ArTiSTic SpriNg AT THe iymc - Auschwitz-Birkenau...

no. 19 July 2010

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O ś w i ę c i missN 1899-4407

sHared Culture Of memOry CoNsidered at Nuremberg

HATiKVA meANS HoPe...

ArTiSTic SpriNg AT THe iymc

issN 1899-4407

EDITORIAL BOARD:Oś—Oświęcim, People, History, Culture magazine

Editor:Paweł SawickiEditorial secretary: Agnieszka Juskowiak-SawickaEditorial board:Bartosz Bartyzel Wiktor BoberekJarek MensfeltOlga OnyszkiewiczJadwiga Pinderska-LechArtur SzyndlerColumnist: Mirosław GanobisDesign and layout:Agnieszka Matuła, GrafikonTranslations: David R. KennedyProofreading:Beata KłosPhotographer:Paweł Sawicki

PUBLISHER:

Auschwitz-BirkenauState Museum

www.auschwitz.org.pl

PaRTnERS:

Jewish Center

www.ajcf.pl

Center for Dialogue and Prayer Foundation

www.centrum-dialogu.oswiecim.pl

International Youth Meeting Center

www.mdsm.pl

In COOPERaTIOn wITh:

Kasztelania

www.kasztelania.pl

State HigherVocational School in Oświęcim

www.pwsz-oswiecim.pl

Editorial address:„Oś – Oświęcim, Ludzie, Historia, Kultura”Państwowe Muzeum Auschwitz-Birkenau ul. Więźniów Oświęcimia 2032-603 Oświęcime-mail: [email protected]

For four days during a conference en-titled “Auschwitz and the Holocaust against the backdrop of genocide in the twentieth century”, teachers from across Poland attended lectures, as well as discussed the nature and the consequences of genocide in the mod-ern world. Discussion also focused on contemporary challenges facing edu-cation about tragic events of the past. During the conference, which took place at the International Youth Meet-ing Center, panel discussions were held dedicated to the topic of “re-sponsibility” in which several spoke, including: Prof. Zdzisław Mach, Prof.

Andrzej Zoll and Zbigniew Gluza. In Oś you will find excerpts of the debate, as well as an article on the conference. The IYMC also extends an invitation to three art exhibitions.In this issue, among others, we write about a visit by Polish educators to Nuremberg, the Documentation Center, which is located in the historic Congress Hall on the former site of the party congresses of the Third Reich (photograph of this is on the cover), as well as a valuable gift the daughters of former Auschwitz prisoner Stefania Budniak transferred to the Museum— A prisoners striped dress, a piece of fabric with a camp number, prisoner

triangle, as well as handwritten notes.On the pages of the Jewish Center, you will read about the Israeli music group Hatikva 6, who were one of the guests of the first Life Festival, and the visit of fourteen American cadets to Po-land and Oświęcim for the program “American Services Academies Pro-gram.” Also on the pages of the Cen-tre for Dialogue and Prayer, there are articles about the visit to Oświęcim of a group of survivors from Hiroshima as well as the “Bearing Witness” re-treat.

Paweł SawickiEditor-in-chief

[email protected]

A gALLery oF tHe 20tH CeNtury

editorial

I mentioned once on these pages about the city herald, that provided residents of the city, still in the post-War period, communications and information from the munici-pal offices. I recalled a figure and the function of the postal horse van that carried, at the time, the consignments from the post office to the railway station, which was not called the station at the time. Today, a more intimate story about events that took place in the backyards and the individu-als.Of course, in the post-War years, in our backyard in the

shade of a maple tree, the organist and his parrot that was good at predicting the lottery did not appear, nor did the so-called “handełes,” swift and versatile business-men and hawkers, mainly Jews who were purchasers of goods of all kinds, the pre-cursors of the cash and carry trade. But in those years on the streets and in backyards, other public services, such as a portable blade sharpener who carried his workshop on his back, and powered the grinder with his feet. The grinder’s wheels rotated sharpening knives, scissors,

and the blades of meat grind-ers. Sometimes there were those who would use “cold welds” to fix holes in rusted pots, with little success, when compared to the excellent sharpening. During the years I write about, there were rare appearances by “wire-men,” who fixed damaged, cracked or broken stoneware vessel or clay bowls, pitchers, among others. They fixed the dam-aged parts of the pottery us-ing a tight wire mesh, braided like a plait. Even in the 1970s, there functioned a profession-al “wire-man” doing repairs. The pottery was only covered

in the wire mesh on the out-side, while the inside was left smooth and even. This is a forgotten folkloristic craft, an interesting ethno-graphical craft, which, like all those of the past is worth sav-ing from oblivion!Today, Roma bands rarely wander from block to block, counting on small amounts of coins wrapped in paper, flying from windows or bal-conies in exchange for a “con-cert.” But this is generally a “miserable” amount, when compared to the length and strength of music!

Andrzej Winogrodzki

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Surroundings of the Oświęcim Castle. Photo from Mirosław Ganobis’s collection “A Gallery of the 20th Century”

Oś—Oświęcim, People, History, Culture magazine, no. 27, July 2010

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Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum

Contributions will be de-posited in a special Per-petual Fund. The income from the Fund will finance a permanent long-term plan to preserve the authentic re-mains of the Nazi German Auschwitz concentration and extermination camp. Annual interest on the Fund should amount to €4 to €5 million. At a special conference in Cracow, Clinton informed about the decision of the US president Barack Obama. “The United States strongly encourages other nations who have not already done so to follow suit and to con-tribute to the Auschwitz-Birkenau fund. In 2009 alone, more than 1.3 mil-lion people from around

the world visited the mu-seum and memorial. The preservation and continu-ation of Auschwitz Memo-rial is essential so that fu-ture generations can see for themselves why the world must never again allow a place of such hatred to scar the soul of humankind”—said Hillary Clinton.

Dr. Piotr M.A. Cywiński, the director of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum, who is also the president of the Foundation, thanked the Secretary of State per-sonally. Commenting on previous declarations of support for the Foundation, he said that “things are go-ing well. The reaction of the public and decision makers

in many forward-looking democracies around the world, mindful of histori-cal experience, gives us a good chance to preserve what remains at this Memo-rial. When we began work-ing to set up the Founda-tion almost two years ago, I did not know how things would turn out. Today, I have a real hope that work financed by the interest on the Perpetual Fund will begin in 2012. I feel a great sense of satisfaction.” The United States is the third country to declare substantial support to the Foundation since it was es-tablished last year. So far, the German federal govern-ment and the governments of the Länder (federal

states) have jointly pledged €60 million, and Austria has pledged €6 million. Talks are also at an advanced stage on the subject of sup-port for the Foundation by

Belgium, the United King-dom, France, and several other countries.

uNiTed STATeS cONTribuTeS $15 miLLiON TO AuScHwiTz-birKeNAu fOuNdATiON

AgAiNST crime Of geNOcide

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced in Cracow on Saturday that the United States will support the Auschwitz-Birkenau Foundation to the amount of $15 million (€12.2

million), bringing pledges to the Foundation to around €80 mil-lion—two-thirds of the required total of €120 million—in less than a year and a half since it was established. Clinton flew into Cracow for a meeting to mark the tenth anniversary of the Com-munity of Democracies.

The third Raphael Lemkin Seminar—organized by the International Center for Education about Auschwitz and the Holocaust at the State Museum Auschwitz-Birkenau, The Raphael Lemkin Center for the Preven-tion of Genocide, and the Holocaust Research Center at the Jagiellonian University—has come to an end.

