What is Auschwitz-Birkenau?
After the tour at the Auschwitz camp, the next stop is the Birkenau camp.
It's a five-minute bus ride from Auschwitz.
I have talked about the Auschwitz camp, but what people usually imagine when they hear the word "Auschwitz" is probably the picture above.
But this is not exactly Auschwitz, but a place that corresponds to the Birkenau camp.
So what exactly is Auschwitz-Birkenau that we often hear about?
To begin with, it was mentioned in an earlier article that the name Auschwitz was created from a German reading of the Polish place name Ossifientum.
In other words, the Auschwitz camp that we have been referring to is the first camp that was built on the Osifientim site.
Jews from all over Poland and the world were transferred here, and the Auschwitz camp could no longer accommodate them because of the sheer number of people.
Even if the camps were to be enlarged, the topography makes that impossible.
So the Nazis were driven by the need to build a second camp in an adjacent village.
That is the Birkenau camp.
This is a vast camp built on a marshy area on the outskirts of the village.
More than 300 facilities were then built here to house those who were brought here and allowed to survive.
The camps spread out right in front of the railroad tracks.
The same view is on the other side of the tracks.
The railroad tracks run through the middle of the camps and camps, but the tracks actually run outside the concentration camps, which are fenced off. The tracks are not inside the concentration camp.
As soon as people get off the train, they are lined up and "sorted".
Those who can work and those who can't are sorted out by doctors.
It is said that as many as 75 percent of the people who were selected went directly to the gas chambers without ever entering the camps.
In other words, only those selected for this selection were to enter the camps that extended beyond the railroad tracks.
After walking along the railroad tracks for a while, you will reach the place where the gas chambers were located at that time.
The Nazis, certain of defeat, order the destruction of the gas chambers to destroy evidence.
However, the Nazis, on the verge of defeat, were unable to act as orderly as in the past, and their destruction was only half-hearted.
So what was left behind were the ruins of the gas chambers.
In fact, the gas chambers in the Auschwitz camp that we had just visited have been restored to their original state.
Here is that Auschwitz gas chamber.
It was not possible to take pictures inside.
It is not an area where photography is prohibited, but I could not do it.
Was it really such a horrible place?
No, no.
Then why?
I don't know.
But I was terrified that I didn't feel anything too much.
I feel I can say that.
The room is inorganic, dark and cold. Perhaps it was the concrete walls, but I could feel the cold air on my skin with every step I took.
This is it. Countless people were gassed to death right here where I am standing right now.
I was shoved in here without knowing what was going on, and when I thought I could take a shower, I suddenly felt like I was suffocating. The victims must have drawn their last breaths with groans of agony, not knowing what was happening...
But that's just my imagination. I thought so because I was told that such a thing had happened here and learned about it.
Terrifyingly, the gas chamber was so inorganic and just plain empty that it didn't feel that way...
When I fearfully passed through this room, I found an incinerator at the end of it.
What was there was a form of sending each person lying down to the furnace.
We monks attend cremations far more often than most people.
So when I saw a furnace of this shape, there was something that went through my mind.
I always see the scene where the bereaved family members shed tears as they say their final goodbyes and send the departed into the furnace.
I was convinced only when I saw this furnace.
That people died here.
Just looking at the inorganic gas chambers, one did not get the sense that there was a genocide there.
That inorganic quality is the most horrific method of murder created by the Nazis.
Technology that doesn't make you feel that people are dead.
I am keenly aware of this.
I wonder how many people would recognize this photo of Birkenau if I did not tell them that it is a photo of Birkenau.
There is no special atmosphere at Auschwitz or Birkenau.
It was a "normal" place.
There was a massacre here."
It is a place where the regrets of many dwell."
We who think like this would probably think like this.
Such a place must surely be terrifying, dark, and unique."
Not at all.
Such an atmosphere did not exist at all.
But,
That is why this is such a horrible thing.
This can happen in any ordinary place, anywhere.
This is not the only special place.
Auschwitz-Birkenau.
I always thought it was a place I would like to visit someday.
This is the setting of Frankl's "Night and Fog". This book led me to read many of Frankl's books.
Frankl's words and Auschwitz had a great influence on my way of thinking.
I wonder how I would feel if I actually went to Auschwitz.
I used to think about such things before my trip.
So what did I actually feel when I came here?
I will say it again and again.
It was the "normalcy" of Auschwitz.
But at the same time, it is a horrifying fear of it.
I am so glad to be here. And I am so glad to have listened to Mr. Nakatani's guide.
There is too much to learn. There is too much to learn from now on.
Auschwitz was, after all, a place that left a powerful impression...
be unbroken
Next Article.
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