Terezin 1

Warning: There are things in here that are not easy to read. They were certainly not easy to write. If any of my readers are unfamiliar with the Terezin Ghetto, I suggest you do some minimal research and familiarize yourself with Terezin’s history before reading any of my Terezin entries.

There is not much I can write yet about Terezin. I can only say a few things, in a fairly disjointed manner, taken from the notes I scribbled on the bus between the ghetto and the museum. So, forgive me.

I brought my camera, but couldn’t bring myself to take any pictures.

It is not like Dachau. Dachau has ghosts, a feeling of unrest. The buildings at Dachau were all destroyed when the camp was liberated, and all the buildings at Terezin still stand. There is a graveyard at Terezin, and perhaps that is why I didn’t see any ghosts there. They are all actually resting, in the very visible cemetery. However, I wouldn’t call it peaceful. It’s more like emptiness than peace, as if history has come in with its broom and swept the ghosts into the wind.

Our guide was a survivor. He had been in Terezin, Auschwitz and Friedland, all camps. Sara asked him how he felt coming back to Terezin to give tours, and all he could say was that it was easy compared to Auschwitz. He took us places and was able to say things like “This is where I was, and what I did, and what was done to me.”

There was a swimming pool. I almost laughed when I saw it. Our guide said they would put groups of Jews into the pool, and give them clubs to beat each other with. The rule was this: that only one man would be allowed to climb out alive. The rest must be drowned. He showed us the balcony from which the wives of the SS guards would watch and cheer.

Near the swimming pool was a tunnel, which led under a hill into the execution yard. Our guide called it the tunnel of death. As I walked through it, I whispered in Hebrew “and though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I have no fear, for You are with me” over and over again to make sure I kept breathing until I stepped into the light.

I wasn’t able to stand in any rooms without windows. I felt choked, and had to step outside to keep from hyperventilating, or vomiting.

As soon as we stepped outside the gates, my stomach growled fiercely. I went from feeling stuffy and sick to starving. How could I be hungry? How could a person be hungry in a place like this? But I saved some bread from breakfast on the bus, and it tasted wonderful. How can bread taste wonderful? But it does.

I did not cry.

This was Terezin. I visit Auschwitz next month.