Grim History

Sunday, October 7, 2012

Under gray skies and rain that increased in intensity all day, we drove about an hour west of Krakow to spend much of this day at the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camps.  We spent about four hours with an English-speaking guide, who provided excellent commentary; she related the history, explained the exhibits, and let the gut-wrenching reality of these places tell its own story.  Massive collections of personal goods, the dormitories left as they were, the double-barbed wire electrified fences (through which not a single person escaped), a lone cattle car used to transport Jews sitting on the rails at the inspection station, the moving postwar memorial to the 1.6 million killed here, a silent walk through a gas chamber and crematorium -- these experiences left us speechless.  There is simply no way to comprehend how such a thing happened, how any human beings could have committed such atrocities against others.  This was a hard place to visit, but, without any doubt in our minds, a place that should be experienced, so that the world never forgets.

 

Back in town, we drove around Nowa Huta, a Soviet-era suburb conceived as a “workers’ paradise” focused on a steelworks factory.  The communist-era idea was an attempt to counteract the intellectual and cultural sophistication of Krakow’s old city.  Now, large trees and parks have softened the harsh lines of the original architecture and streets once named for Soviet heroes now bear the names of Pope John Paul II (Krakow’s hometown boy) and Ronald Reagan.

Late afternoon left us enough time to visit St. Mary’s Church, with its fabulous altarpiece, in the Market Square, and to hear the famous hourly bugle call from the church tower.  We also had a last walk through the Cloth Hall and visited the tiny round St. Adalbert’s Church, in a corner of the Market Square.  As the rain continued throughout the day, the square was much quieter than the lively scenes we’d experienced on previous visits.

As we headed home, still using our umbrellas, we remarked upon the fact that today’s weather may be the worst we’ve ever had in our travels. (How lucky have we been?!?)  Somehow, given today’s primary destination, it was very fitting, and not something we would have changed…