Polen
Pławy

Entdecke Destinationen von Reisenden, die auf FindPenguins ein Reisetagebuch schreiben.
Reisende an diesem Ort
    • Tag 411

      Auschwitz & Birkenau Concentration Camps

      23. Juni 2023 in Polen ⋅ ☁️ 27 °C

      Today we had a very solemn experience, but we could not leave Europe without paying our respects.

      Auschwitz was the largest Nazi Concentration Camp created by the Nazis. In conjunction to it later becoming classified as an Extermination Camps well, 1.1 million of its 1.3 inmates were killed. The most well known group of these victims are those of the Jewish faith/ethnicity, but a large portion were also that of the 21K Romani (formally known more commonly as gypsy).

      The first transport of prisoners arrived on June 14, 1940. It contained 728 Poles & political prisoners. Of the 960,000 Jewish people that came to the camp, 865,000 never spent a night at Auschwitz. Many were assessed upon arrival on how fit for work they were. Only about 25% were admitted and the rest were gassed immediately.

      I took a lot of pictures where it was permitted. A lot of info on plaques in here. Below is a link to a zip of the higher res version of all my pictures. Feel free to go through them if you have the time.

      https://drive.google.com/file/d/1odJKi19HQ3QUee…
      Weiterlesen

    • Tag 2

      Auschwitz-Birkenau

      6. Juli 2022 in Polen ⋅ ⛅ 22 °C

      [JJ] A very sobering experience. No words are able to truly describe what went on here.

      We saw corridors upon corridors of prisoners' belongings taken from them: kids' shoes, spectacles, cooking pots, even human hair. We walked through the gas chambers, we saw the giant Auschwitz camp, then Birkenau, which was 25 times larger than even that.

      I walked a million steps last month, and if every step were a person dying then it still wouldn't be as many people that died within these fences.
      Weiterlesen

    • Tag 16–18

      Auschwitz-Birkenau

      19. Juni in Polen ⋅ ⛅ 27 °C

      Dear readers we depart from our regularly scheduled travel blog of fun and light heartedness and instead, take a slight detour through some very important history of Europe. Now most of you reading this I’m sure are aware of the Holocaust and if you’re not, well that’s simply embarrassing for you. You may as well be American with that level of historical knowledge. Some of you will have even visited this unbelievable place (Rowan), so please bare with me as I try to inelegantly explain my experience here, as this place and the events of the “Jewish question” was quite hard to wrap my head around. In order to explain my experience here there will be a mini history lesson trying and inevitably failing to explain the scope of “the Jewish question” in a digestible and understandable context.

      The day started off with a nice sleep in of a 5:50am pickup from my hotel room, and a 1.5hr shuttle bus ride to Auschwitz. I was quite pleased with how easy the tour was to organise as I referred to in my krakow post but everything here is very cheap it was only €60 for a full tour of Auschwitz and Birkenau including door to door hotel transport. On the way we watched a 1hr doco on Auschwitz including some slight backstory but what I found more impactful was red army footage of Auschwitz liberation which helped me to really link the modern day museum with the atrocities committed.

      The tour guide had a microphone and we were given headsets which was very handy as I could dawdle at the back and still hear what she was saying. I’ll skip most of the actual tour so we can hear my very important digest but I felt the tour was quite rushed. We were only allowed to walk around with the guide and we barely spent 40seconds on any one thing. She’d just drop bombs like “this is 40,000 pairs of shoes and you can see a kids shoe” and then onto the next spot or building. I would’ve preferred to have been able to wonder around and really appreciate small details such contemplating and appreciating that each one of those pairs of shoes belonged to someone with a history and backstory, workers boots, academics shoes, a little girls cute shoes etc. But nooooo, we had places to be apparently, and as such while I can appreciate the Auschwitz museum - after the fact whilst I’ve had a bit of time to digest. I did feel that the whole experience was quite neutered. It also didn’t help that it was a 35deg day with extremely pretty, vibrant colours everywhere. I sent a photo of the Auschwitz entrance to the family group chat and my competitor/little sister “Lucinda” remarked how pretty the scenery was until she noticed the infamous “Arbiet macht frei” (work sets you free) sign. Not the same as the cold freezing\starving to death place I had come to expect from documentary footage.

      We then hopped on our shuttle bus and had a 5min transfer to Birkenau. It is important to note the difference in function between Birkenau and Auschwitz when touring the two. Auschwitz 1 was a labour camp designed to get slave labour out of its inhabitants, Birkenau or its proper name “Auschwitz II-Birkenau” was a death camp where Jews would either be immediately executed or worked to death, or worked to near death then when unable to perform their duties, they were then executed.

