The Student Room Group

Auschwitz-Birkenau

Has anyone visited Auschwitz-Birkenau in Poland?

The Holocaust Educational Trust took about 200 lower sixths yesterday to Oswiencem (Auschwitz) for the day and it was...overwhelming. I couldn't find any words to describe how I felt, it was surreal seeing the extent of human nature.

Has anyone else been or has any thoughts?

There's another thread on here by a user Thom? to sign the petition he made for preventing the Holocaust to be sucked out of the curriculum, if you find it please sign it to help stop this and give fuel to the Neo Nazis and those Holocaust deniers.

In the words of George Santayana -"Those that forget history are destined to repeat it". It's already beginning in places like Darfur.

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Reply 1
i have. chilling, truely chilling. although at birenau so much has been destroyed the scale is easy to miss. as it is at auschwitz I due to it being made in to exibitions. and the high volume of people in it took away some of the impact.
although the room of female hair made me feel physically ill.
ill throw up a couple of pictures for people who want to see
Reply 2
i have never been but i would like to go see it before i die.

thats such a waste taking it out of the curriculum, i found it really interesting when i learnt about it. I shall defo sign it if i can find it!
I visited Auschwitz-Birkenau two months ago with my year 12 history class. It was a very moving experience, and I agree it was horrific to see for yourself the extent of the torture they suffered. It was horrible seeing all of the suitcases with their names, and all of the photos on the walls, especially the children.
Reply 4
http://www.thestudentroom.co.uk/showthread.php?t=380235 here sausage
i agree with the photos comment. could anyone figure out why there were 3 photos of each. 1 face on, 1 sideways, and one looking up to the left with a hat on?
Reply 5
The rooms of hair was truly horrendous. There were hair pins and small clips if you looked closely. Also plaits which remained in tact.

The mugshots of all the prisoners up to 1943 they had taken all had that same vacant look in their faces. It appeared as though the ones who perished were the ones who couldn't bring themselves to defy the Nazis i.e not act as animals.

It's even worse that yesterday has been sandwiched in between two ordinary school days. I suppose that's a lesson in itself.
I went with sixth form with my religious studies class, (We studied Judaism) and I have to say that it is quite a sobering experience.
Reply 7
TheBellJar
In the words of George Santayana -"Those that forget history are destined to repeat it". It's already beginning in places like Darfur.


Beginning?! No no, it started a long time ago. They promised the world 'Never again' after Auschwitz, but it didn't last long: Indian/Pakistan in 1947, Cambodia in the 70s, Rwanda in the 90s, to name but a few. These three are all mentioned in this harrowing video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2TgVyfS_W8
Reply 8
Damn I can't watch it on this computer.

Why is there so much prejudice and intolerance.
I have, the most sombre eye opening trip ever.

Walking round auschwitz itself was crazy, red brick exterior, couldnt comprehend what occured there. Seeing all the hair, still with the female plaits was just sick man.

Then ending up in the preserved gas chamber, some 600 people killed in their at a time, scratch marks on the walls, well i can honestly say that my mates and i were just silent for the rest of the day.

It was crazy.

Regarding birkenau it was the sheer scale of the place. We went when it was covered in snow. Seeing the childrens blocks with the pictures on the walls just typified the evil performed. Then seeing the actual gas chambers, even though they were destroyed was a real eye opener ya know.

i mean you can read about such things, hear accounts, but to go and experience it was a completely different experience.
I would like to go there, i have read so many books and watched programmes on it, but until you go there I don't think you can appreciate what those innocent people had to experience.
I'm going on 9th May with that same organisation, and I'm looking forward to it in the sense that I can finally visit the place I've read and heard so much about, especially having been to a lecture given by a survivor, but I'm so apprehensive as to just how emotional it will be. I think it's definately something all young people should visit though, and it still baffles me how the Holocaust happened at the hands of people of only my grandparents' generation. I'll definately feedback to you guys when I return :smile:
Yeah, I went a few years back. It is very freaky walking along the same train line tracks that brought in thousands to be gassed. And seeing all their hair, bags and belongings in the Auschwitz museums is truly devastating.

I went as part of a March of the Living programme, so there were effectively 30,000 people there visiting at the same time, I seem to recall, which consisted of a march from Auschwitz to Birkenau. You could see people as far as the eye could see... and yet this wasn't even marginally close to the amount that perished during the Holocaust. I think this is what stood out the most for me.

I think it is vital for people to visit, because it gives you an insight of what it was really like, which is a great deal more than what a textbook can do. Especially considering the proposal not to even learn about it anymore, despite it being a historical fact which should be learned about in a history lesson... :rolleyes: But anyway.
dh00001
http://www.thestudentroom.co.uk/showthread.php?t=380235 here sausage
i agree with the photos comment. could anyone figure out why there were 3 photos of each. 1 face on, 1 sideways, and one looking up to the left with a hat on?


just signed it.
Reply 14
It was a sunny day yesterday and I'd say it made everything look so sinister.

Our programme was called 'Lessons from Auschwitz' and the extraordinary survivor Kitty Hart-Moxon spoke at the preliminary seminar 10 days ago. There'll be another in 9 days where we'll all share our individual experiences.

That's what touched me a lot. How all these individuals had their individuality and identities snatched from them but carried individual plights.
Thats it, i cannot fathom the evil performed in the holocaust, and just going to aushwitz makes things much more real, otherwise its just an incomprehendable statistic of deaths.

All the exibitions, and seeing the preservation of Aushwitz I was just real ya know. Real.
Reply 16
when i went it was -3. had a wind chill that took it to -8. it snowed heavily all day and the fog made visibility about 100m. that really made the atmosphere worse when you consider what prisoners had to wear. i spent 8 hours drenched and freezing but its nothing in comparison
Reply 17
I meant the town of Oswiecim. Wasn't it renamed Auschwitz by the Germans? We looked at different parts of it including Auschwitz and the site where the Great Synagogue was situated in Jew Street. It was razed to the ground about 3 weeks after Nazi occupation and there isn't even a sign or memorial. It's just been sucked in to council territory.
dh00001
when i went it was -3. had a wind chill that took it to -8. it snowed heavily all day and the fog made visibility about 100m. that really made the atmosphere worse when you consider what prisoners had to wear. i spent 8 hours drenched and freezing but its nothing in comparison


yea exactly the same here.
Reply 19
Did all of you walk back along the tracks aswell? We placed candles on them after a service at the memorial by the Rabbi leading us.