Taking place from 20 to 27 of June, the seminar is in-tended for professors and lecturers from all military schools, educating the offic-ers of the US Military and NATO. Among the 35 par-

ticipants of the seminar and tour of the former Ausch-witz Concentration Camp, were lecturers from West Point, Fort Leavenworth, The Auschwitz Institute for Peace and Reconciliation, as

well as from the State Mu-seum Auschwitz-Birkenau. The lecturers included, among others: Dr. James Waller from Keene State College of New Hampshire, Dr. Piotr Setkiewicz the Manager of the Research Department at the State Mu-seum Auschwitz-Birkenau, Ms. Norul Rashid from the Office of the Special Adviser to the UN Secretary General for Genocide Prevention. Subjects of the lectures in-cluded: the definition and history of genocide, respon-sibility to protect against genocide, the psychology of the perpetrators, the role of the Auschwitz Concen-tration Camp in the mass murder of European Jews, and the diplomatic and economic methods of pre-venting crimes of genocide. The seminars dealing with the crime of genocide and its prevention are planned

to take place three times annually. Their goal is to highlight the problem of genocide and its political, economic, and humanitar-

ian consequences. The semi-nar is the brainchild of New York philanthropist Fred Schwartz who also finances the endeavor.

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US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Director of the Auschwitz Museum Piotr M.A. Cywiński

Participants of the seminar during their visit at the Auschwitz Memorial

Raphael Lemkin Center for Genocide Preven-tion was created by The Auschwitz Institute for Peace and Reconciliation [AIPR]. It was estab-lished to connect the leaders of the world in-volved in preventing genocide and armed conflict. Raphael Lemkin, who the seminar is named after, was a pre-War Polish Jewish lawyer and creator of the term “Genocide.” During the War, he was able to get to the United States. Adopted in 1948, the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Geno-cide was created largely thanks to the efforts of the in-ternational community as a response to the crimes of the Holocaust. The intention of its authors was to pre-vent future mass murder. Meanwhile, events in Cam-bodia, Bosnia, Rwanda, and Darfur show that after 65 years since the liberation of Auschwitz, humanity has failed to draw lessons from the crimes of the Second World War.

RaPHaEL LEmkIn CEnTER fOR GEnOCIDE PREvEnTIOn


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The program included work-shops, discussions with German guides and teach-ers, and a series of lectures. Eckart Dietzfelbinger of the Documentation Center and Prof. Robert Traba of the Polish Academy of Sciences Center for Historical Re-search in Berlin spoke about the evolution of the way in which Nazism and its effects have been presented and interpreted in Poland and Germany. Harald Schmid of Hamburg delivered a talk on “The Place of the Deeds of the Perpetrators, the Place of Suffering, and the Place of Education,” in which he considered the presenta-tion of German memorial sites from the perspective of the Europeanization of the culture of memory. Aside from Nuremberg, the Polish-German group visited the site of the former Nazi concentration camp in Flos-senbürg. Between 1938 and 1945, almost 100,000 prison-ers, among whom Poles were the most numerous, were slave laborers there, working for the large German compa-nies that supported the Third Reich war effort. Granite from a nearby quarry went

into the construction of the Congress Hall in Nuremberg. The educators also toured the Documentation Center in the alpine town of Ober-salzberg, where Hitler had a residence in the war years. Participants in the semi-nar stressed the importance of the existence of origi-nal memorial sites in the educational process. Marta Królikowska-Hardek of Oświęcim, a guide at the Auschwitz Memorial, said that “it is very important that such places exist, and also to take care of them. They make an incredible impression. When you’re right there, in Nuremberg, in the Congress Hall, you have the feeling of being connected to history. This is especially important for young people, since they understand history better this way. They can see with their own eyes that it all hap-pened there. Groups visit-ing the Auschwitz Memo-rial also frequently stress the importance of originality.” The coordinator on the Pol-ish side was the International Center for Education about Auschwitz and the Holo-caust at the Auschwitz-Birk-

enau State Museum. “I think that taking part in this project is a valuable experience for both sides, Polish and Ger-man. A great deal of time has been devoted to discussion and exchanges of opinion on the subject of the exhibition, as well as presenting various forms of education at memo-rial sites,” said Magda Urba-niak of the Education Center. “We also discussed future cooperation. This was the first part of the project—the

second will be held in Poland in September—and I think it was a good first step toward closer contacts. One possible form of cooperation could be a temporary education presented at both Memori-als, or a joint educational project for young people from Poland and Germany. The first part of the project could be held in Nuremberg, in the place that, one might say, marked the beginning of what was later continued

in Auschwitz. The second part of the project could be held at our Memorial.” The director of the Nurem-berg Center, Hans-Christian Täuberich, held a similar view. “We would like to con-tinue our cooperation and we are happy to see the interest from the Polish side, because this was not something that could be taken for granted in view of our difficult common past.”

Jarek Mensfelt

SHAred cuLTure Of memOry cONSidered AT Nuremberg

Educators from the Auschwitz Museum and other memorials in Poland had a chance to examine the German perspective on commemorating the victims of Nazism. As part of the Tracks Project, they spent a week as in-vited guests at the Documentation Center in Nuremberg, which is located in the historic Congress Hall on the

grounds where party rallies were held under the Third Reich.

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DOCUmEnTaTIOn CEnTER nazI PaRTy

RaLLyInG GROUnDS In nUREmBERG

Founded in 2001, the Center is located in the north wing of the unfinished NSDAP Congress Hall, the largest of the extant monumental Nazi buildings. Work on the structure began in 1935. Modeled on the Colosseum in Rome,

the edifice was planned to stand twenty sto-ries high and hold fifty thousand people under its roof. Work was halted in 1939. The complex under construction included a stadium, parade ground, and maneuver ground set in an eleven-square-mile site in the southern part of the city. Open in the Congress Hall since 2001, the Doc-umentation Center has informational and re-search functions. It also features an exhibition on “Fascination and Terror” that attracts 180,000 visitors per year. Occupying 1,300 square me-ters of floor space, it shows the causes and ef-

fects of the national socialist system of terror. It uses new media, such as computer anima-tion, films, and presentations on touch screens, in combination with photographs and docu-ments. The exhibition explains the buildings at the site and informs visitors about the his-tory and background of the Nazi party rallies. Audioguides with texts and commentaries in seven languages, including Polish, are available to visitors. The educational center or “study fo-rum” integrated into the exhibition also offers educational programs in Polish.


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OBERSaLzBERG DOCUmEnTaTIOn CEnTER

Hitler had a summer house here from the 1920s. Rebuilt in 1933 and known as the Berghof, it became his second command post, after Ber-lin. In the thirties, the Berghof became popu-lar as the goal of pilgrimages by Hitler sup-porters. Schoolchildren and hikers came to see the Leader and his companion Ewa Braun. Hermann Goering, Martin Bormann, and Albert Speer had villas of their own nearby. It was in Ober-salzberg that British prime minister Neville Cham-berlain agreed to turn the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia over to Hitler in September 1938. Polish minister of foreign affairs Józef Beck visited at the height of the Polish-German crisis in 1939. The Allies bombed Obersalzberg in April 1945. The remains of Hitler’s villa were blown up in 1952. Fragments of the foundations are still visible today. The Documentation Center was opened in 1999 at the place where a hotel for the guests of the Na-zis once stood. Sixty thousand people a year visit a permanent exhibition prepared by the Institute for Contemporary History in Munich. Aside from themes directly connected with Hitler’s mountain residence, it covers the subject of Nazi rule in gen-

eral, including the cult of Hitler, Nazi race policy, mass murder, the Second World War, and the German resistance movement. The center also has educational programs.

