I remember the winter when I watched the six part documentary titled “The Holocaust”. To tell you the truth I never watched all six. After fifth one I felt sick, depressed, suicidal. I couldn’t take more of it. Previous week I was there – The Auschwitz I and Auschwitz II Birkinau. Among these two grounds there died more than one million fine young men, women and children. During the whole visit there were two places where which can give you shudders. First one was a room in Auschwitz I where the hairs of actual victims are kept.
Before I go to the second one here are some facts. Most of Auschwitz was destroyed towards the end of war when Germans were retreating and Red Army was chasing them. In spite of this some parts remain in original and some of it is reconstructed to look like as it were. The hairs of female victims were stored in a room to be sold to German fabric industry at half price for recycling purposes.
Second place was the incinerator in the Auschwitz I which was mostly in its original form. The room looked similar to a bakery I saw once. It was the place where people were rounded up for the ‘shower’. Of course there was no shower, there was cyclone B gas, and there was fire. For once I wanted it believe it was all fabricated. I wanted someone to tell me that the whole thing was a bad bad joke someone was trying to pull on me and nothing of this happened. The entrance gate built by Germans read in German “Work makes you free” which was obviously a pretty bad joke.
It is quite hard to believe that there was a society which allowed this to happen. Like love, hate is also a very strong feeling. It can make people do devilish things.
Auschwitz II Birkenau, built later in the war, was a much bigger ground where Jews from all over the Europe were brought. Originally there were barracks for Polish army in these grounds. Each barrack, built for about 70 horses, was later used to house about 300-400 people in them. In these grounds everything that was in Auschwitz one was at a bigger scale. There were 4 gas chambers. Because of the large amount of population sanitation became a problem and threatened safety of Nazi officers staying there. There were several sterilization facilities built here.
I thought I would write much more about it. I remember most of it. I can create a virtual tour of Auschwitz but I think I better not. I don’t want to write about it and I believe you don’t want to read about it.
May be I will write about jolly days of my ‘holidays’. My flight is about to land in India and I am going to see family after a long long time.
Before I go to the second one here are some facts. Most of Auschwitz was destroyed towards the end of war when Germans were retreating and Red Army was chasing them. In spite of this some parts remain in original and some of it is reconstructed to look like as it were. The hairs of female victims were stored in a room to be sold to German fabric industry at half price for recycling purposes.
Second place was the incinerator in the Auschwitz I which was mostly in its original form. The room looked similar to a bakery I saw once. It was the place where people were rounded up for the ‘shower’. Of course there was no shower, there was cyclone B gas, and there was fire. For once I wanted it believe it was all fabricated. I wanted someone to tell me that the whole thing was a bad bad joke someone was trying to pull on me and nothing of this happened. The entrance gate built by Germans read in German “Work makes you free” which was obviously a pretty bad joke.
It is quite hard to believe that there was a society which allowed this to happen. Like love, hate is also a very strong feeling. It can make people do devilish things.
Auschwitz II Birkenau, built later in the war, was a much bigger ground where Jews from all over the Europe were brought. Originally there were barracks for Polish army in these grounds. Each barrack, built for about 70 horses, was later used to house about 300-400 people in them. In these grounds everything that was in Auschwitz one was at a bigger scale. There were 4 gas chambers. Because of the large amount of population sanitation became a problem and threatened safety of Nazi officers staying there. There were several sterilization facilities built here.
I thought I would write much more about it. I remember most of it. I can create a virtual tour of Auschwitz but I think I better not. I don’t want to write about it and I believe you don’t want to read about it.
May be I will write about jolly days of my ‘holidays’. My flight is about to land in India and I am going to see family after a long long time.
No comments:
Post a Comment