      The Birkenau tour was much better as I was given a lot more free roam, upon seeing the infamous gatehouse with the railway line through the middle I stopped and took it in. This place actually looked like the photos, pure death camp. I stood looking at the gatehouse for a couple of minutes contemplating just how serious what had occurred here was. All the final goodbyes of families, unknowing Jews, Romanians, homosexuals, and polish people who had entered this gatehouse and not known that they would never again see the outside world as a free human, not know the feeling of a full meal or certainty over their future. These harrowing thoughts filling my brain as I ventured further into the camp to then be standing on the loading dock of the train. The size of the camp was far greater than Auschwitz, I actually logged the walk on my Garmin and it was 3km to the end of the main causeway and back. I then saw the ruins for the crematoriums and gas chambers which the nazis had blown up before they evacuated the camp before the red army advanced. Apparently this was to hide evidence of their atrocity. I could see the underground entrances where Jews were first undressed and told to remember their ID numbers so they could get their stuff back after their “shower.” The remnant of the second chamber where 2000 people at a time could be put to death in 20 minutes. They had 4 of these chambers in Birkenau. They were pretty ruined so i had to use my imagination a bit to picture them.

      However on the way out there was numerous barracks we toured all with beds mostly untouched. This is definitely an experience as I vividly remember seeing footage of rescued Jews in these exact style of beds, 6 starving corpses of humans crammed into each level. With the sickest people on the bottom level as they didn’t have the strength to climb onto other levels. Knowing and having seen footage of people so sick they would literally die in these bunks, and touching, seeing and smelling them was a very morbid experience. The smell was so unique it was a weird mixture of cattle manure and dead possum, a very filthy and deathly smell but not in the same way a decomposing body smells. I imagine it’s leftover from the conditions they were forced to live in with no access to toilets or ability to wash themselves. It’s a very unique smell to Birkenau that I don’t think I’ll forget (Of course could all be placebo who knows).

      Overall the Birkenau tour was much greater and really showed the scale of what was being done by the Nazis better than Auschwitz. Still, the scale of “the final solution” with their 40,000 concentration camps is still quite a handful to process.

      Now onto my history lesson and the real thoughts of Birkenau. Attached in the photos you will see the loading dock at Birkenau being used in 1944 taken by a smug SS soldier, in another photo you will see the prisoners being sorted by the SS doctor who with a simple uncaring wave of his hand had the ability to choose life or death for these people. The Dr would assess if you were fit enough for work, and if you were, you lived and if you weren’t, you were sent to the gas chamber that same day. The criteria for not being fit enough for work was, a pregnant lady, old people, young kids, young girls, sick looking people. The Dr did this by simply looking you up and down. Knowing this before I came and standing in this same spot that these events had occurred some 80 years ago was surreal. Imagining this smelly train arriving filled with about 10,000 people and they would arrived after having been crammed into a goods railway cart of a journey of 7-9 days having not been allowed to eat or go to the toilet. They were just relieved the journey was over. All to be suffocated to death. In the supposed name of racial hygiene, eugenics, and antisemitism. As I walked around Birkenau, near the fences, on the pathways I found myself wondering, how many dead bodies had been on this spot I was standing. How many Jews had flung themselves into this electric fence to end it all? They were so hungry and mentally broken. The infrastructure just symbolised death and hopelessness, I know if I was in that situation I wouldn’t have lasted long.

      The Auschwitz prototype gas chamber (video attached) which operated until 1942 until gassing was moved to Birkenau. Able to kill 700 at once and was responsible for the death of tens of thousands, so many people they had to use open pits to burn the bodies with the ash remains still visible. This was converted to an air raid shelter for the SS, the fact that these men were able to convert and use this area knowing what had took place, with such indifference is quite frankly undigestible to me. For example old mate Himmler witnessed these gassing like a science experiment in 1941, and not liking the numbers ordered Birkenau built.

