This was one of those day trips that’ll stay with me for the rest of my life. In high school I read Elie Wiesel’s book Night. It’s a horrific book but did no good in preparing me for my day at Auschwitz. The immense amount of work that went into exterminating the Jews is so apparent and in your face when walking around Auschwitz and the massive Birkenau sites that there’s no escaping it.
I won’t go into too many details about my visit but here are a few memories.
1. There’s a 30 meter long glass display in the museum that contains a few tons of human hair. The Nazi’s would shave their victims and sell the hair for use in industrial and textile manufacturing. Visitors and relatives of victims have left roses in front of this glass display case. For me, it was by far the most powerful, shocking and immensely saddening display in the museum.
2. We call them concentration camps but they were actually extermination camps. After visiting I see why holocaust scholars make the distinction. The few who made it through the selection process faced an average life expectancy of 2-3 months before succumbing to exhaustion, disease or starvation. I have no idea how a few individuals managed to survive a single a polish winter of hard work with rations of 1300 calories and clothing as thin as pajamas.
3. The inhumanity displayed by the Nazis is shocking.
4. The visit is immensely worthwhile.
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