I have never been good at talking about things that make me sad. If I am angry I'll give you a fist full of the latest pet peeve or the college drama that sometimes plagues a sorority girl. When I am excited I can talk about it for days-repeating my findings to everyone I meet, including strangers who are usually surprised at my extent of self-disclosure. But when I am sad I like to wrap myself in blankets or the nearest cuddly object and wallow in silence and reflections- sometimes even letting myself have a good cry. My visits to the towns of Lidice, Litoměřice and Terezín in the Czech Republic as well as a tour of the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland left me in a solemn affection as I think it would to any moral person. As I've suggested I can't bring myself to go too much into detail, I believe we all know what happened. The greatest response I have to the history of these places is the realization of the cruelty of mankind. In travelling I see so many beautiful things, I am breathless knowing that someone imagined this, someone made this. The potential of the human mind and the magic of seeing something impossible is truly wondrous. But as much as we hate to see it the other side is true as well. There are many terrible terrible things that have happened and are still happening and I am breathless too at these acts of incredible cruelty that seem to hang as if a daunting black cloud above all things beautiful.
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| Auschwitz Extermination Camp |
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| Empty Gas Cans |
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| Thousands of eyeglasses collected after extermination |
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| Millions of shoes |
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| Wall of Death |
After the assassination of Reich Protector Reinhard Heydrich the SS suspected Czech citizens for having a role in the murder. In punishment the SS picked a Czech village in order to make an example of the consequences of disobeying. They picked the village of Lidice. On 10 June 1942, all 173 men over 16 years of age from the village were murdered. Another 11 men who were not in the village were arrested and murdered soon afterwards along with several others already under arrest. Several hundred women and over 100 children were deported to concentration camps; a few children considered racially suitable for Germanisation were handed over to SS families and the rest were sent to the Chełmno extermination camp where they were gassed to death. After the war ended, only 153 women and 17 children returned. The village was bombed over and over until nothing was left. The SS went so far as to pull out even the trees in the village-they wanted nothing standing.
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| Where the village used to be |
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| Memorial to the murdered children |
1 comment:
Donielle,
Very well done. So little really needs to be said.
So very sad( seems like too small of a word) but I agree we should never forget. It is very difficult to understand how one person could do this to another, let alone millions.
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