Day 5, June 18

In the morning we visited Oscar Schindler's Enamel Factory in Krakow, Poland.  The last two times I was here we were not allowed inside, but it has since been turned into a museum presenting the history of Krakow's inhabitants, both Polish & Jewish, under Nazi occupation, along with Schindler's story & those he saved.  Only a few original items remain from the factory including his office & desk.  

Schindler is a very controversial figure, & Steven Spielberg is accused of romanticizing him & taking creative liberties in his 1993 movie Schindler's List.  The movie was filmed in Krakow, was awarded seven oscars, & the story of Jews from Schindler's factory became famous across the world.   Whatever the truth is about Schindler, he saved the lives of over 1,000 Polish Jews employed at his factory, & the descendents of those survivors number in the thousands.  

Cor told an interesting story about him & Miep Gies being seated at a table with Emily Schindler, Oscar's widow, at a fund raiser for the Anne Frank House in New York City.  One of them asked if she felt her husband had been depicted fairly by Spielberg in the movie. She replied that she did not like the way he was shown drinking so much.  She was then asked how she felt about his womanizing, & she said , "After one, what difference does 100 make?"

This afternoon we went to infamous Auschwitz-Birkenau, my third visit.  There were actually three camps, Auschwitz concentration camp, Birkeau built as a death camp, & Monowitz, the work camp where Elie Wiesel & his father were.  There are no words to adequately describe what visitors see.  i have often said that I wish every American citizen was required to visit the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washinton DC, for I truly believe it would change people's lives & the way they treat others.  That goes for Auschwitz.  

We entered the concentration camp by passing under the famous iron sign, "Albrect Macht Frie"--work makes one free, a euphemism designed to make entering  inmates believe that if they worked hard, they would earn their freedom.   Some may remember that the original sign was stolen & recovered a few years ago.   The original sign is in safekeeping somewhere; the replica remains.  

The  concentration camp has barracks that have been turned into a museum where visitors go through & see separate displays of items brought to camp by the victims: suitcases, toiletries, prayer shawls, shoes, eye glasses, prosthetics of all types, & bundles of hair cut from corpses ready to be used for submarine  pipe insulation, to be woven into cloth, & stuffed into mattresses.  Like the display of shoes at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, the shoes affect me the most, for I cannot help but wonder what happened to the wearers--the baby who wore the little shoe, the woman who wore the high heel, the workman who wore the boot?

True to Nazi efficiency, the train tracks ran right into the camp at Birkenau. 

They had four crematoriums, & when the war was near its end & they knew the Soviets would soon arrive, they dynamited them so as not to leave evidence.  What remains of all four is piles of broken cement.  

To me one of the most haunting things at both camps are the electric barbed wire fences & guard towers seen everywhere.  

At Birkenau we entered a women's barrack with the beds made of three tiers, the first two wood & the bottom one cement & five women would sleep on each tier.  It was a very hot day while we toured with full stomachs after enjoying a hearty lunch.  We all carried water bottles & got back on an air-conditioned bus.  I tried to imagine 700 women jammed into the building starving & with no water.  

The whole place defies imagination.   Elie Wiesel said, "Auschwitz shall forever remain a question mark to me."  I agree.  

                 

On a lighter note because when studying the Holocaust, or touring Holocaust sites, it is necessary to  to look for some merriment & remain positive or one would go crazy so both before & after a lovely dinner back in Krackow, we shopped in the old city square which is filled with shops.  I discovered beautiful Christmas ornaments decorated with Swarovski crystals, & I went a bit overboard in my buying.  Now the trick will be to transport them home.  We ended our evening with a glass of wine at a little outside restaurant/bar on the city square.  Again--pure magic.

Day 4, June 17

Today we spent almost the entire day riding in our small Mercedes bus to Krakow.  It was absolutely  gorgeous drive.  As I said in my Day 1 blog, there are 12 of us on the tour along with Cor & his son Joop (pronounced Jope), & it is proving to be an interesting group. There is only one man who is traveling with his wife,& sister-in-law & niece.  There are three Holocaust educators, Lolle, Dana & me, along with three other teachers of other disciplines, one retired principal & five non-teachers.  So out of 12, only three are involved in Holocaust work.  The other nine are simply interested in the topic & four of them have been on the tour before anywhere from one to four times.

Cor is 90 years old & this is his 128th time leading a version of this tour as usuallly he does seven a year including groups of school childen.  No two itineraries are the same.  He has had as many as 52 people on a tour making me very happy to be part of a small group.  He had his left knee replaced last summer, & six weeks ago he broke his right leg.  He can barely walk; when he does, he uses a cane.  He has a scooter he rides in the hotels & to get out to the bus & into restaurants.   I have already said I came on this trip to spend time with Cor.  The longer the trip progresses, the happier I am with that choice.  We are re-living history from one who lived it.  As we ride along, he shares stories from that time & ones containing wisdom that can only be learned from a long life well lived.  Tonight  Dana, Lolle & I sat with him at dinner & he passed a great little bit of that wisdom to us.  