THE TRaCkS PROJECTAn exhibition titled Tracks: The Logistics of Racial Madness is open from May 19 to October 31 at the Documentation Center Nazi Party Rallying Grounds in Nuremberg. It was prepared in coop-eration with the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum and the memorial sites at Majdanek, Bełżec, Treblinka, Sobibór, and Chełmno on the Ner. The project is financed by Deutsche Bahn AG, the German State Railways, which is covering the cost of trips to Nuremberg by Polish study groups on their way to see the Tracks exhibition. Groups in-terested in traveling for free to Nuremberg to visit the Documentation Center Nazi Party Rallying Grounds should contact Silvia Feghelm (tel. +49 911 231 56 66) or Martina Christmeier (tel. +49 911 231 84 09)

fLOSSEnBüRG COnCEnTRaTIOn CamP

Flossenbürg Concentration Camp was founded in May 1938. The SS chose Flossenbürg as the site for

a camp because of the granite deposits around the city. Until 1942, prisoners labored mainly in quar-ries owned by the SS company “DESt” (Deutsche Erd- und Steinwerke, German Earth- and Stone-works). After 1942, the SS opened about a hundred sub-camps to serve the armaments industry in north Bavaria, Bohemia (now the Czech Republic) and Saxony. Prisoners at Flossenbürg itself were employed for arms production by Messerschmitt. Between 1938 and 1945, about 100,000 pris-oners were registered in Flossenbürg and its sub-camps. They came from 30 countries, but mostly from Poland, the USSR, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia. Poles were the most nu-merous. The number of victims of the camp is estimated to be at least thirty thousand. In 2007, a permanent exhibition on Flossenbürg Concentration Camp 1938-1945 opened in the building that housed the camp laundry and bath-house, which is partly preserved in its original state. The new exhibition centers around the indi-vidual stories of selected prisoners. The sub-sec-tions include the history of the site before 1938, the setting up and expansion of the camp, labor and death in the stone quarries, the camp SS garrison, executions, the role of the camp in the economy and armaments industry of the Third Reich, the sub-camps, and the death marches.

(Study based on materials from Flossenbuerg Memorial)

iTemS remiNd AbOuT A TrAgic fATe

A prisoner’s striped dress, with a triangle and the number of prison camp items belonging to Stefania Budniak, a prisoner of the camps Auschwitz, Ravensbrück, and Helmbrechts, were given to the Ausch-witz Museum by her daughters.

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“We are certain that for these mementoes this is the most appropriate place and here they will be duly preserved. Memory is the most important thing, and now, when there are less and less witnesses of those terrible events, these items are a reminder of their tragic fate,” said Katarzyna Budniak-Wojtas, as she gave the items to Museum staff. She is the youngest of three sisters, born after the War, and often

participated in her mother’s meetings with fellow former prisoners and listened to the memories they shared about the camp.“We will give the Museum photographs of our sisters Ewa and Barbara, which my mother carried with her in the camp, as well as handwritten notes, which described the evacuation route,” added Mrs. Budniak-Wojtas.The family holdings include

other camp mementos, which have been saved by Stefania Budniak from the camp. These are figurines of an elephant and a mousen made from a piece of plastic and a ring with the camp number on it. “We are very connected to them emotionally, and for now, we cannot part ways with them. But perhaps in the future, we will also give these items to the Museum,” said Katarzyna Budniak-Wojtas.Stefania Budniak, wife of ZWZ activist and engineer forester Florian Budniak, who had the pseudonym “An-drzej,” was committed to sup-plying the fighting troops and took an active part in partisan campaigns, as well as also joining the conspiratorial ac-tivities. She also led, among others, radio intercepts, and participated in printing the pamphlet “Czyn Zbrojny” (Armed Action).

October 28, 1943, in the for-ester’s lodge in Kobiele Wiel-kie in which a contact point and hiding place were set up, the Gestapo carried out a search. Stefania was arrested and incarcerated in a prison in Częstochowa. Her two daugh-ters, Barbara and Ewa found

their way into the care of a family near Poznań.

After several weeks of investi-gation, on December 19, 1943, Stefania Budniak was trans-ported to Auschwitz where she received camp number 72307. She worked in con-structing roads, she did farm work, and then also worked at a sewing workshop in the camp. Throughout her stay she hid photographs of her daughters, a medal with the image of the Virgin Mary and Christ, miniature stat-ues of an elephant and a mouse made from a piece of plastic, and a ring with her camp number. She had these treasures until liberation. In mid-August 1944 she was

transferred to the Raven-sbrück camp, from which after two weeks she was sent to the Helmbrechts sub-camp. She received the number 55131, which was later embroidered on a piece of fabric. On a piece of felt, from which the pris-oner triangle was made, the letter P was embroidered. In April 1945, prisoners were evacuated on foot to the Zwo-dau sub-camp. Stefania Bud-niak described the two-week evacuation march in detail on a scrap of wrapping paper us-ing a pencil. On May 7, 1945, the US military liberated her. She returned to her husband and children, who also man-aged to survive.

JKObjects given to the Museum by daughters of Stefania Budniak

The museum collects all the items from the period of the camp’s operation, and provides them with the proper care, appropriate conservation, and storage conditions. If you have in your possession items related to the functioning of Auschwitz, please contact the Museum. Each is a separate story. Let us not allow that to be forgotten. The donated memorabilia is a very precious gift. They all have great historical value and are used in research pro-jects, exhibitions, and for education. In many cases it allows one to learn the fate of the individual camp prisoners and complete their documentation. Being a witness of those times, helps in preserving the memory of the victims of Auschwitz.


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Participants of the conference “Auschwitz and the Holo-caust against the background of genocide in the twentieth century” not only captured the insightful description of the events, but also attempted to answer the fundamental question of: how to prevent similar crimes in the future. “This must be a long-term effort, especially education,” stressed Prof. Zoll during the panel discussion. “It is not just about passing on knowl-edge, but also about vigilance in recognizing the danger. At the end of the twenties and thirties it was not seen in Germany. And all that was needed was to closely listen to Goebbels’ statements such as: ‘If we are to defend the rules of democracy, it is because they allow us to gain power.’ The former ombudsman for human rights is concerned about the rebirth of inter-est, even fascination, in some circles with one of the most dangerous men of the 1930s —Carl Schmitt, the leading ideologist of Nazism’s begin-ning: “In Poland, in the 21st century, I see works that refer to his good work. I look upon this in horror. Such situations might testify that he saw no danger. We need to warn so-ciety about him.” Prof. Zdzisław Mach stressed the importance of teaching about the universal human rights as the basis for educa-tion. He also talked about the problem of coping with oth-erness. A lack of these skills leads to hostility and crime. “In Poland, entire generations have been raised without con-tact with ‘otherness’ and have had no discussion about it, because we had a very homo-geneous society,” he stated. “Today we have to build on the idea of a diverse society as a community, that does not exclude others.” Another problem is the memory of the Holocaust and crimes of gen-

ocide. “Its difficult to comes to terms with it - stressed Prof. Mach. “In Poland, this is par-ticularly difficult because we tend to regard ourselves as victims. We have been build-ing our identity on martyr-dom since the nineteenth cen-tury. Therefore, it is difficult to accept any responsibility, even for the Holocaust. Not as criminals, of course, but for ex-ample as silent witnesses.” Fr. Cardinal Franciszek Machar-ski in a deeply reflective way referred to the symbolism of Auschwitz for different na-tions. Adam Balcer of Domos Europa presented the histori-cal conditions of the genocide and massacres of Armenians, ethnic and religious cleansing in the Balkans and the Cauca-sus since the beginning of the nineteenth century. About the prevalence of teaching about the Holocaust all over Eu-rope, not only within school education, but also informal-ly Dr. Piotr Trojański said: “Mass politicization of the Holocaust and the simultane-ous marginalization of other crimes creates opposition to the education related to the mass murder of the Jews. Questioning the effectiveness of teaching about the Holo-caust and stressing that it can-not be a panacea for all evil,” he noted. Dr. Jacek Leociak of PAN, in an emotional lec-ture attempted to answer the question of how and at what point the Jews were aware of the Holocaust awaiting them. “It is doubtful whether we can capture a moment when the terrible truth started to reach them,” he said.

