Krakow

• By admin
• October 26, 2016
• No Comments

Our second day in Krakow was an intense sightseeing fest. After a short cruise on the Vistula we visited Schindler’s Factory. The story of the factory owner Oskar Schindler, made famous by the eponymous book and film, is fascinating. The videos of factory workers talking about the trauma of daily life during the pogroms was harrowing and poignant. Our next stop was Auschwitz. Joanna had organised a trip to the most famous of all concentration camps for that afternoon. The journey to Óswięcim, the location of Auschwitz, was to take more than two hours and the sun was beating down as we boarded an airless coach, devoid of air conditioning and packed with tourists.

It is difficult to put into words the feelings you experience as you walk around the three camps created on the site in a complex of, extermination, labour and transit camps.  After walking through the famous gate, it is the sheer scale and size of the camps which overwhelms. The barracks, crematoria, (existing and ruins), railway lines, and offices extended over 40 square kilometres. It was industrialised murder on an inhuman scale; the statistics remain unconceivable. The sun shone throughout our sombre walk around the camps, the atmosphere oppressive with no shade for respite. Yet despite the knowledge that the coach journey would be another two hours of almost unbearable stifling heat I was relieved to board the bus.