      What really shone through during the tour was the absolute indifference and sub human treatment that the SS treated the prisoners with, often killing prisoners because they could or for fun. One of the attached photos shows a small guard room for one SS guard to perform roll call for the entire Auschwitz camp. This hut was there so if it was raining or cold the guard could retreat into warm while all the prisoners had to stand outside. This is a small example of how conditions of living weren’t even a second thought for the prisoners they weren’t even a thought. No latrines or washing areas in 90% of the barracks, with prisoners being able to use the toilet twice a day. Many prisoners suffering from diarrhoea due to starvation etc. would soil themselves in the line. The tour guide told us once during roll call one single prisoner was unaccounted for, and the SS made all the prisoners stand at attention for 19hrs as punishment in negative 27 degree weather with 10 or so people dying due to hypothermia. What’s even more crazy about this is guess how many SS guards were around to make this happen… one single guard. The prisoners were so mentally broken, tired and exhausted, with the SS creating such a good systems with the “kapos,” who were prisoners assigned to oversee other prisoners in exchange for special privileges. That the SS didn’t even need to police this punishment, their lapdog kapos would. Who were so fearful of becoming a proper prisoner that they pitted themselves against fellow prisoners in order to maintain favour. I listened to the most heartbreaking podcast of a teenage girl survivor of Auschwitz a while back and she described the kapos as even worse than the SS.

      Auschwitz Birkenau personally saw 1,300,000 people exterminated there. Of the 11 million Jews in Europe the holocaust wiped out approximately 5/6 million. These are figures everyone has heard. However, coming from Australia, nice and removed from all this and with my own eyes touring Germany, Netherlands and Poland. Places that had been directly impacted and seeing the effects to this day. With the Jewish populations in these countries effectively having been wiped off the map, really put into perspective just how absolutely massive the scale of what the Nazis did, and how many people it had affected. There were multiple people I spoke to in each city I visited, that had effectively had one side of there entire family wiped out. Or a grandfather who was adopted and out of their whole family, they were the 1 out of 40 who survived.

      I think it’s definitely a good thing I visited Poland after visiting Germany otherwise I’m pretty sure some form of indirect hatred towards any nationalistic Germans might’ve shone through.
      Weiterlesen

    • Tag 3

      Day 141: Auschwitz-Birkenau

      30. Mai in Polen ⋅ ☁️ 73 °F

      Tough and triggering post today, but we must cover it and relevant topics.

      When traveling, it’s important to learn local history, even when subject matter is disturbing. If you do visit Poland, it’s imperative that you go to the largest German Concentration Camp and Memorial Museum to learn about the 1.3 million Jews, Poles, Hungarians, Czechians, Slovenians, Romanians, and Soviet prisoners who were murdered viscously in Auschwitz I and Auschwitz II-Birkenau. The Holocaust and Jewish extermination was meticulously planned by Hitler, the SS, and German Wehrmacht and supported by everyday Germans; the prisoners, survivors, and victims were beaten, experimented on, starved, tortured, gassed, and shot in Auschwitz. Most Jewish victims were uprooted from their homes, trained to Auschwitz, and shuffled into gas chambers within 30 minutes of arrival. When the Soviet Army was close to victory on the Eastern Front, the Nazis attempted to hide their war crimes by blowing up the gas chambers, evacuating prisoners, and lighting fire to the lodging. This was a State ran and State executed operation from the top to bottom, and Auschwitz was only three camps of its entire Jewish camp and ghetto extermination system.

      To this day in America and Europe, there are Holocaust deniers and neo-Nazis who make light of this tragic history and commit hate crimes in person and online; they continue to conduct anti-Semitic rallies and work their way into American political discourse. There are also existing Middle Eastern extremist governments and terror organizations in Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, and Gaza who also would like to see death to Jewish people, as evident in the Hamas October 7 terrorist attack and attempts to underestimate the total number of Jewish Holocaust victims.

      But let us be clear on where we stand on current events: the Israeli state government and military is actively committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. Through the denial of aid and food; intentional bombings of hospitals, schools, mosques, water sanitation facilities, refugee camps; and the systematic raids, prison torture, settler attacks, and bulldozing of homes in the West Bank, the state of Israel and specific Israeli politicians/commanders are enabling the systematic destruction of a specific group of people. The Geneva Convention, ICC, and ICJ does not factor in who starts wars and tit for tat military actions: each party is solely evaluated on the atrocities they commit in isolation. Hamas will face ramifications for its terrorist attack and constant targeting of Tel Aviv/other cities and Israeli government leaders will face ramifications for the the destruction of the Gaza Strip.

      The Biden Administration, due to military strategic importance and the desire to play identify politics with Jewish super PACs and voters, continues to shield the Israeli state government from international criminal courts. We think this is bad for America overall and our nation is losing the trust of international communities to protect democracy and distribute justice equitably. Despite all this, it’s important that right wing leaders and Jewish hating politicians do not enter our US government and political system. We will still vote for Biden because the alternative is so much worse.

      TLDR: We continue to hope for a Palestinian State based on the 1967 borders and a free, safe Israeli State where Jewish citizens can live without the fear of missiles, bombings, and attacks.