Dr. Piotr Setkiewicz focused on Auschwitz as a tool for ter-rorizing occupied European society. He mentioned the reasons why after the war this concentration camp became a reference point in discus-sions on other crimes —as

the model for executions and its technocratic form unsur-passed. Alicja Białecka ana-lyzed the massacre in Nan-

jing—the symbol of Japanese crimes during World War II as well as the discussions on this subject in China and Ja-pan: “The question of how to memorialize the crime —de-nouncing, explaining, clear-ing up, justifying, or even ignoring—is still a current

issue. Dr. Sławomir Kapral-ski presented the problem of persecution of the Roma and the consequences for the con-

temporary situation of this community. Dr. Alicja Bartuś, chairwoman of the IYMC Foundation, spoke about the importance of administering even symbolic justice for each nation’s historical memory as exampled by the ongoing trial currently taking place, 30 years after the crime, against the Khmer Rouge. “The vast majority of the Khmer were poorly educated, but all the major founders of the regime received excellent educa-tion at French universities. Knowledge and education do not, therefore, mean that man ceases to have a tendency to tolerate evil and crime,” she noted. This brings about a key and the most difficult question: what education and upbringing are needed so

that genocide does not hap-pen again? Stanisław Kracik, the governor of Małopolska, appeared at the conference. Among the guests was also Waldemar Rataj, the presi-dent of Civic Foundation Pro Publico Bono.

The conference was organ-ized by: Foundation for the International Youth Meeting Center in Oświęcim, the In-ternational Center for Educa-tion about Auschwitz and the Holocaust at the State Mu-seum Auschwitz-Birkenau, the Oświęcim Academy with support of the Institute of European Studies at the Jag-iellonian University and the Institute of History of Peda-gogical University in Cracow. Financial support was of-fered by: Auschwitz-Birkenau Death Camp Victims Memo-rial Foundation as well as by the ALSAL company of Niegoszowice.

(AP)

HOw TO preVeNT crimeS AgAiNST HumANiTy?

The causes and consequences of today’s crimes against humanity were debated for two days at the IYMC in the presence of over fifty educators, university lecturers and representatives of institutions dealing with this topic.

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VAriOuS meASureS Of reSpONSibiLiTy

During the seminar a debate devoted to the issue of responsibility was held. It was attended by Prof. Zdzisław Mach—director of the Institute of European Studies at the Jagiellonian University, Prof. Andrzej Zoll—Head of the Department of Criminal Law at the Jagiellonian University, the former Ombudsman for human rights

and the initiator of the creation of the Oświęcim Academy, and editor Zbigniew Gluza—President of the “Ośrodek KARTA” Foundation. The moderator of the discussion was Teresa Świebocka, who asked among others, about is-sues of group and individual, dehumanization of victims, as well as the issue of prevention of crimes of genocide in the context of accountability. Here are excerpts of the participants’ statements from the debate.

PROf. zDzISław maCH What is important for me is the extent to which each of us, individually, may feel responsible for the crime of genocide in which we are not personally involved. It is a question of individual sensitivity: some show empathy and try to do something about it, while others find it difficult to be blamed person-ally. For me, as the sociologist who deals in Euro-pean affairs, the most important question is that of collective responsibility. The memory of the crimes and genocide is perhaps the most difficult type. In Poland it is particularly difficult for us, because of our own collective memory, closely linked to na-tional identity, which does not help us reflect on our own responsibility for a crime against someone else, or about the suffering of others. We tend to regard ourselves as victims who have suffered in a special way. Our identity is built on martyrdom, and it goes back to the nineteenth century so it is therefore more difficult for us to accept responsibility—even for the Holocaust—certainly not as criminals but as silent witnesses. It is difficult for us to see ourselves not as victims but also those who may carry part of the fault. We can look at it from a broader European perspec-tive—responsibility not only for the crime of the Holocaust, but also for other genocides. Many au-thors have shown that the Holocaust is a product of enlightened, rational civilization. You can argue with that, but it is a vital concept. If we want to be part of this heritage, we should feel responsible for this common European evil. It is not easy. To-day we have a great problem with Turkey and its membership in the European Union. One problem here is acceptance of responsibility for the genocide against the Armenians. The words “dehumaniza-tion of victims” have been used here. Otherness is a cultural construction. As long as we do not learn to deal with differences and we argue that the other is a stranger, a stranger is an enemy and the enemy is to be destroyed, the phenomenon of genocide will always come back in one form or another. We will not get rid of the threat of genocide, if we can-not deal with otherness. It cannot lead to exclusion, marginalization and, in extreme form, to physical domination. In Poland we have difficulties, because a whole generation has grown up without contact with otherness, and without a public discussion about diversity. We need to build the image of a so-ciety and nation as a diverse community—not eth-nically exclusive and excluding others. Each of us

is probably annoyed about the anti-Semitic graffiti on walls. Nevertheless, we are afraid of those who paint these inscriptions. Much more serious is that they seem not to disturb anyone. There are few who erase them.

PROf. anDRzEJ zOLL I think the basic problem is with the individual, because responsibility rests on them to be vigi-lant. There is a very important sentence that was said by Bernd Rüthers—German lawyer, honor-ary doctor of the Catholic University of Lublin. He has devoted several of his works coming to terms with Nazism and responsibility for the crime. He writes that the lawyer is able to prevent a catas-trophe if he realizes the danger before the rules of democracy are destroyed. It is the responsibility of the individual—to see the critical moment when defense mechanisms against such savagery and perversion are attacked. The Germans did not no-tice this, even though some things were presented very honestly. Even before Hitler came to power, Goebbels said: “We are defending the rules of de-mocracy, because they allow us to gain author-ity. Then, of course, we will destroy democracy.” I would like to draw attention to the problem of the future. Prevention is not only a problem of noticing a dangerous moment, but long-term educational efforts. I am glad that today we talk with teachers who share knowledge with succeeding generations. It is not without reason that we find ourselves at a conference, which is co-organized by the Oświęcim Academy whose patron is Paweł Włodkowic—the man of human rights. We must make these young people aware about human rights, and they must come of age with knowledge of the inherent dig-nity of each and every other person. If we are able to pass this on, then we will be safe, and the crime will

not be repeated. We must point to Oświęcim, as an international center for human rights—this should be a counterpoint to Auschwitz.

zBIGnIEw GLUza In Oświęcim, it is worth recalling the fact of the event that has been proven, which sheds new light on the Auschwitz camp. A recently confirmed astonishing fact is that Oświęcim could be a place of salvation of the Jews. Representatives of Oświęcim’s Jewish community went to Berlin to negotiate the creation of an evacuation center to assist Jewish emigration from Silesia, but no country accepted this commu-nity. This was even before the creation of the camp. It is worth recalling, that because these countries re-fused to accept these people, they in some way take responsibility for what happened later.It is a historical responsibility, but contemporary responsibility is more important. The difference between collective and individual responsibility is crucial here. The first is difficult to define. In Poland, it is difficult to actually say which collectivity is to express the responsibility. One would like that in a free country, the story was assessed according to the paradigm of human rights. We do not know how to do this. Much more often we consider it through the paradigm of the nation, which is dangerous, be-cause it revives historical conflicts. For us, the more important dimension is the individual and wish the bitterness I say that in Poland it is almost absent. I am involved in documenting the history and fate of the victims of both totalitarian regimes and the individual reaction to the plight of the victims is ex-tremely rare in contemporary societies—this is not exclusive to Poland. In fact, the Polish state—the communist and the democratic—did not take into account the victims for almost 70 years. Of the 35 million citizens of pre-War Poland, at least 12 mil-lion of them were directly victimized, i.e., harm was done to a particular person by taking their life or health. Postwar Poland was not ready to pull these people from non-existence. They are mostly anony-mous; because of the 12 million names we know two. This makes the individual responsible. With-out a reaction of the individual, nothing happens. Tygodnik Powszechny has recently given the Medal of St. George to Alexander Guryanov from the Me-morial. This is the only man who regularly deals with the Polish victims of Soviet repressions —the only one. Without this, the process would not have taken place. In Poland, it is similar. Our contempo-rary responsibility is simply not up to measure and it is an important reason for our reflection.

