8/28/02 Warsaw and Krakow, Poland (Kelly)
Okay, this is really odd. You know Phillip and I have been traveling without each other since April and what do you know I am only 2 days late and I could have seen him here in Krakow. I am still with James, actually until Friday when he leaves to go back to London and I move on to Italy. We spent all day Monday and Tuesday in Warsaw, which is the capital of Poland. Warsaw actually has a very unique history behind it. From 1918 until 1939 Poland was a peaceful independent nation and then Hitler tried to come in and over run the land, which in fact he did a pretty job. He bombed and destroyed 85% of the city forcing the once inhabited one million people to evacuate the city. The "Old Square" in Warsaw was built about 700 years ago in the Gothic era, which of course was destroyed. However, the community ceases to amaze me. There apparently was an artist that had painted the square before the bombings and the city was able to rebuild almost an exact replica of the 13th century buildings, crooked and all. Anyways, yesterday James and I caught a train around 5:00 pm for a three-hour train ride to Krakow.
So on that note, in Krakow...James and I went to Auschwitz today, which if you are anything like I was, I didn't know about this place. Turns out that it was the largest Nazi concentration camp in all of Europe. It was extremely eerie to walk around the camp. A majority of the buildings were still in place so we were able to get a full-blown tour. The most horrific of all the barracks (buildings) was barrack 10 and 11. There was a wall in between these two buildings that was called the death wall...as you can imagine many thousands of prisoners were executed against this wall.
There were two areas of Auschwitz, which we toured. The second one we had to catch a bus for a 3 km ride. This is the area that the majority of the gas chambers were. The remains still lie as the SS dynamited them in order to destroy them but the "museum" has left the ruble to be viewed. This whole experience reminds me a lot of cambodia's experience with the killing fields.
The next two days here in Krakow are going to be filled with touring the city and then I am off to Milan on Friday...coming back to France on my way to Spain...makes more since this way so that I won't have to back track the other direction.
Posted by Admin at August 28, 2002 12:35 PM