April 2015

Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp is not a place of attraction, and I hate that it appears in every other guidebook about Krakow. It’s not a place of fun, of selfies and of gift shops, and it pains a lot to see with which disrespect some visitors treat this camp of murder which “operated” less than 100 years ago, and whose victims are still alive. It took us a while to decide whether we should go there or not. To realize fully the tragedy of Auschwitz, one needs to refuse deliberately his or her own inner comfort – any other attitude will be hurtful and disrespectful to the million of victims suffered in Auschwitz-Birkenau only, not to mentions dozens other concentration or extermination camps all over Europe.

Then it took us even longer to decide whether it is a subject to be talked about in a travel blog. Yes, it is. It is the subject that has to me reminded again and again, as those, who do not remember history are bound to live it through again.

Gas chambers