Reported by: Paweł Sawicki

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The exhibition of Interna-tional Symposium of Enam-el Art opened on May 13, organized in cooperation with the city of Frýdlant nad Ostravicí and the Asso-ciation of EMAIL ART from Frydek-Mistek.“Since 1999 the host of the annual artistic meeting has been the lovely town of Frýdlant nad Ostravicí, whose initiative is to expand interest in enamel art and is related to the 150-year tradi-tion of artistic enamel mak-ing and foundry work in the Podbeskidzie region,” says Prof. Elżbieta Kuraj, a lecturer at the Katowice Academy of Fine Arts, Fac-ulty of Art in Cieszyn, and curator of the exhibition at the IYMC.Enamal making in Poland today is done by a very small group of artists, and is not well known by the public, but it is expanding in our southern neighbor, through the model patron-age of the authorities of the small Frýdlant, whose rep-resentatives visited the exhi-bition during its opening at the IYMC.“Tireless promoters of ‘smalt’ and organizers of the workshop are the mayor of the city Frýdlant nad Os-travicí, Engineer Bohumil Dolansky, and Commission-er Dr. Klarem Bogar, who meticulously documents the effects of creative artists through films, reproduc-tions, and publications cata-log accompanying the next

exhibitions, as well as cares about enriching the Ena-mal Museum in his native town,” says curator, who last year participated in the symposium and became fas-cinated with enamel.It turns out what visitors can see that this technique al-lows for an extremely wide range of artistic methods, and that the “language of smalt” can be used in paint-ings, drawings, and graph-ics. The whole spectrum of possibilities was shown in the exhibition at the IYMC.“The collision of the various schools, individual artis-tic preferences, indigenous traditions, and the inter-national make-up of the participating artists of the symposium produced inter-esting artistic and workshop results through experimen-tation with form, materials, and color,” adds Prof. Kuraj.During last year’s meeting in Frýdlant artists in attend-ance were from the Czech Republic, Poland (E. Kuraj and Janusz Karbowniczek), Hungary, Slovakia, Hol-land, England, France, and Austria.Enamel making, known since ancient Egypt, is as-sociated mainly with the decorative arts, goldsmiths, jewelry and religious art. In Europe, the longest running center, still in operation, is in Limoges.Nowadays, this technique is used in architecture and de-sign. Enamel on metal plates as a form of autonomous

artistic expression, still alive, and discovering new opportunities for creating these paintings has grown strongly in the countries of Europe, while in Poland it is

almost unknown. For many visitors of the IYMC these images on metal plates have become a kind of discovery.Another exhibition, which was shown until the end

of July at the IYMC comes from a batik exhibit by Bożena Formas-Mądry from Oświęcim. She is a graduate of the Pedagogical Univer-sity in Cracow in artistic ed-

ArTiSTic SpriNg AT THe iymc

Late spring and early summer at the IYMC was the time of exhibitions. For art lovers (and not only) we proposed three exhibits (two of them could have even been seen in July), presenting a varied and in at least two cases—rarely seen techniques done very well.

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During the recent flood, the home of Agnieszka Okoń from Bieruń, a staff member of the International Youth Meeting Center, and mother of two children (a 9-month and 9-year- old),

was flooded to its attic.The staff of the IYMC have joined in the help by organ-izing a collection among themselves as well as invit-ing other people and institu-tions to take part. The col-lected aid for Agnieszka was handed to her by a member of the Foundation for IYMC Dr. Richard Pyritz.On July 8, representatives of IG Metall Wolfsburg

Joachim Fährmann and Dieter Achterman visited Oświęcim, and brought do-nations collected from the participants of seminars or-ganized by IG Metall at the IYMC. They emphasized that the organization of aid for the family was an act of solidarity and gratitude for the kindness that they have experienced from employ-

ees of the IYMC for years during their stays. Raising money for Agnieszka was coordinated by Frank Patt, long-time organizer of the study visits by IG Metall workers to Oświęcim.The collected funds were donated for the purchase of the most needed everyday items that were lost to the flood.

HeLp fOr AgNieSzKA

ucation (graduated in 1989) and from the Academy of Fine Arts in Cracow, faculty of graphic arts (graduated in 1992). She is associated with a group of Silesian art-ists AKWE (Artistic Crea-tion of United Europe.) She now lives near Żywiec and is professionally associated with Żywiec City Museum. So far she has had a number of solo and group exhibi-tions at Oświęcim, Szczyrk, Warsaw, Myślenice, Bielsko-Biała, Chełmek, Brzeszcze, Cracow and Ostrava. Many of her works are in private collections. Bożena Formas-Mądry deals mainly with oil paint-ing and the batik technique. “For me, batik is inextrica-bly linked with decoration, but I also try not to avoid its essence,” she syas about her art. Batik is an ancient technique originating in Java. It con-sists of the repeated paint-ing of a textile with hot wax as well as dyeing. “Techni-cally, it is easy, but it con-

ceals the mystery within it. You can never fully predict the final result—wax and cracks provide emotion dur-ing the creation process and are often responsible for the final effect—the artist adds.These effects can be admired in their completed form at the IYMC. In the halls of the main building, some 40 works are displayed, char-acterized by the harmony of linear composition and beauty of a soothing, sin-gle range of colors, or on the contrary—the strong contrasts of color. The ex-hibition is entitled “Under the trees,” which is a reflec-tion of the artist’s favorite theme. The tree grows (up, down, or horizontally) on the batik as an independent “character” of the composi-tion stable, leafless and clear in its structure as an apple tree. Sometimes it happens that one of the elements of the presented world, cre-ates shielding “umbrella” for the melancholic, impres-sionistic human figures. The

compositions also include characteristics of shells. This well-used “repetition” of themes so typical of the decorative arts, combined with an extraordinary sense of color and precision unites the whole picture, it creates a kind of artistic language— a unique and recogniz-able style of Bożena Formas-Mądry.In the House of Silence in the IYMC garden an exhi-bition of drawings by the Hungarian artist József Orci can be seen. The exhibition curatorship, overseen by known Oświęcim graphics artist Paweł Warchoł, was organized within the frame-work of the “European Mas-ters of the drawing.”József Orci was born in 1944 in Budapest. He creates ink drawings and watercolors, often combining both tech-niques in one work. “He is an analytical observer of the world around him, fasci-nated with nature, even in the slightest, almost indis-cernible ways. The works

of nature are often trans-posed and interpreted by him in various ways in his work, most often in direct contact with nature,” Paweł Warchoł says. József Orci defines himself as an artist associated with Christianity. He comes from a very religious family, was an altar boy, and he attend-ed the Piarist School in Bu-dapest.Just as Paweł Warchoł wrote in the catalogue for the exhibit: “He is well ed-ucated theologically, with great freedom, and scru-tiny shows the characters and scenes from the Bible in various interpretations and facets. Silhouettes of the drama’s protagonists, their gestures and poses are building an amazing feel-ing and emotional atmos-phere of the work. Interact-ing with these works, the recipient seem to feel the presence of the Absolute, it is even more shocking that such a deep statement could be achieved, contrasted by the simplicity of the ele-ments used—black ink, and heavily diluted watercolor. Character of these works in some way reflect the charac-ter of the artist, these works appear to us as a metaphor of a great series of self-por-traits.”

