Never again

We cannot get by Auschwitz. We should not even try, as great as the temptation is, because Auschwitz belongs to us, is branded into our history, and – to our benefit! – has made possible an insight that could be summarized as, ‘Now we finally know ourselves.’

Gunter Grass

I don’t know what I can say about visiting Auschwitz — or any Nazi death camp — that hasn’t already been said. We went out of a sense of duty to bear witness and we knew it wouldn’t be easy.

Entrance is free but you must book a time slot. You can explore on your own or pay for a guided tour in one of 20 different languages. We chose the tour, and it was helpful to be escorted around the enormous grounds to specific buildings and displays. However, we didn’t learn more from the guide than we already knew about the Holocaust and the death camps. The true value of visiting is to experience firsthand the place we’ve seen so many times in newsreel footage and movies.

As we entered through the famous gate I felt a wave of fear and sadness and it stayed with me even after we walked outside hours later.

We were immediately struck by the rows of multistory brick buildings. The image we had of Auschwitz was of the low wooden barracks we’d seen on film in countless documentaries and feature films so the brick buildings surprised us. We learned they were originally built as army barracks and were repurposed and modified during construction of the camp.

We followed our guide from building to building. Some housed displays or photographs, some remain as they were as housing or for special purposes. We took very few photos of these often disturbing displays.

The infamous Block 10 was the site of Josef Mengele’s gruesome medical experiments.

I was glad to see these faces. Each was a person with a mother and father, a spouse, a brother, a sister, a child, not just one of six million. I wanted to read all their names, and I lagged behind our group, wanting to acknowledge every one of them. Seeing these expressions of hopelessness, fear, but also often strength, affected me almost more than any other part of our visit.

This is a reconstruction of the death wall, where thousands of prisoners were executed.

We walked and walked, into buildings, through displays, up and down staircases, then out again. The narrow pathways lined with barbed wire were as claustrophobic as the interiors.

We boarded buses for the short drive to Birkenau, the adjacent extermination camp, and this is where we recognized the long low barracks we’d seen so many times on film.

Who hasn’t seen this view? It gave us chills.

Most of the barracks had been destroyed but there are a few remaining to give you a clear picture of the living conditions.

We ended at the ruin of one of the gas chambers, destroyed by the Nazis when they evacuated the camp as the Russian army approached in January 1945. Our guide left us alone with our thoughts for a while.

It was a quiet bus ride back to the visitors center. Jack and I sat on a bench across from the entrance to rest and reflect before walking home.

On our way back to the van we saw where people have left the time slot and language stickers you wear on your tour. We added ours to the lot.

Here’s the part we both can’t fathom: Oświęcim was a thriving community since the Middle Ages, then was largely cleared and destroyed by the Nazis when they built the death camp and the I.G. Farben chemical factory. After the war, after 1.1 million people were murdered at the camps, after the world learned what horrors took place there, people moved back to Oświęcim. They built homes and schools and churches and shops and playgrounds on land that certainly harbors the ashes of victims. They live within meters of the site of incomprehensible atrocities. If you believe in ghosts, they are certainly here. And I can’t imagine calling this place home.