The pope wanted to be able to explain the difference in heaven & hell  to people so he contacts Saint Peter who takes him to the gates of heaven & hell.  Before St. Peter opens the door to hell, the pope is surprised not to hear screams & smell sulfar.  They go in & he again is surprised not to see flames.  Instead he sees people sitting opposite each other at tables filled with all kinds of delicious food, but the people look depressed.  Then the pope notices that the people have stiff arrms so they cannot reach the food with their hands to put it into their mouths.  He understands that instead of jumping into flames & having it all be over, this would go on forever & that is truly hell.  

Then they go to heaven & when Peter opens the door, the pope again, like in hell, sees people are sitting across from one another at tables heaped with delicious food.  The people also have stiff arms, but they are smiling.  He tells Peter he does not understand, & Peter tellls him to take another look. This time the pope sees that the stiff-armed people are feediing the people across from them.  The pope realizes that the difference in heaven & hell is that even on earth people need to help others.  If you reach out to your neighbor, your brother, you are in heaven.  If you fail to reach out to your neighbor, your brother, you live in hell on earth.

Lolle, Dana & me with Cor

Lolle, Dana & me with Joop

Joop, Cor's son, is very dear.  He has been accompanying his father on these tours for some time now.  He drives the bus & handles all business transactions.  It is a joy to see how devoted he is to his father.  He has recorded 40 hours of his father telling his stories & plans to continue with the tours after his father retires in Sept.  

Day 3, June 16

  

This morning we toured Berlin seeing so many famouis sites including the Reichstag, seat of government,  & the Brandenberg Gate, symbol of Berlin.  We walked through the official Berlin Holocaust Memorial which had been contoversial since it was buiilt in Dec. 2004.  Marv & I had seen it when we were in Berlin in 2008, & I had the same disappointing reactiion this time--it leaves me cold & emotionless.  It is a series of blocks of concrete of all sizes that covers a city block in central Berlin so citizlens see it as theywalkj & drifce by so it is a constant reminder.  The architect deliberately left no description, no words, wanting people to come to their own conclusions & feelings,  I still cannot believe that this is the design that won out of the many submitted.

We drove by the site of Hitler's Bunker where he cowardly committed suiicide when he knew Germany's defeat & his "1,000-year Reich" was nearing the end.  The bunker was destroyed after the war so it would not become a Neo-Nazi Shrine.

We toured the House of the Wannsee Conference, a former industrialist's villa where on Jan. 20, 1942, 15 high-ranking members of SS met.  In a 90-minute meeting these men, nine of whom had Ph.D.'s, confirmed the plan to murder all European Jews.  Even though I have studied the Holocaust for several years & know & teach how it was methodically carried out, i still cannot believe it could have happened.  Whenever I travel to Holocaust camps & other sites, my bewiderment grows.  

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We saw the remnants of the Berlin Wall, erected in 1961 in order for the Soviets  to keep the East Berliners from moving to West Berlin; it was torn down in 1989.   I saw the wall in 1969 & vividly remember after going on a bus tour to East Berlin, the bus going through 'Check Point Charlie" & being stopped when returning to West Berlin.  I watched officers with mirrors on long carts putting the carts under the bus to make sure no one had tried to escape East Berlin by holding on under the bus.

"Check Point Charlie" still exists as a tourist attraction manned by actors wearing uniforms pose for photos.

In the afternoon we went to Ravensbruck, the only concentration camp built exculsively for women   Between 1939 and 1945, 132,000 women were imprisoned along with 20,000 men.  Jews & Gypsies came from over 40 countries.  Tens of thousands were murdered or died from hungar, illness or medical experimentation.  Hauntiing statues memorialize the victims & most disturbing to me was seeing the small town of Furstenberg right across the lake in front of the camp.  There can be no doubt that villagers knew of the camp's existence & could see the smoke.

Day 2, June 15

 This morning we drove five hours toward Berlin & went to Bergen Belsen Concentration Camp which operated from 1940-1945.  As with previous camps I have visited, it was a sobering experience.  We spent hours in the museum & walking the grounds.  In August of 1944, a tented camp was erected because the concentration camps near the front line were to be evacuated.  Many transports arrived with more than 8,000 girls & women from Auschwitz-Birkenau.  Among these in November 1944 were Anne & Margot Frank.  Open holes in the ground were used for toilets.  During a heavy winter storm, the tents collapsed.  Margo & Anne died of typhus in March 1945 only a few weks before the camp was liberated by the British April15th.  The number of prisoners still alive numbered approximately 60,000 & of those over 13,000  died.   What I did not realize was that Bergen Belsen became a displaced persons (DP) camp from 1945-1950 as so many Jews had no place to go.  