József Orci has been in-volved in many meetings and annually takes part in Art Camp organized in the Hungarian primeval forest by Révay György—Hungar-ian art expert and collector. About himself, he says that his sensitivity to nature was forged during his childhood in the suburbs of Budapest, filled with natural land-scapes.“József Orci is an artist who is extremely sensitive both in life and in art, remarkably precise lines characterize his work as do perfectly con-structed compositions, even in the most banal sketches. His pen or brush marks are exceptionally various, sometimes thin parallel lines, or even dots, turn into aggressive dark lines and stains in other places. The artist avoids scribbling, his works are a triumph of line-arity,” adds the exhibit’s cu-rator. “In his work, the artist often adds subtle stains of color that are typically lu-minous watercolors or sub-limely sophisticated grays. Specifically, the individu-ally designed works created on various types of paper and cardboard allow one to identify József Orci as their author without a doubt.”

Joanna Klęczar

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The main part of the festi-val were concerts, which took place on the main square, Rynek Główny (an extraordinarily successful inauguration and first large party to take place after the “dissapearance” of the un-forgettable Tęcza building in 2009), as well as at the MOSiR Stadium. During the three days, several thousand people had the pleasure of watching many well-known artists perform. Oświęcim welcomed the Twinkle Brothers & Trebunie Tutki, VOO VOO & UkraInni, Ka-sia Kowalska, Varius Manx, Ray Wilson and Genesis Klassik, Nomada as well as Mosa Sisic & The Gipsy Express. So, it was interna-tional and multi-ethnic… Jamaican, Polish Highland-ers, Ukrainian, Roma, and Jewish… but in reality Is-raeli. This idea was after all a conscious decision by the organizers of the Festival for Peace. Multi-nationalism is a value that should bring peo-ple together. Moreover, and worth emphasizing, it was a cooperative undertaking by many, &. two Oświęcim based non-governmental organizations, including the Jewish Center and the Roma

Association of Poland. Thanks to the well-planned and widely publicized pro-motional activities, which in the context of the town represents a major break-through, information about the festival was on many tel-evision and radio stations, where OŚWIĘCIM was mentioned in each case, but the context was entirely dif-ferent from what inhabitants of the city were accustomed to, up to now…One of the discoveries of the festival was the Israeli reggae band Hatikva 6, who, during their concert in the first days of the fes-tival on the Main Square in Oświęcim played their mu-sic with natural force and spread their message to the several thousand gathered there. Both the concert and the reaction of the audience exceded all expectations. The positive reception was a positive surprise to the Is-raelis. It is worth to empha-size the word MESSAGE, and return once again to the same concept of the fes-tival, where in such a sym-bolic place it is so important. It was possible to connect remembrance and dignity for the tragic history that

took place in the suburbs of the city during the Second World War at Auschwitz with a message of peace for the future. A message beyond the divides of cul-ture, ethnicity, and politics. The festival —as the organ-izers state on website—has the goal of getting rid of the prism of cultural differ-ences, racism, and anti-Sem-

itism. It also has the goal of building a new image of the city of Oświęcim, as a city of peace, a place open to the di-versity of the contemporary world and breaking down stereotypes. A concert by an Israeli group perfectly fit into this concept. The music of Hatikva 6 goes beyond stereotypes… It has nothing to do with klezmer music, or

with any other form of tra-ditional Jewish music. This modern, energetic reggae, is a combination of new roots and dancehall, presenting and promoting a new Israel and the new—perhaps sur-prising to some—the face of Israeli popular culture. The band, whose Hebrew name means HOPE, comes from Ramat ha-Sharon. They

sing their songs in Hebrew, English, French and Patois (Jamaican English). Thanks to their extraordinarily ener-getic concerts, they have gar-nered a number of fans and have recently become the biggest Israeli reggae group. In 2007, their first single If I Will Meet God became a big hit in Israel. The same year, the group released their first album, with a guest ap-pearance by a legend of the Jamaican reggae scene—Luciano and Elana (former vocalist of the Wailers). The second album Afrokaliptus was released in 2009—this time done in cooperation with famous Jamaican reg-gae star—Anthony B. The band has performed twice in the United States in, among others, New York’s Central Park. Haktiva 6 is composed of: Omri Glikman—vo-cals, Shelly Glikman—key-boards, Michael Guy—bass guitar, and Ron Linial—per-cussion. After their return to Israel, the band will con-tinue to work on their third studio album, which is due

From 17-19 of June this year, an uncommon cultural event with an international character took place in Oświęcim. Pop and classical music, film screenings, international food as well as exhibits, is, in short, what took place this year during the first edition of Life Festival Oświęcim 2010—Festival for Peace, which was

the brainchild of Oświęcim resident and known musical journalist at RMF FM Darek Maciborek and the organi-zation created by him, Peace Festival Foundation.

HATiKVA meANS HOpe...

Hatikva 6 during their concert at Life Festival Oświęcim 2010

Hatikva 6 during their visit at the Jewish Center in Oświęcim, from the right: Shelly Glikman and Omri Glikman

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cAdeTS iN Oświęcim

Fourteen cadets of the Navy, Air Force, and U.S. Coast Guard Academy at West Point visited Oświęcim and Poland as part of the annual “American Academies Services Program” project of the Jewish Center. The pro-gram aim at the in-depth study of the history of the Holocaust and ethical issues related to the prevention of

genocide.

The arrival in Poland was preceded by a preparatory course at the United States Holocaust Memorial Muse-um and the Museum of Jew-ish Heritage in New York, where participants met with Holocaust survivors and heard their histories and dis-cussed the ethical challenges of a career officer in the army.The first Polish city to the cadets were introduced was Cracow, which enchanted

them with its Renaissance Era Old Town and Wawel Castle. During the follow-ing days, the guests from the US visited the former Jewish district of Kazimierz and the site of the former ghetto of Cracow.In Cracow, the students also met with the Professor Lech Rościszewskim, who was awarded the title Righteous Among the Nations for sav-ing Jews during the war.

In the second part of the pro-gram, the Americans came to Oświęcim and its Jewish Center, where they learned the history of the local Jew-ish community and its con-tribution to the develop-ment of the city. The visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau made a great impression on par-ticipants, where educational workshops were conducted, and there was a special part of the program—a meeting

with a Polish former prison-er, Ms. Zofia Łyś, who talked about how her family was deported from the Zamość area and their subsequent tragic fate in Auschwitz.Thanks to a trip through former Galicia, the cadets learned the history of the Jewish communities of the region, who were killed during the Holocaust. Af-ter the visit to Tarnów and Łańcut, the program partici-

pants visited the site of the former Nazi death camp in Bełżec, and visited the newly opened exhibition dedicated to people who lost their lives there.The traditional end of their stay was a visit by the Amer-ican guests to the Pieniny Mountains and a trek to the Red Monastery on the Slovak side of the Dunajec River.

