turned around and saw what was the last thing they saw. Then you look at the marks and the utter insanity, incomprehensibility of where you are standing wash over you. You walk away with no words or thoughts to absorb it all.
Then the last picture shows one of the rooms that faced the execution area where people heard and waited for their turn to stand in front of the grey stone.

As you walk through the various buildings our guide, explains their different uses. All the buildings look the same and it is easy to think that the interior would be similar, but each had its own story of use in the process of destruction. It really hits you that it was a process. That the process had a purpose, the elimination of groups of people. Planned, thought out, organized, and successful. After all who would go see if it hadn't been successful. What an irony
Who carried these cases, what hopes were packed inside. These represent peoples lives, I took pause at the thought of what I would like to represent me; a suitcase never came to mind!

Ausschwitz

These are more picutres of Auschwitz You can see how large this section of the camp is with its guard towers and fences.

Auschwitz

It has been weeks since I posted. There are so many reasons for it, but I would say the main one is to try and put into words what it is like to be at Auschwitz is like trying to empty the ocean with a thimble.
The day of our visit was filled with rain, at first it was the kind of rain that made you want to run for cover and stay there until it is over, but unlike ourselves the dear souls that arrived there found none. As the day wore on it turn to a soft drizzle the simply gray dark skies How fitting.
What you see here are the part of the camp call Aushwitz. It originally was a camp for the Polish army. The German efficency. The buildings housed workers. The Germans meeded slave labor.
The bottom picture is the famous saying that greeted a prisoner as they entered the camp-"Work will make you free"

These are pictures from behind the monument. This large bowl shaped field was the place where most of the prisoners were shot. You can see from the next shot a fellow traveler standing in the sandy center of the pit. We have come to see, others came and were killed.
We can to bear witness and remember, others before use were brought here to be forgottened.

In the final picture is a smaller memorial. This camp was filled with Poles, Jews and others. You will find different subgroups from the camp remember in different ways. Like I said earlier many were placed in this camp to be slave labourers in the factories around Krakow. Krakow was the center of the Central Government set up by the Germans.

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There have been many interruptions. Beginning school and two other jobs so glad to be back to finish my postings
As we left Schindler's factory we visited the memorial for the Plaszow concentration camp. This is the camp that was represented in Schindler's List. It is crazy to see a large car dealer right across the street. As you can see you walk up a hill and from the distance the monument is difficult to discern. As you get closer you begin to feel smaller as when you arrive at the top you are dwarf ted by the granite. Then as you look up you see the faces looking down at you. What a moment!!!!! I could just picture prisoners walking with their heads down shuffling to their work, but from this postition it is like you could see what they really felt. What a sight to have those heads facing down at you.

The orgininal purpose of this camp was a a work camp. It graduated into a concentration camp.

As you leave the ghetto you drive by a factory made famous by Steven Speliburg. This is Oskar Schindler's factory and this is the place where Schindler's list was film. The factory is under renovations which prohibited us from entering it. Schindlers Jews were workers who were place in the care of Schindler by the Nazis.
Because of the movie it is like being able to see the workers standing in the factory yard. The movie runs through your mine and makes this place so much more real.

In the Center of the Krakow ghetto was a pharmacy called Pod Orlem. This pharmacy was run by a Polish gentile. (We were not allowed to take pictures of the interior of the pharmacy.) This gentile would help smuggle in information, food, medicine. The product in greatest demand from this pharmacy was not medicine, it was hairdye. The younger you look the longer you would live. The inside is quite small but you can't deny the power of one!

As we left the castle, we went to the section of Krakow that was sectioned off as a ghetto. The pictures you see are of the memorial in the square in the ghetto. You can see chairs in rows and that is all. It reminds me of the Oklahoma bombing memorial. The ideas of the chairs were chosen from a survivor of the ghetto who saw a group of children carrying chairs. When asked what they were doing, they replied that they had to leave their school and they were bringing the chairs so they would have a place to sit in their new school. Needless to say those children didn't survive. What would these children have brought to our world had they lived? What did we lose with those children. The Krakow ghetto was used as a supply of labor for factories that were established in and outside of the ghetto. One of the factories was the one run by Oscar Schindler. More pictures of that the next post
This is also a transportation depot so people use the chairs as they are waiting for their buses and and trams. This is ironic because streetcars would travel through the ghetto all the time, yet they were never allowed to make a stop.

As a teacher, I wonder how my students would respond in relationship to the threat of their schooling being cut off.

Once you get up to the top of the castle you see the cathedral that faces you. You realize that faith has been a intertwined with the ruling of this area for centuries.
The second picture is of the foundation of the original castle.
The last picture is of a courtyard where dignitaries and important political visitors are still entertained today. It is amazing to think that when the Nazis made this a their capital in the central government they enjoyed such accommodations.

After being in the Kazimierz and the old Jewish section we traveled back a few blocks from our hotel. I caught this couple celebrating their wedding. They were taking these photographs in front of the castle wall we were going to visit. From the next picture you can see the size of the wall. The next picture is the stairs we climbed to arrive at the top. These ramparts and balustrades are the markers of the the center for rules for centuries. As we arrived at the top of the stairs you see part of the view over the rest of the city.

These are pictures from inside the synagogue. This is from the 15th century. You see the alter in the front between the two pillars is kept the Torah, (first 5 books of the old testiment). The iron cage in the center is the place from where the reader reads. Directly behind the cage are the pews for the worshipers.
In looking at this picture I hope that you can get a sense of how small by comparing the room size to the people in the picture.




Sitting in these pews you can't help but wonder at the prayers that were offered up and were they any different in theme and desire from what we would hear someone pray today. Our commonality so out weights our differences!

In the last post was the picture of the gate to the synagogue, as you pass through the gate and a courtyard your are face to face with this Jewish cemetery.
The rocks place on the graves are placed in the Jewish faith to express memory and memorial to that person or persons. In the States we will place flowers at the grave on a anniversary to remember. One thing about the rocks is how sustaining they are in their remembrance.

In the next picture you are seeing the wall around the cemetery and synagogue. Many times the Nazis would take the heads stones from Jewish cemeteries for other purposes. Like building a wall. You can see some partial head stones used to help build this wall.