EB Visits Auschwitz - 25 March 2008

Thank you very much EB.
It seems a wrong word to use, but beautifully shot photographs.
Never having visited that's one of the clearest series of picture I've seen.

Cheers,
Adam.

As VP says, it is very difficult to choose the right words about the photos.

Thank you for sharing them with us and reminding us that we should never forget.

Robert

 

There's nothing to say that hasn't been said already.

Many thanks for sharing.
Andy

 

Well taken photographs on a very distressing subject.

With several of your photographs you have shown excellently, just how big this KZ was.

Regards
Tom

 

All I can say is hm and shake my head in dispair.
Those photos seem to capture the reality of the fact, sorry if thats not the right words, i cant really think at the moment, i just cant get my head around the fact.
Least We Forget.

 

Does anyone know what the cans around the memorial is?

Thanks EmersonBigguns,
Very Powerful photos

Jills

 

I would suspect that have candles inside and are to protect the flame from going out.

 

One of the ponds into which the ashes of those cremated were dumped , as Andy says candles.

 

And even today some refuse to believe it happened----I visited Dachau near Munich which I believe was the first camp or one of the early ones---the scale of these is monstrous compared to Dachau---the Nazis certainly were efficient in murdering people, especially those who could not defend themselves---so far we have our 2nd Amendment Rights here in the USA but have to watch the 'new guy' and his followers-

 

Beautifully taken photographs. I would love to visit myself but I wouldn't want to go on my own.

 

I thought I'd upload some pictures I took when I was in Oswiecim/Brzezinka in March 2006. Hope you like them.

*edit*
The 1st picture 2nd row shows the railway just before the camp (directing away from it) - it's barely visible nowadays.

 

Cheers for sharing Kate.

 

Thanks for charing, they are very nice indeed.

 

We have cheap flights to Krakow now and I am hoping to go soon. How can people try and deny it happened? Unbelievable.

 

Thankyou for such a sad reminder, I visited Auschwitz just after you in the December. I felt ashamed when I arrived at Aushwitz II – Birkenau and did not want to leave the bus as I realised I had in some way come to somewhere of such disgust and knew I should not be there as I thought I was doing a great dishonour to the dead by glotting, but I then thought by going in and saying a little prey It was my way of saying sorry to them and remembering and hoping that it never happens again.

 

Not sure if I could go there...

 

For anyone planning a visit:




Battledetective Now and Then

 

Very good photographs. They give a sense of the sombre atmosphere and also the size of the place.

 

Excellent photos, EB, Many thanks for posting them.

In case anyone is interested, here was my take on visit Auschwitz/Birkenau in 2009. BTW, I lost a few family members there, not sure how many, but I don't think it was a lot.

My first Concentration Camps visited were Terezienstadt and Sachsenhausen, in 2005. Neither of these was of the more infamous or large variety. I expected to feel, and actually felt, huge moral outrage at the bastards who could conceive of, and then follow through on such horror.

Later, in 2009, when I was getting ready to visit Auschwitz, I was expecting to feel more of the same, but in even stronger proportion. But surprisingly that was not the case. All I felt at Birkenau was immense sadness.

Last year, during a business trip to Warsaw, I took an afternoon off and ventured over to Treblinka (an hour or two away), and learned again about the horror at first hand. For those of you who don't know, you could not even reasonably call Treblinka a Concentration Camp. In fact, there was no camp. All it was was a huge death factory. If you got off the train there, you went straight to the gas chambers. Not even a slim chance at survival. Something like 800,000 victims were murdered there. Again, my sense was incredible moral outrage, and I just wanted to scream at the top of my lungs (but didn't).

That's what it is like to visit Concentration Camps.

I was at Dachau last weekend, and an earlier poster is correct: it is tiny compared to Birkenau.

Marc

 

My heart goes out to you and your family. A couple years ago a Doctor from Israel contacted me. He was trying to trace his family. His mother was a Heilman and a gentle from Pennsylvania. In time we confirmed we were 7 TH cousins on his mother's side.

I asked him once why he was tracing his mother's side. He explained so many were lost in the Death Camps of the Nazis on his father's side it is nearly impossible to trace anyone.

We communicated for a long time, he comes to the States every year to keep his medical licenses current in the USA. He is a really fine individual.

It was a heart breaker to hear of his families lost and they are one of millions of families with such stories. You know that only too well I am sure.