Maciej Zabierowski

Cadets during their visit at the Jewish Center

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out still in 2010. The concert in Oświęcim was not only their first in Poland, but also in Europe. Moreover, the group’s visit to Poland and Oświęcim was not just for purely artistic reasons, it also had a person-al, symbolic, and emotional meaning. All the members of the group are grandchil-dren of Polish Jews. Until now, this place— Ausch-witz —was only a symbol of tragedy, which they re-membered from their school trip to Poland. This time, the perspective was completely different, and the group en-thusiastically approached the idea and concept of a Festival for Peace in a place such as Oświęcim.” The victory of life over death is

very symbolic for us vocalist Ormi Glikman commented before the concert.As banal as it may sound, music is the universal and international language of cooperation and the com-bined forces of various local organizations, institutions, and individuals show that the project in Oświęcim can succeed, and not only meet the criteria of a high level of artistry, where everyone could find something inter-esting for themselves, but also promote the city in an original way. Therefore, we await Life Festival 2011! More about the festival: www.lifefestival.pl

ASz

Hatikva 6 during their concert at Life Festival Oświęcim 2010

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This retreat “Bearing Wit-ness” has already taken place for 14 years. It was started in 1996 by Bernie Glass-man, who together with Eve Marko, organized the first group of Peacemakers to come to Oświęcim and spend a week in November to meditate at the site of the former Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp and in this way bear witness, honor the memory of those who were killed, by experiencing “not knowing and personal suffering.” These extraordinary retreats have, from the beginning, had an international and in-

terfaith character: taking part in them have been Jews, Bud-dhists, Catholics, and Mus-lims from all over the world.

The basis for these meetings are three tenants created by the Zen Peacemakers: “Not-knowing”—thereby giving up fixed ideas about ourselves and the universe, “bearing witness”—to the joy and suffering of the world, and “loving actions” —towards ourselves and others. In the spirit of these three tenants, participants experience Auschwitz.

This time, it was not Novem-ber, but June that the Peace-

maker group took part in the weeklong retreat.

Each day started at the Center for Dialogue and Prayer with meetings in small groups, led by leaders of various faiths. This was an important time for participants, where in an atmosphere of mutual re-spect they spoke about their experiences. Individuals who come for these retreats often have a very personal connection to Auschwitz and the Holocaust through their ancestors, and the morning meetings allow them to open up and because of this better experience this place.

After the morning meetings, the group spent most of the day on the ramp at Birkenau meditating in silence, read-ing out the names of the victims who were murdered in Auschwitz, while deal-ing with the unusually hot June weather. Apart from daily meditation in the camp, there was time for Jewish, Buddhist and Christian reli-gious ceremonies conducted in smaller groups by the clergy of the given religion, while the Kaddish—the Jew-ish prayer for the dead - he was said together in four languages under the care of Rabbi Ohad Ezrahi. An extraordinary spiritual ex-

perience was meditating the entire night in one of the bar-racks, when those willing shared their experiences with other participants. Taking part in the meditation both on the ramp as well as in the barrack during the night vigil was also exceptional thanks to August Kowalczyk—a Polish prisoner, who on June 10, on the anniversary of his escape from Auschwitz, shared his experiences in the camp and that of his further work in promoting reconcili-ation among nations. For Au-gust, these were not the first mediations on the ramp at Birkenau. He took part in the Peacemaker retreat in 1998.

During the last day spent at Birkenau, the group walked together through the camp, stopping at stations, where they prayed for, among oth-ers, the victims, but also for the perpetrators. Father Manfred and Rabbi Ohad led these stations.

As opposed to the morning meetings in small groups, evening meetings included all 150 participants together. During these meetings, those willing shared their insights arising from the stay in the camp and also their experi-ences arising directly or indi-rectly from the subject of the Holocaust or Auschwitz.

This year’s retreat was miss-ing Marian Kołodziej, who had taken part in the groups meetings every year. He was remembered by the partici-pants while in the camp and during their visit to his ex-hibit Memory Images: Laby-rinths. One of the evenings featured the presentation of a new film made by one of the participants that tells Kołodziej’s history.

The retreat ended with a Sabbath dinner led by Rabbi Ohad. With a love for life, another retreat of the Peace-makers has ended in Ausch-witz.

WB

Photographs show participants of the retreat on the grounds of the farmer camp Auschwitz II-

Birkenau

Information about the Zen Peace-makers Institute can be found

online: www.zenpeacemakers.org

From June 7 to 12, over 150 individuals came to Oświęcim, to take part in the yearly retreat organized by the “Zen Peacemakers” institute, which was created by Bernie Glassman.

AN iNTerfAiTH meeTiNg wiTH AuScHwiTz

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Peace Boat is a Japan-based, international NGO that has been working since 1983 to promote peace and sustain-ability, mainly through the organization of educational peace voyages onboard a large passenger ship. The Peace Boat Hibakusha Project invites survivors of the atom-ic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to join global voyages and share their testi-monies of the horrors of war, as well as link together with victims of other wars and with youth around the world to jointly express their mes-sages for peace and nuclear abolition.

Peace Boat was started as a way to educate youth to come to terms with Japan’s

past war responsibility and to form bridges in order to build a peaceful, sustainable future. Combining this focus on rec-onciliation and the Hibaku-sha’s calls for peace, this visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau was a long-held dream for Peace Boat that could finally be re-alized.

Eight Hibakusha joined this visit, including some who had been teenagers at the time and directly experienced the devastating bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 which killed an esti-mated 160,000 people then. Also amongst the group were those who were affected by radiation after the explosion, in utero at the time, or the child of survivors—known

as Second Generation Hiba-kusha, and Japanese youth working together with the Hibakusha on their voyage for peace. These eight are part of the approximately 250,000 survivors now officially certi-fied by the Japanese govern-ment. Having departed from Japan on April 16, they have travelled around the world as they share their testimonies with people in different coun-tries. They have met with vic-tims of war around the world, including people in Viet Nam affected by Agent Orange/Dioxin, and learned more about the history of World War II—including Japan’s militarism and atrocities com-mitted throughout the Asia-Pacific region. However, the visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau was the first time for the Hibakusha to witness person-ally the legacy of such an in-stitutionalized massacre.

The Hibakusha visited rainy Auschwitz and Birkenau in silence, humbled by the ex-perience. The visit hit every member of the group with the immense magnitude and cruelty of the massacre that was perpetrated there. In the afternoon, Hibakusha met with Mr. Wilhelm Brasse, a 92-year-old survivor of Auschwitz, and a group of young people in the Center for Dialogue and Prayer. This

was a very special occasion for the survivors of two dif-ferent World War II tragedies to meet directly, and share their experiences with each other and with the young people of Poland and Japan. While the Hibakusha are nor-mally in the role of giving tes-timony themselves, they had the opportunity to listen to Mr. Brasse. They were deeply moved by the power of his clear, detailed testimony, and his manifest sense of respon-sibility and passion to pass on his experiences and message to the next generation. Listen-ing to Mr. Brasse’s testimony reminded the Hibakusha of

the importance of their own role to pass their experiences on the next generation and prevent such horrors from ever occurring again.

Upon reflection, the Hiba-kusha said that this visit and sharing exposed to them the weakness of human beings —that they can be capable of doing things unthinkable during peacetime. Some of the group also acknowledged that the Japanese military also committed similar atroci-ties in countries throughout Asia. The common recogni-tion of all participants was that neither what happened in Auschwitz and through-out the Holocaust, nor what happened in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, was justifiable, and must be prevented from ever being repeated.

Although the visit was brief, the experience of visiting the Auschwitz-Birkenau Mu-seum and meeting with Mr. Brasse and Polish high school students affected the Hibaku-sha deeply. Peace Boat hopes to continue to work with the Center for Dialogue and Prayer, and in the future reg-ularly organize similar pro-grams to allow more people, especially youth who have limited access to the legacy and memory of World War II, the opportunity to also be exposed to what the Hibaku-sha experienced during this exchange.

