An Uplifting Visit To Auschwitz by Jane Thurnell-Read

My friends were slightly bemused when I told them I was planning to visit Auschwitz and Birkenau – I’m not Jewish; I’m not Polish or German; I’m not a homosexual or a communist; I’m not a left-wing political activist, so why did I want to go? Before I went, I was somewhat inarticulate, but after I cam back I knew – a visit to Auschwitz and Birkenau can be an uplifting and life-affirming thing to do.

I've always been curious about the place, and a couple of years ago I read Victor Frankel's "Man's Search For Meaning" which I found very moving. In preparation for my visit I read Primo Levi's "If This Is A Man" and "The Truce". Again moving and thought-provoking books.

I was nervous about visiting the actual place, but went anyway. The display cabinets - spectacles, human hair, shoes, documents, shaving brushes, clothes has a numbing effect. Standing in one of the gas chambers .., viewing the place and the gallows where a camp commandant had been hung after the war .., standing in front of a wall where the inmates were shot ..., seeing the punishment cells - as if just being there wasn't punishment enough .. The enormity of it all and the frailty of human life was awesome.

The most disturbing bit for me though was at the end when I climbed into one of the guard towers at Birkenau - I shivered and felt sick. It took me a few minutes to realise why - suddenly I no longer imagined myself as an inmate, now I am one of the people who perpetuated the horror. Now I look down on the trains unloading their miserable cargo. I see the weakened inmates building basic wooden accommodation for the new inmates. I gaze round, watching the haze from the crematorium. I reflect on how the crematorium just cannot keep up with the dead bodies. I shivered again, held on to the handrail in front of me and gazed with relief at the scene below me – tourists like me experiencing the tragedy of Birkenau.

This all sounds like a grim experience, and in some ways it was, but in other ways it was a very uplifting way to spend a day. It brought home to me in a profound way thoughts about our inbuilt desire to survive no matter what the odds, and the inability of the mighty Nazi organisation to achieve its plan.

I'm still processing my feelings about my visit, but in some strange and significant way it affirms life and not death. The Nazi empire has been destroyed; the cultures/people/beliefs they tried to eradicate are now prospering in many different places.

I’m now much clearer about why I went. I had to go, because if I didn’t it would mean that I agreed with the Nazis that the Jews and the communists and the homosexuals are in some profound way different from me. By going I said that these are people first, and Jews or gypsies or Polish socialists second. If the Nazis had chosen to exterminate everyone with black hair, would I not have gone, because I don’t have black hair? Of course not, so why should I ignore such a barbaric place?

Arthur Miller said:

“The concentration camp is the final expression of human separateness and its ultimate consequence.”

By going I said that these people are not separate from me – we are all human beings first.

Copyright 2006 Jane Thurnell-Read Health Supplement Online Shop