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School trip to Auschwitz - opimnions

161 replies

forsale · 19/09/2007 15:19

dd has brought a letter home from school re: a visit to Krakow with a view to visiting Auschwitz - Does anyone have experience of this?

OP posts:
lisalisa · 19/09/2007 22:32

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berolina · 19/09/2007 22:31

cod, whaaaaat? I said you weren't!

TiramisuTartsandPiesInOrbit · 19/09/2007 22:31

Lets not get off track, here now, shall we?
Why must it get personal? I never read into cods remarks that she is denying holocaust. People read the most unnerving things into posts.

fortyplus · 19/09/2007 22:31

From the website... Judge for yourself whether your own child would appreciate it.

What There Is to See

The grounds and buildings of the Auschwitz I and Auschwitz II-Birkenau camps are open to visitors in their entirety, with the exception of several blocks in Auschwitz I that house the administration, Museum departments, and storage. There is generally access to all barracks at Auschwitz II-Birkenau. The duration of a visit is determined solely by the individual interests and needs of the visitors. As a minimum, however, at least one-and-a-half hours each should be reserved for the grounds and exhibitions of Auschwitz I and for the Birkenau site. It is necessary to visit both parts of the camp, Birkenau and Auschwitz, in order to acquire a proper sense of the place that has become the symbol of the Holocaust.

Auschwitz I is where the Nazis opened the first Auschwitz camps for men and women, where they carried out the first experiments at using Zyklon B to put people to death, where they murdered the first mass transports of Jews, where they conducted the first criminal experiments on prisoners, where they carried out most of the executions by shooting, where the central jail for prisoners from all over the camp complex was located in Block No. 11, and where the camp commandant's office and most of the SS offices were located. From here, the camp administration directed the further expansion of the camp complex.

In the Auschwitz II-Birkenau camp, everything happened on a magnified scale. This is where the Nazis erected most of the machinery of mass extermination in which they murdered approximately one million European Jews. At the same time, Birkenau was the largest concentration camp (with nearly 300 primitive barracks, most of them wooden). Over a hundred thousand prisoners at a time were here: Jews, Poles, Roma, and others. The site of this camp contains places that are still full of human ashes; the greatest portion of what remains of the Auschwitz complex is here. The vastness of the space, the primitive barracks for the prisoners, the ruins or remains of other structures, and the miles of camp fence and roads give a full sense of what cannot be conveyed in words: infinite baseness, cruelty, and human criminality, and the specific camp architecture that served one purpose alone: the destruction of human beings.

From January 2005, the so-called Judenrampe has been commemorated. This is the siding located between Auschwitz and Birkenau and it was here that in 1942-1944 deported Jews, Poles, Roma, and others arrived. Up until May 1944 newly arrived Jews were selected by SS doctors there.

The first gas chamber, located beyond the borders of the Museum and started by the Germans in spring 1942, is also commemorated. It is located not far from Birkenau and is known as the Little Red House.
Tickets for screenings of the fifteen-minute documentary film about the first moments after the liberation of the camp may be purchased at the information point in the visitor reception building, at the site of Auschwitz I.

FluffyMummy123 · 19/09/2007 22:31

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southeatsastras · 19/09/2007 22:30

how did they? (interested)

my dad was only 10 in 1940

tiredemma · 19/09/2007 22:30

I think its too young- looking back to myself at 14, I thought I was a fairly mature girl- even then, no way would I have been able to cope emotionally with something like Auschwitz. Not at all- not without a parent there.

FluffyMummy123 · 19/09/2007 22:30

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gibberish · 19/09/2007 22:30

She didnt say that maisym. Read the posts again

berolina · 19/09/2007 22:30

It is a crime in Germany and Austria, lisalisa (I think Irving was prosecuted in Austria).

BecauseImWorthIt · 19/09/2007 22:29

And while we're on the subject - on a roll here - why not take our children to an abbatoir. Shouldn't they know where their meat comes from?

I'm sorry, but sometimes I really do think we are trying to protect our children too much for too long.

I am a very kind mummy, even if it doesn't sound like it!

lisalisa · 19/09/2007 22:29

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FluffyMummy123 · 19/09/2007 22:29

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southeatsastras · 19/09/2007 22:29

there is so much filmed evidence of what went on. i feel that would be more worthwile.

auschwitz should be raised to the ground. we need to move on ...

FluffyMummy123 · 19/09/2007 22:28

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TiramisuTartsandPiesInOrbit · 19/09/2007 22:28

Not sure what to say on this one.

Sad that to some Auswitxh is just a museum. To others it is very real. I am somewhat in cold shivers at this thread. Mostly as I am in awe of the people who were there, and survived, like my dh's grandma, whom I have had the pleasure of meeting before she passed away a few years back. It sure shaped her life.

It is not something we should hide from our children. It is history. It happened. We have to deal with it. Without hate, without predudice, but with fact and information.

berolina · 19/09/2007 22:28

(oh gawd, not IIRC from actual experience...)

gibberish · 19/09/2007 22:28

Becauseimworthit - I do think they should be taught about the Holocaust. But I think they are too young at 14 to actually visit Auschwitz. That should be a personal decision when they are old enough to make it.

maisym · 19/09/2007 22:27

when she writes it's nothing to do with the war and that only people from occupied areas where held there.

FluffyMummy123 · 19/09/2007 22:27

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lisalisa · 19/09/2007 22:27

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berolina · 19/09/2007 22:27

There were concentration camps in existence before WW2, IIRC.

FluffyMummy123 · 19/09/2007 22:27

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CaptainFlameSparrowWifeOfJack · 19/09/2007 22:27

I understand what Cod is saying - I remember WW2 history at school, it was not about Auschwitz. Ok, so things may have changed in 10 years, but I don't feel that a trip there at 14 is going to enhance learning for GCSEs which is about the actual battle side of the war, the foreign policies etc. I don't like the idea of them going without parents tbh - it is the kind of place that if you are going to as a child you SHOULD go to with parents.

But then I got choked up going round Pompeii

fortyplus · 19/09/2007 22:26

that cod is so big and grown up she wasn't upset by the trenches experience!