Treblinka (too srs for a fun title)

Today I took a solo trip to Treblinka, the German death camp located an hour and a half away from Warsaw. My driver and guide, Jacek, arrived at 9AM to start the journey with historical facts as we left the city. He pointed out museums and old Soviet buildings, and told me how the current administration changed some parts of the WWII Museum to fit their agenda. It was a good way to begin the day. He told me about how his grandfather died in WWII, and how he loved his & his family’s city. Every year, he explained, on the first day of the 1944 Warsaw Uprising, all traffic stops and every citizen sings the songs of Polish resistance. And how during the entire 63-day anniversary of the event, there are celebrations throughout the city of their dead heroes. When we arrived to Treblinka, celebration of heroes continued.

The small museum at the entrance to the camp features two rooms: one with artifacts found in the remains of the camp upon liberation and after, and one with maps and reconstructions of daily life. The latter prominently showcased the work of those who saved and hid documents from the camp, the doctor/orphan-saver of Warsaw (whose name I am blanking on), and Jewish artists who recreated the camp through their art and words. There was a heavy focus on these heroes, however none of them survived. That was what made Treblinka different—almost no Jew who arrived ever left. 

(TW: Jewish genocide, murder of children/elderly, religious symbols, murder devices, Maya’s retelling of history which may or may not be 100% accurate so take it with a grain of salt)

Treblinka was built in two parts: the death camp and forced-labor camp (known as Treblinka I). Poles were sent to Treblinka I, where up to 20,000died due to starvation and sickness, and Jews were sent straight to the gas chambers upon arriving. An estimated 900,000 Jews were killed at Treblinka—its first arrivals in July of 1942 and last in November 1943. It was one of the first three camps to be built after the Wannsee Conference, where a group of Nazi officials met and decided the answer to the “Jewish Question.” Treblinka was built on the eastern border of the General-Government (German-occupied Poland). To the east was Soviet-occupied Poland. 300,000 Poles and Polish Jews were sent to Treblinka from Warsaw, where they were sorted by men, women, and children & elders. The men and women received haircuts and were led to believe they were being “washed and disinfected” before transferring to a work camp, while the children and elderly were sent to Lazaret. Lazaret was a small building marked by a white flag bearing a red cross, behind it lay two massive pits. The children, elderly, and infirm prisoners were forced to stand at the edge of the pits before being shot in the back of the head. Their bodies were buried on top of each other, and eventually dug up and burned to make space for more. Those who died in the gas chambers were placed on “barbeque style” grills, where their bodies were burned in the open air. 

Today, in place of the (for lack of a more sensitive word) grills, lay two large rectangles made of volcanic rock. They shone in the light rain, and the white stones marked with Jewish symbols of love and loss stood brightly against them. Past these two black rectangles was the main memorial, a large stone statue with faces carved into the top third. On the front two hands reaching upwards are the focal point, while on the back there is only a menorah. Surrounding the memorial however, is the truly breathtaking memorialization of the space. 17,000 stones of varying sizes and colors are planted in the earth, jagged and greyed, 216 of them listing cities from which victims were taken. One stone alone is named after an individual: the doctor who saved orphans in the Warsaw ghetto for much of the war, but died in Treblinka. There are stones of Jewish remembrance scattered everywhere. The area outside of the memorial is completely forested, the train tracks and borders long gone. The Nazis left nothing in their wake. 

After seeing the grounds of the camp, Jacek andI enjoyed pierogîs and I was dropped off at the train station where I’m writing this from. If anyone is interested in visiting Poland, I highly recommend it. In the States we aren’t told anything about Polish history, just that they were victims in the war. In reality, they had the 5th largest fighting force against Hitler, were the original decoders of Engima (no disrespect to Alan), and ENDED COMMUNISM in the nation without a violent rebellion. They are an empathetic and hopeful people, who do not forget the past but carry it as a light guiding them toward a better future.