During our time in Krakow, our visit to Auschwitz was a very humbling experience. In class we try to put ourselves in the shoes of the people we learn about to better understand their situation and the events that took place. However, when we came to the camp, we walked on the platform that led a million people to their deaths and we saw the shoes that were all that remain of many of the victims at Auschwitz. We saw the gas chambers and crematoria that were the greatest instruments contributing to the success of the Nazis in annihilating the Jewish population. The exhibit that made me the most emotional was seeing the two tons of human hair, collected from over 30,000 women, and the objects the Germans made out of the victims of this tragedy, such as rugs, rope, and socks for their soldiers. I think the site helped us understand just how many people died at the camp. In class we saw large numbers and devastating statistics, but understanding that over a million people were killed in this way is something that can only come from seeing where and how it happened in person.
I live in the suburbs of Washington, D.C. and have been to the Holocaust Museum many times. Each time I definitely felt overwhelmed with and saddened by the exhibits, but that was nothing compared to the absolute shock I received when I came to Auschwitz. The museum in D.C. had many similar exhibits to this site, such as a room filled with the shoes of the victims. However, instead of 5,000 pairs of shoes in a room, there were 70,000 pairs of shoes in the room at Auschwitz. The hundreds of thousands of artifacts helped me to understand just how many people were affected by and suffered from this tragedy in human history.
Visiting Poland as a whole was very interesting because it had a completely different feeling of culture from France and England. Not just in that their cultures are inherently different, but more that England and France have an atmosphere that portrays victory for and pride in their nations, while Poland has the atmosphere of defeat and occupation. For instance, in the Schindler Museum the majority of the exhibits are on general information about WWII, the Polish Resistance and resistance, and the tragedies that affected Poland throughout the war. The resistance with a capital R is referring to the official resistance movements, while those with a lowercase r refer to the small acts of resistance common throughout Poland at the time. At the end of the exhibit, instead of a portion on the victorious end to the war and the surge of national pride and honor, the Polish museum had an enormous picture of Stalin hanging on the wall. Poland became occupied by the Soviet Union after the war and continued to struggle under their lack of freedoms. So, Poland did not have a happy ending like the allies did. Poland did not recover after the war like the other nations did because they were immediately taken over by another power – the Soviets replaced the Nazis. This was very sad, seeing much of their struggles throughout the war and knowing that it never truly ended. This occupation after the war was seen all throughout he city of Krakow, especially in the architecture of many of the buildings. They had the classic Soviet, basic, concrete style of design that portrayed the sad, strictly controlled society they were forced to endure both before and after the war. However, even with the remnants of occupation around the city, Krakow has become a place in which people thrive in a new, rich culture that bloomed at the end of their Soviet occupation.