      #FreePalestine #StopGenocide #CeasefireNow
      Weiterlesen

    • Tag 23

      Auschwitz-Birkenau

      6. Januar in Polen ⋅ 🌧 4 °C

      Unfortunately, I was late to book a personal ticket for Auschwitz-Birkenau, and so I had to complete a guided tour with a travel company on Get your Guide. Something that I detest to. I don't like having to miss out on a personal ticket to encourage you to buy through a travel company. Though admittedly, I had a great tour and understand why they do it. It does great things for tourism in the region and does add to the experience. The tour guide was great, and she provided a very immersive experience and I learnt a lot more than I would have without a guide. Some of the stories were horrific, and it was truly an experience I'll never forget for all the wrong reasons. We started by walking through Auschwitz, the original camp that was designed for labour. Mostly containing Polish intellectuals, prisons of war, and threats to the nazi regime, they worked endless hours with barely any food, brutal treatment, and the occasional bout of torture. In the early days, they preferred to complete the executions in the form of starvation or exhaustion. Not yet in full genocidal fervour. As we progressed, we made our way through history, and as the early 1940s arrived, we began to see the more extreme killings and treatment of prisoners. They soon realised Auschwitz was unsuitable for the quantity of people that they were beginning to imprison, and so began construction of Birkenau just a couple kilometres away, which we will get to. This was the result of beginning the mass transportation of millions of Jews out of the cities into their new 'safe home'. They told the Jewish people to bring their most precious belongings on their journey to their new safe and secure city built just for the Jews to live amongst themselves. They provided a horrificly false sense of security by having bands play music, having welcoming rooms, and the like to ensure that no panic set in. Of course, in reality, they were stripped of their belongings and sent very quickly into labour camps. Auschwitz was also the first place to have an extermination facility and crematorium. For those who arrived and could not work, the disabled, the old, and most saddly, the children and the pregnant, were sent straight to their death. These people were often put to death as soon as they arrived due to having no labour capacity. In another attempt to minimise panic and stress amongst the new arrivals, the nazis conducted one of the most macabre and gruesome things. Rather than separate the mothers from their children and likely cause panic, they would instead send all of them to the extermination facilities altogether. They would then tell them to remember the number in which they placed all their belongings so they could easily be found after their shower, then locked them in a huge factory, and suffocated them with Xyklon B, and stealing all their belongings to fund their war machine. Some of the installations showed the sheer quantity of belongings that had been stolen from their prisoners. Quite interestingly, many of the survivors of Auschwitz even found strength in themselves to complete tours of the now museum to teach people of the horrors and the disgusting treatment within the camps. One of which spent 60 years completing tours through Auschwitz. Toward the end of the Auschwitz tour, we began to explore the soldier quarters and the extermination facility. As we made our way through, we walked past the manor of Rudolf Hoess, who was the commander of both Auschwitz and Birkenau for most of the war. After he was sentenced to death in the Nuremberg trials, he was executed within the camp as a symbol to all those who died under his command. We then walked past the soldiers' quarter that was situated right next to the extermination facility. They had to have trucks running outside the soldiers' lunch room because the screams would ruin their rest time, apparently. We then saw the remnants of the crematorium and extermination facilities, of which only remain because the Germans used them as air raid shelters at the end of the war.

      When we arrived at birkenau, we learnt how many of the most incriminating buildings were destroyed to get rid of the evidence of genocide. Yet, the most daunting part of Birkenau was the sheer size of everything. They couldn't destroy it all. It was mind-blowing to walk along the train tracks and check every direction and see row after row of long thin brick buildings. We walked for 30 minutes through these buildings before arriving at a map that showed the tiny little portion that we had actually explored. The sheer size was difficult to comprehend. Even more macabre still, the nazis had become more efficient at exterminating Jews than they had been able to achieve the burning and removal of the bodies. Meaning that a facility had to be built purely to store the backlog of bodies that had not yet been burnt. Our guide then walked us through the buildings and the living conditions of the prisoners. In bunks of three, 10 people would sleep on each level. I would estimate close to a hundred bunks in each house and fucking hundreds of these houses in Birkenau. As far as the eye could see. The number to imagine is far too much to comprehend. The people on the top bunks were generally the newer, stronger prisoners because the weakest could not fight for their position. Diorhea that was prominant throughout the whole camp provides the picture as too why. You begin to understand and be able to comprehend how 6 million people died in this camp alone when you see the sheer size of it all. These were the people 'lucky' enough you have not been killed instantly upon arrival, once again determined if they could be useful to the regime. After this emotionally draining walk, we finally finished the tour. Going from the train tracks to the sorting facility, following those on the death walk, seeing the memorial and the destroyed extermination facilities, then seeing the number of concentration camps before ending with the conditions inside.