Cor is a fascinating person.  To learn more about him, go to:

  http://www.ijn.com/features/1781-dutch-hero-saved-13-jews--but-it-was-not-enough

We continued on four more hours to Berlin, & Cor shared stories of his time with Otto Frank.  A friend introduced him to Otto in 1965. Cor was then CEO of the dairy industry in charge of milk products for the Dutch government & living with his wife & children in Amsterdam.  The friend had told Otto about Cor & at their very first meeting, Otto asked him to go on the Board of Directors for the Anne Frank House.   He knew of Anne' s diary which had been published in 1947 (although he was embarrassed that he had not yet read it).  He had seen a photo in the newspaper of Otto with the pope.; Cor went on the board.

Otto lived in Switzerland & the next time he came to Amsterdam, he asked Cor to become Director of the Anne Frank House.  Cor was very flattered & he felt led to accept even though his wife disapproved.  Otto offered him half the salary he was making in the dairy industry, & it was a very small operation compared to his government position.  In the 27 years he was Director, the Anne Frank house grew in leaps & bounds.  When he first took over leadership they had 22,000 visitors the first year.  By time he left they had 920,000 a year.

Cor told us why Otto gave Cor five pages of Anne's diary which contained information he did not want shared with the general public.  Anne had written about not getting along with her mother & said her father told Anne he had never gotten over his first love.  He had been engaged for three years to a German woman who did not have permission from her parents to marry Otto & that he had never been in true love with his wife.

When Holocaust denial became an issue, the German government investigated Anne's diary to make sure she had actually written it.  They sent the top government secret service official to Switzerland to confirm the authenticity.  Otto gave Cor the extra five diary pages so they would not be in his possession & made him promise not to publish them until the death of Otto & his second wife Fritzi.  

After the death of Otto & Fritzi, Cor told the Dutch authorities about the five pages & Cor was accused of stealing the pages from Otto.  After five years of fighting between attorneys & experts, Cor's story was found to be true.  There were many offers to purchase the pages from Cor up to several million dollars, but he donated the pages to the Dutch government.  Out of gratitude they gave him $300,000 which he donated to the Anne Frank Foundation in America.  

Otto came from a prominent family, & had been an officer of tremendous distinction during WWI.  When a Nazi official came to arrest the Frank family of four plus the four others who had been hiding in the annex. (the betrayer who turned them in is still unknown), he found a box containing Otto 's military medal, & out of respect gave the group an hour to pack up to leave for deportation to the camps.  

Another memory from Cor was being invited to have dinner at Melissa Muller's home.  She is the author of Anne Frank the Biography ( & hopefully will now be writing Cor' story).  Also in attendance was Hitler' former secretary Traudl Junge.  She told them that Hitler was always very kind to her & that she was one of the people in the bunker in Berlin with him.  Before he & mistress Eva Braun, whom he married a few hours beforehand, committed suicide, he called Traudl to him & dictated his final will.  She typed it up & he read it & made corrections by hand.  She kept that rough draft & actually had it in her purse & showed it to them.  

And now for a much less interesting story--how this blog came to be.  My roommate Dana was blogging about our trip & promised to teach me.  Little did she know what she was getting into.  After arriving at our hotel in Berlin & a late dinner with our group, at 11:00 p.m. Dana, Lolle & I headed for the lobby for a lesson from Dana.  Two hours & 15 minutes later at 1:15 a.m. we had finally been able to log in & were able to begin our blogs.  Dana has the patience of Job.  It was a very short night in the feather beds.

Day 1, June 14

I flew out of La Crosse Thur. June 13th & met dear friends Dana Humphrey & Lolle Boettcher in Detroit.  We share a rich history in our interest in the Holocaust.  All of us have Fellowships at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum & are members of the Midwest Holocaust Education Consortium that meets yearly in La Crosse.  Dana has been at the last two Holocaust Educator Workshops at Viterbo staying at our home & being my right arm when we entertain presenters.  We had an easy eight-hour flight to Amsterdam arriving at 8:00 a.m Netherlands time, 1:00 a.m. La Crosse time.  We met the other 10 members of our tour group plus tour leaders 90 year- old Cor Sujik & his son Joop & hit the ground running. 

Cor was a friend of Anne Frank's father Otto & has been leading Holocaust Historic Sites Tours for over 20 years.  He is retiring after the June trip & a final one in Sept. so I felt I could not miss this chance to touch history & to see history through the eyes of one who has lived it, the same way I feel about hearing Holocaust surviviors.

I have heard Amsterdam referred to as the "Venice of the North" so it was appropriate that we began with a canal river cruis e.  Most of us had a few head-nodding moments, but the for the most part the refreshing air kept us aw ake.  We then toured the Corrie Ten Boom Museum.  The first Holocaust book I have a memory of reading was Corrie's book The Hiding Place so I enjoyed seeing the house where she resided & hid Jews.   

After lunch we toured the Anne Frank House.  I last was there in 1969 & found many changes.   We finally checked into our beautiful hotel at 7:00 p.m. absolutely dragging.  After a great dinner--I had the best steak of my life-- we dropped into our feather beds totally exhausted.