Today we visited one of the most anticipated places of the
trip - Oscar Schindler’s Factory in Krakow. I have now written two term papers
over the life of Oscar Schindler, so visiting his factory was another chance
for my academics to come full circle.
His factory has been turned into an exhibition museum and is
located at 4 Lipowa Street and was completely different than what I expected
the museum to be. Instead of reconstructing how the factory worked or
reflecting heavily on Schindler or the individuals on his list, the museum
focused a lot on the city of Krakow during WWII. Germans occupied Krakow within
five days after the invasion of Poland.
Schindler was a member of the Abwehr (intelligence service
of Germany) and joined the Nazi Party in
1939 as a spy. To be completely honest, Schindler was a businessman looking to
make a quick and easy profit. Luckily, after realizing how cheap it was to use
prisoners from the nearby Plaszow Concentration camp, Schindler chose to employ
Jewish individuals and subsequently saved over 1,000 lives. When it became
obvious that Germany was going to loose the war in 1944 and concentration camps
began to be liquidated, Schindler convinced the SS to move his workers to the
Brunnlitz Concentration Camp that was closer to his factory.
Although the museum did not focus on Schindler heavily, his
office was still intact and was a powerful sight to see knowing that from here,
over 1,000 Jewish individuals lives were spared.
After leaving Schindler’s factory we made our way back to
the city center of Krakow and visited St. Mary’s Basilica. It first built in
1221 by the Bishop of Krakow. The church is most famous for the Altarpiece of
Veit Stoss, which is the largest Gothic altarpiece in the world. During WWII
the altarpiece was dismantled and shipped to Germany and was discovered after
the war in a tunnel in Nuremberg.
After a quick lunch at KFC (eating cheap at this point in
the trip) we boarded the bus for Worclaw. We arrived in time to walk around the
city square a bit and look at the many statues that dot the streets. My
favorites so far have been the little gnomes that line the streets and tomorrow
I plan to seek out even more!
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