After visiting Auschwitz I do not think I can look at the Holocaust or World War II the same as I did before seeing the concentration and death camps of Auschwitz and Birkenau. No book, picture or anything else can compare to actually seeing the camp in person. Reading about the Holocaust and seeing pictures does not truly represent the feelings and thoughts that I had while there and afterwards.
While in the camp I was speechless. I was looking not at just suitcases, eyeglasses, pots and pans and other personal objects people brought to the camp. I was looking at someone’s suitcase or other personal and valuable items that were important enough to them that they brought them for starting their new life. That realization was very evident with seeing the names on the suitcases.
In one hallway the walls were covered with pictures of the prisoners with the date they entered the camp and then the date they died if they did not survive the camp. At first I was looking at every face and every date. By the time we left the hallway, I was just looking at the dates and imagining how someone could have survived. The guide pointed out several pictures on the wall for people who only lived one night. We were told that the reason why the prisoners were tattooed with their numbers at only Auschwitz was because the pictures originally taken of them would no longer be able to identify the person. Starved and repeatedly beaten, inmates quickly grew unrecognizable. The walls on both sides of the hallway were covered in these pictures and it was moving to see individuals. The holocaust usually is talked about with mass numbers because the number of people killed was on such an unimaginable scale. The tour guide made sure to point out individuals and tell personal stories that survivors have shared where the individuality is seen.
The guide took us into a room with two tons of hair in it. He explained that when the camp was liberated there was three times the amount of hair that is currently displayed for visitors. When the camp was liberated the hair would not have been on display. It would have been stored somewhere waiting to be used for the war effort. I was not prepared to see two tons of hair. The hair was much more touching and terrifying than anything else up and until that point of the tour. The next area had pots and dishes in it. It was terrifying to know that before liberation the Nazis started a fire to try destroy and cover up the war crimes.
After leaving Auschwitz I had a feeling that what I saw was surreal. Seeing the reconstructed gas chamber and crematorium was so terrible and moving. I could not imagine how terrifying it would have been for all the victims who died in there. Even walking into the buildings /where 700 or more people would have slept . I could not truly imagine the living conditions and what it must have been like to try to survive in the hellish conditions. The building afforded little protection. It was was not heated or well ventilated. We were told that the building would be about the same as the outdoor temperature. The most horrific part of the building was a story a survivor told of a night living there. A twelve year old boy woke up and thought that the people next to him had a blanket. They were not given blankets so that was odd. The man then realized that it was cockroaches. These living conditions and the inhumanity was unbelievable that people could subject anyone to the conditions that were present at the camp.
The worst part of visiting Auschwitz was when the tour guide told us that the one crematoria and gas chambers was closed because it could not kill enough people at once. That was why the crematorium numbers two and three where used. They could kill more people at once. After seeing the reconstructed crematorium number one and seeing how many people it killed at once it was hard to imagine the ruble of crematorium numbers two and three being larger and build just to kill people faster. Overall, seeing Auschwitz really changed my perspective on the Holocaust and what life was like for the people who were forced to live and die in the concentration and death camps. Seeing the housing rooms and gas chambers with crematorium really made me realize just how terrible it was in a camp. Seeing the pictures of a small select few of individuals who were at the camp added a personal touch to know that everything that happened there was not statistics but happened to actual people and added a personal sense to the holocaust for me.