On 7.October, I went to the Auschwitz-Birkenau Museum.
I took the 6 hours study tour in English, our (we were group of around 10 people from USA and other part of the world) tour guide/lecturer was Polish.
ASHES INTO THE SOUL
At the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, also at the Sachsenhausen Memorial and Museum, what impressed me the most were, the huge, empty and green grass field and the forests behind. If I hadn’t known the history, I’d imagined completely different story.
Our guide said that she comes from the local town Oswiecim (Auschwitz).
I wonder it must be extremely sad that their beautiful old town became known not by the beauty but the brutal history.
In surprise, it wasn’t huge walls separated the forests of the town and the the camps, but the camps ware surrounded by fences.
The camps ware visible from the outside, the brutality must have been witnessed by the local people.
The guide said “ Yes of course it is very sad for us, and yet it is important for us to keep the historic locations, because it had happened at our soil.”
I questioned the word “soil”, and it was more than just a metaphor.
Later at crematorium she explained that the NS-Germany spread the ashes of their victims into the field used as a fertilizer.
“Listen, ” I told her. “Just listen for a second. Do you hear anything? Wind and birds. Now travel back in time.
A Little more, further back. The bards are still singing, the wind is still blowing, you’re in the same place, and it’s full of people.
They arrived by train and within an hour or two they’re just dead animals, burned to ashes. Focus, feel it. They are here around us, a part of nature.
– The Memory Monster by Yishai Sarid –
A Little more, further back. The bards are still singing, the wind is still blowing, you’re in the same place, and it’s full of people.
They arrived by train and within an hour or two they’re just dead animals, burned to ashes. Focus, feel it. They are here around us, a part of nature.
– The Memory Monster by Yishai Sarid –