I hope you're not overloaded by this WWII history stuff. Are you? Because, well if you are then I am sorry. Because it is probably going to be peppered through my blog for the next month-ish...although there are recipes and outfits, etc. posts so don't get too upset if this isn't your thing.    Anyway, today was the Warsaw Ghetto tour. I had been to many of these sites on my own during a 2011 trip to Warsaw, but what was missing was the new Museum of Polish Jews (which is freaking amazing by the way), the cemetery and a few other places and facts sprinkled in.   Today was especially difficult for me because, aside from being tired, it was the first time that I felt feelings. I have teared up previously during testimony, but today was the first day that I actually wanted to run into a corner and sob. This is very difficult because this kind of thing is often discouraged in academia, but this group is very "safe" in that regard--as in we are academics but humans first. It is really difficult not to think about one of the biggest genocides in human history for 3 weeks straight without dissolving into tears at one point or another. What got me was the monument to Janusz Korczak . Since he died in Treblinka, the monument is his grave. Thinking about him standing by the orphans during their deportation really made a wave of sadness rush over me and I couldn't shake it for the rest of the day.   However, as you read this, I will be spending the day touring Birkenau. I can imagine the feelings I will feel there will be overwhelming in comparison to this. But, you'll read about that when I get there.   So, really I'm just going to show you a lot of pictures: 

The only synagogue not destroyed by the Nazis left standing in Warsaw. It is still operational.

The interior of the Temple

Interior

Warsaw Ghetto Wall and outside of the Cemetery

Warsaw Jewish Cemetery

Adam Czeriakow's grave. (More info about him in the link)

Graves

Marek Edelman's grave (more about him in the link)

Monument to the Jewish partisans at the cemetery

Symbolic grave of the children of the Warsaw Ghetto

Symbolic grave of Janusz Korzcak. Sculpture of him going with the orphans to Treblinka

Umshclagplatz, where Jews in the ghetto waited to be deported to Treblinka

A little departure from the Holocaust

Memorial to the Jewish Partisans

Polish crossings...a girl with a giant lollipop?

Symbolic grave of some of the Jewish Partisans who died at Mila 18

Memorial to the Jews of Warsaw

Irena Sendler Street (click her name for more info)

Recreation of a destroyed synagogue in Ukraine at the new Museum of Polish Jews

The roof of the synagogue

Roof of the synagogue

The remains of Mila 18, the bunker that was the home base for the Jewish partisans (I am sorry that some of these are out of order)

One of the few remainders of the original Ghetto Wall

Original Wall

Original Wall

Hmmm....

One of the last buildings that looked as is did in the Warsaw Ghetto

This says, "Here there was a Ghetto."

One of the last courtyards as it was in the Warsaw Ghetto

One of the last original courtyards as it was in the Warsaw Ghetto

Courtyard

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