For more information about Peace Boat, visit:www.peaceboat.org/

english .index.html

A group of eight Hibakusha (atomic bomb survivors) participating in the Global Voy-age for a Nuclear-Free World: Peace Boat Hibakusha Project visited Oświęcim to see another side of World War II.

A SHAriNg Of TeSTimONieS: SurViVOrS Of HirOSHimA ViSiT AuScHwiTz-birKeNAu

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A participant of the Peace Boat Hibakusha project

Wilhelm Brasse—former Auschwitz prisoner

Meeting with Wilhelm Brasse—former Auschwitz prisoner


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Historia

Some received a spoon to-gether with a bowl. Czesław Arkuszyński has written in Oś: “A less sympathetic Stubendienst gave me a cup, bowl and spoon, and pointed out my bed. ... The spoon was made of steel and was com-pletely rusty. I spent more than an hour scrubbing it in the sand behind Block num-ber 23.”Metal spoons were much more common than the wooden ones made in the camp. In many cases, the prisoner had no spoon at all. Moreover, it was not nec-essary. The soup could be drunk straight from the bowl. Alfred Fiderkiewicz writes in his book: “Having received the the soup for the first time, we stood over bowl in fours and did not know what to do. We had no spoons ... Finally, following the example of oth-ers, we started to lap the soup out of the bowl, but somehow we were not successful. We looked at each other. Some people spit out everything, others only potato peels and weeds. Soon we learned to eat the entire contents of the bowl as well as to lick the bowls completely clean.” In some parts of the camp to have a spoon was even prohibited.Spoons made in the camp workshops were not paint-ed or even signed, this one is special. Its handle was painted yellow and on one side black paint was used to inscribe the name “Zośka,” and the other side is the camp number “30921.” At the top of the handle is a hole drilled in the handle, which probably served to tie the spoon to a belt. Thanks to that its owner could always have it with them as well as make sure that no one else would take it as their own. Perhaps the spoon was not necessary, but it allowed one to retain the remnants of human dignity, just to eat soup, “like a per-son.” In many cases, it helped in life, because sometimes the soup was hot and they had to eat quickly.“I will never forget the first meal in camp. We were very

hungry. We were made hap-py when we noticed the even-ing soup pot was brought to us. Our joy did not last long. It turned out that for every five women there was one small container of soup, and we were not given any spoons for the soup. The first woman in the five had to eat a bit of soup and give it to her neighbor. Since it was very hot it could not be quickly consumed. The waiting women yelled at her: “Hey! Give us some! Give us the bowl! … Everything pos-sible was done to degrade us and bring out our animal in-stincts,” Sara Urbach wrote in her testimony. In many ways, wooden spoons were not perfect. They were large and injured the corners of the mouth, and it was difficult to keep them clean. But it was better than not having a spoon at all. Despite its drawbacks for the prisoner it was a real treasure, as evidenced by the fact that wooden spoons that have been preserved, were found in various hiding places in the attics of the housing blocks.The way the yellow spoon was decorated (not even tak-ing into account the name, which may have been a pseudonym) indicates that its owner was a woman. The number “30921” marked one of the Jewish women who was deported to Auschwitz in January 1943, transported from the ghetto in Grodno. Out of the 3,650 men women and children, after the se-lection, only 365 men and 229 women were sent to the camp. The others were most likely killed in gas chambers. It is unknown if she managed to survive. No documents about a prisoner with that number have been found, so we do not know whether she managed to survive. Some women from this transport were taken to the Raven-sbrück camp. The spoon was found on the site of the former Auschwitz camp after the War.

Agnieszka Sieradzka ABSM Collections Departme

Born in Straszęcin, near Dębica, on November 20, 1917, she was the third, youngest child of Alfred and Aniela (née Kurczak). Janina’s father was an estate manager in the Rzeszów area, which meant that the family frequently moved. Janina graduated from gim-nazjum and commercial school in Nowy Sącz, and also attended Alfred Ter-lecki’s Private School of Fine Arts in Cracow.Several years before the start of the Second World War, her family moved to Oświęcim, living near the train station. In August,

1939, Janina began an intern-ship at the local Metal Roll-ing Mill.In the autumn of 1940, she came into contact with Auschwitz prisoners for the first time when the sur-veyors’ detail was carry-ing out measurements near her home. She joined other women in supplying them with food. With the consent of the SS men, the prisoners went to the home of Helena Stupka, one of the organizers of the relief movement. They received food and medicine there and secretly dropped off letters to their families. Janina mailed these letters or delivered them person-ally to the addressees. In 1941, the Czernek family was ordered to leave their home, which was taken over by the Germans. They moved to a new address near the Oświęcim Main Square, and Janina went to work for the German Anhalt Company (the prewar Pi-ast Cooperative). In the fall of 1941, she was employed by the Petersen Company, which had its offices in the

house she had lived in be-fore being expelled. She remained in contact with the prisoners who came to carry out various kinds of repair work at the Petersen offices, supplying them with food, medicine, and litur-gical items, and receiving their illegal correspondence. She also put out food for the prisoners working on the new road from Oświęcim to Dwory. She continued her aid work until the end of the war.After the war, in 1946, she ran a stationery store. In 1947, she married Władysław Komusiński and later had three children, Zbigniew, Jan, and Anna. After the birth of the chil-dren, she no longer went out to work and stayed home to care for her family. In 1967, they moved to Krzeszowice, and in the following year to Mikuszowice (near Bielsko), where she died on April 14, 2000.After the war, in recognition of her service, she received the Oświęcim Cross.

JanIna CzERnEk (1917-2000, maRRIED namE: kOmUSIńSka)

peOpLe Of gOOd wiLL VeSTigeS Of HiSTOryfrOm THe cOLLecTiONS

Of THe AuScHwiTz muSeum

Has anyone ever wondered how many prisoners of Auschwitz used spoons? Seemingly a simple question, but in

the case of Auschwitz there are no simple an-swers. In reality, it was quite various.

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Recently, I have been dealing with the matter of locating and photographing all the bunkers and air raid shelters in

our city. What interested me above all was the area from the Old Town to Monowice. Initially this seemed to be enough, because I did not know that the Germans built as many as 150 shelters during the occupation. So far, I have found 45.

I set my goal to locate and in a sense inventory them. Walking around the areas where they are or were locat-ed, I ended up in the end on the site of the former Buna IG Farben. As I walked past the buildings, which are ru-ins today, I wondered what

was in each of the halls. In the nearby Monowice, where there was a sub-camp Monowitz III, apart from bunkers I came across sev-eral interesting places. In addition to the supports, which held up the roofs of the barracks, I was able to photograph one of the few standing barracks. As it turned out, during the occu-pation, the barrack was the one where the Germans had their offices.My attention was drawn to the red brick buildings quite far from each other. These were electricity distributors. After walking into one of them, I noticed something lying on the ground. It was a porcelain insulator, black in color. It looked rather nor-

mal, but I decided to take it with me. After cleaning it at home, I found something written on it: S.A. 10 1941, imprinted in the porcelain.I decided to return to the place where I found the in-sulators to look for another. I found several, but they did not have any writing on them. I wondered what happened to the rest of the insulators because in the electrical distribution center there must have been many. I have not fully resolved another mystery, but I have saved another item, along with the memory of the times and the people of the sub-camp Monowitz III.

Mirosław Ganobis

frOm gANObiS’S cAbiNeT

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A wooden spoon

Insulator found on the site of the former electricity distribution center


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Photographer

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The concert of Mazel Tov! Cocktail Hour band took place on July 4, 2010 at the Jewish Center. The band plays klezmer music. The Oświęcim audience, attending the concert in large numbers, had an opportunity to admire their artistic performance.

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ArTiSTic SpriNg AT THe iymc - Auschwitz-Birkenau...

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