Jewish Town & Museum

The afternoon of my third day in Prague, after lunch with Z, I wandered down to the Jewish Quarter where there was a fabulous collection of Synagogues that, together with the Jewish Cemetery, made up the Jewish Museum in Prague. Set up in the early 20th century to preserve valuable Jewish artefacts, it managed to survive Nazi occupation in 1939 after extensive negotiations to create a central repository for confiscated Jewish items were successful (albeit with varying motives).
It was a rather reflective wander through the Old Jewish Cemetery, where over 12,000 tombstones remember the passing of the Jewish deceased since the 15th century stood, & many thousands more were buried in layers due to restrictions on space here.
It was in the Maisel Synagogue that many of the questions streaming through my mind about the discrimination suffered by Jewish peoples over the centuries were finally answered. Seemingly, when the early Christian Church realised their attempts to convert Jews to Christianity were failing, the discrimination began. Many myths were created over the years & Jews were blamed for all types of crimes from murder to the bleeding of children for the purpose of religious ceremony. My gut tells me that there was also a significant degree of fear (of the presumed occultist powers of the Jews) & envy (of the Jewish learnedness & business acuity) involved in the repression & inferiorising of the Jewish people.
The Pinkas Synagogue remembers all the Jewish people from Bohemia & Moravia killed in the Holocaust - the names of all murdered by the Nazis are printed over the walls of the Synagogue. There is also a small gallery of children’s paintings/drawings depicted life during the Nazi occupation - very moving.
The Klausen Synagogue presented a wonderful outline of Jewish ceremonies & religious definitions together with a display of various Jewish artefacts. And finally the Ceremonial Hall completed the Jewish Museum trip for me - an incredibly insightful afternoon.

Around Krakow - Lovely Old City

For centuries Krakow had been the capital of Poland, but no longer. Luckily, the city hadn’t been destroyed by the Nazis as Warsaw had been, so many of the beautiful old buildings were still more-or-less in their original form. The people here in Krakow seem friendlier & not as unhappy as they do in Warsaw. Still, walking through the streets along broken pavements & past old dilapidated houses, you are keenly aware how much work needs to go into this country to improve conditions. But then again, that’s where a lot of its character lies.
I did one of those ‘free’ history walks, after remembering how great the one in Berlin had been. But this was a different company, newly started it seemed, run by a couple of students whose history & humour was largely targeted at young people out to have fun. It went to just over 4 hours, & I didn’t give a good tip. I did meet a woman from New York called Yana & we had a nice chat along the way. She was in Krakow with her parents travelling over the US summer season.
The tour ended in the Jewish Ghetto. The movie, ‘Schindler’s List’, was based & filmed here. Many of the streets were recognisable from the movie. This is the happening place to be in Krakow - most of the pubs & clubs are here & so attract a young crowd each day. Not many Jews live here now - only 200. I find it interesting that, even though Jews have lived in Poland since the 15th century, they are still not seen as Polish, but as a minority group. Why is this? No wonder the Jewish people felt they needed a home of their own - no one would ever let them completely assimilate.

Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camps

I only had 2 nights in Krakow, so had to get cracking with sightseeing. Although I don’t usually opt for organised tours, I did book in for one to Auschwitz to save from stuffing around with how to get out there & back. The tour was advertised as going for 6 hours including 3 ½ hours at the camps. While not a lot of time to see & take in everything, I thought it would be enough. However, we left at 3pm & the drive out there took 1 ¼ hours, & we ended up only getting 1 ¾ hours at Auschwitz & ½ hour at Birkenau. The guide there was great though. While we only got to see about a third of all the Museum, she revealed a lot about the history & was extremely respectful in doing so.
The feeling of being in a place where 1.1 million people were murdered was quite intimidating. I could myself going into self-protect mode to block out some of the negativity of the place. But, of course, I still got overwhelmed by the monstrosities committed there - the calculated & systemic annihilation of all these people as part of a bigger plan for complete genocide. How people were treated not as people but as insects to be exterminated. Their personal items collected & valuables separated for recycling. Even human hair was used to make cloth. People placed overnight in standing pens, four at a time, so they couldn’t sit down, then forced to work through the next day. Children sentenced to crimes against the state & executed - all innocent.

Once a survivor from Birkenau on reviewing photos taken of the site had said "there was no grass here, if there had been some, we would have eaten it".
I am convinced that every person needs to visit one of these places to understand what intolerance can ultimately lead to. The seed of intolerance that has the potential to lead to hatred lies within each of us. But we just don’t learn from the past - or maybe some of us just don’t want to. A sign on one of the doors, a quote by George Santana, reads "the one who does not remember history is bound to live through it again".

August 1st - Warsaw Uprising Anniversary

Well, I had chosen the most special (& busy) day of the year to visit the Warsaw Uprising Museum - the Uprising anniversary. The museum was packed with Polish people & it was a challenge to get to see any of the exhibits.
One which sticks in my mind was video footage of the Jewish people of the ghetto that had to collect dead bodies from their neighbourhood, through the emaciated bodies on a cart, then transport them to a mass grave where they then had to shuttle the bodies down a ramp. Instant tears - imagine how it would feel to do that work? There were also a couple of Rabbis looking on at the mass grave - I cannot imagine how much distress they must have been going through.

Horrors of Nazi Germany

My last full day in Berlin was left to explore the atrocities of Nazi Germany. The ‘Topography of Terror’ is an open air museum based at the site of the old Gestapo/SS headquarters, now demolished. The new museum is still being built & in the meantime, they’ve established a pictographically history along a path on the site. Museum entry was free to all visitors.
I was moved to tears - a powerful introduction to the monstrous crimes perpetrated by the Nazis. And while wandering along & reading all about the history, I couldn’t help but think about the news story I saw only a few nights beforehand about the rise of the far right extremists in Hungary trying to clamp down on the Roma (gypsies) who they blamed for the crime sweeping the country. It all sounded far too familiar. How in trying times we continue to blame the ‘other’ for all of our problems. We still haven’t learned from history.
Then on to the Jewish Museum, which was an incredible architectural building. I had always wondered why the Jewish people had been the target for so much hatred throughout history. It was while I wandered through the Jewish museum that I finally understood why. How myths & lies and the fear of difference had built a severe intolerance to these people. And it was here that I also finally understood why the Jewish people needed to have their own homeland after being denied assimilation again & again in so many countries - never permitted to completely fit in anywhere.