escaped

So my week of sickness was weird. I knew I didn't like to be home a lot or alone a lot and now I also know that doing both of those things, for a few days, will make me lose my mind. On Friday (5 days into being home), nothing sounded like a good idea for me to do to entertain myself given my grumpy mood...and then i started to cry out of no where. This is when i knew i would be running away soon, for sanity's sake. :)

Saturday night i packed my backpack and headed to Krakow on my own. My train was quiet and lonely which made me wonder if i was going the right way. I was. Then i found my hostel and made friends with my new roomies. The next day i met up with some friends and we headed off to Auschwitz. I forgot my camera (tragic) so i can not show you this place...which is maybe good, because you should just go and see it for yourself. It is such a heavy experience.

So heres some quick history....
Auschwitz is a group of concentration, labour and extermination camps built by the Germans during the Second World War. There are 3 main parts to Aushwitz, with 40 sub-camps in the neighboring cities and in the surrounding area. Poles, Jews, gypsies, and prisoners of other nationalities and minorities were incarcerated there in one of the biggest mass murders in history, all part of Hitler's plan for complete destruction ('the Final Solution').

Jewish people were deported from their homes all over Europe to Auschwitz. They believed they would all be safe and with their families and belongings. Most of these people were instead, immediately sent to a gas chamber and put to death upon arrival. Their bodies were afterwards cremated in industrial furnaces. Others were put to very hard work, though people were only able to survive these conditions for 1 week-5 months.

Its hard to tell how many people died from this experience....the Germans tried to keep things quiet and burned papers and bodies. Though well over a million is very safe to say.

The experience was one I won't ever forget.