      I am a bit of a history buff, and consider my knowledge of the second world war above average, and so although I thought I knew a lot about the treatment of the Jews, I really didnt. This tour portrays a picture that can not be comprehended with words and stories. Being there and seeing the size and efficiency with which the nazis were killing innocent people puts a whole different perspective on your life. 6 million is a number that the brain can not comprehend, but seeing these sites makes it slightly easier.
      Weiterlesen

    • Tag 8

      Auschwitz

      19. August 2023 in Polen ⋅ ☀️ 29 °C

      Nach dem wir unseren Stellplatz gefunden haben, wollten wir uns das Gedenkmahl ansehen.
      Schnell hatten wir einen Parkplatz gefunden auf dem Weg zum Gedenkmahl haben wir ein paar Bilder gemacht. Als wir rein wollten, sprach uns ein Sicherheitsmitarbeiter an, wo unsere Tickets sind.
      Nachdem er uns erklärt hat wie und wo wir die Tickets erhalten, sind wir mit dem kostenlosen Bus Transfer vom Auschwitz II nach Auschwitz I gefahren. Im Bus lief uns der Schweiß den Rücken hinunter. Endlich da, ab zum Ticketsautomat. Leider nur 2 Sprachen. Englisch und Polnisch.
      Es hat geklappt, bis wir die Uhrzeit gesehen haben, wir hätten fast 2 Stunden warten müssen. Obwohl es alles kostenlos war, haben wir uns entschieden zurück zum Platz zu fahren.
      Weiterlesen

    • Tag 36

      Krematoriet

      30. April in Polen ⋅ ☀️ 26 °C

      Og hvor gjorde man af resterne?
      Sonderkommand: de fanger som var dødsdømte men udvalgte til at flytte ligene fra gaskammeret til krematoriet kørte resterne ud til en grav (ved de sorte sten), når den var fuld blev asken etc. smidt i floden.
      SS sprængte krematoriet til sidst inden dødmarchen mod Tyskland.
      Weiterlesen

    • Tag 13

      Auschwitz Tag 2

      26. Juni 2023 in Polen ⋅ 🌙 18 °C

      Heute stand das KZ Auschwitz und Auschwitz 2 Birkenau auf dem Plan
      Nach einem 10 Minuten Fußweg waren wir da.
      Um 9:15 began unsere 6 Stündige Führung.
      Wir schauten uns beide Lager an, und unser Weiblicher Guide (ca 50 Jahre alt) war super, sie konnte jede Frage ohne Probleme beantworten, und hat eine super gute Führung geliefert.

      Zu dem Inhalt sag ich nichts, ich kann nur jedem ans Herz legen, den weiten Weg auf sich zu nehmen und mal hierher zu kommen.
      Es ist es wert.

      Nachdem wir fertig waren sind wir kurz ins Apartment und haben uns etwas getrunken und uns kurz ausgeruht und sind dann zu unserem Restaurant von Gestern gegangen.
      Es gab Kartoffelpuffer für uns beide.

      Nach dem Essen sind wir wieder die 20 Minuten zurück gegangen und haben den Rest des Abends im Apartment verbracht.
      Weiterlesen

    • Tag 3

      Auschwitz e Birkenau

      14. Mai 2023 in Polen ⋅ ☁️ 18 °C

      Siamo stati a visitare i due campi dì concentramento di Auschwitz e Birkenau. Esperienza altamente formativa che ci ha dato modo di pensare e riflettere sulla insensatezza di quanto accaduto
      Un’esperienza da fare almeno una volta nella vita
      Weiterlesen

    • Tag 9

      Auschwitz

      16. Juli 2019 in Polen ⋅ ⛅ 18 °C

      Nach einem leckeren Bagel und Kaffee in einem süßen kleinen Café ging es los nach Auschwitz. Die Führung war sehr gut gemacht und die Tour dauerte insgesamt (inkl. Fahrt) über sieben Stunden.
      Ich denke jeder sollte Mal dort gewesen sein, auch wenn es wirklich kein schöner Ort ist.....

      Am Abend ging ich noch mit Jette in ein Pasta-Restaurant und anschließend mit noch anderen Mädels aus dem Hostel was trinken.
      Weiterlesen

    Möglicherweise kennst du auch folgende Namen für diesen Ort:

    Pławy, Plawy

    Sei dabei:

    FindPenguins für iOSFindPenguins für Android