Krakow: a bit of history and breaking some myths. Also, Auschwitz and its horrors.

 I felt very happy to be back in Poland, with its grandmother food in big portions, cheap beer, beautiful women and nice people. We arrived with Dominik in Bielsko Biala as the sun fell on the horizon and decided to cheat and take a bus to spend the night in Krakow. I called Martha, but she was still in Warsaw, returning from a trip around Portugal and having some problems in their  car, so meeting that night was unlikely and finally got a room at the hostel of a friend of her. Arrived at the bus station and the first thing we did was eating a 'zapiekanka', traditional Polish snack consisting of a half open baguette with cheese, mushrooms and a little sauce. We were hungry after a long day and the zapiekanka tasted deliciously like one euro... From there, to the hostel, a well-deserved shower and recover energies.The next day we left our backpacks at the hostel and went to visit the city. We found a free walking tour, in the style of others 'free walking tours' of other European cities. These tours take you through some 3 hours around the city and work on donation bases or tips. They are usually very fun and a great option to get an idea of ​​the history and customs of the place, and meet other backpackers, as opposed to pay tours (which are full of retirees with hat, shorts, Hawaiian shirts, sandals and socks and photo camera) because they gather mostly young people short of cash and travelers hungry for experiences. Unfortunately the guide was not too funny, but also learned a lot about the city and the country, places and history. One legend attributes the founding of the city the mythical ruler Krakus, who built it above a cave occupied by a ravenous dragon. Many knights unsuccessfully attempted to oust the dragon fighting him until a shoemaker named Dratewka gave the dragon a sheep full of sulfur, which he ate, then drank the water from the Vistula River and exploded. The center of town (Stare Miasto) is beautiful, with examples of Renaissance architecture, Baroque and Gothic, and was declared a World Heritage Site by Unesco in 1978.

The city dates from about s. X, when it was starting to be considered an important trading center. Was almost completely destroyed during the Tatar invasions from the s.XIII and then rebuilted, flourishing with the Lithuanian-Polish union between s. XIV and XVI. The city survived intact the atrocities of World War II as it was considered by Nazis as a German city. The most representative buildings and sites are now the Castle and Cathedral on Wawel hill, numerous churches and museums scattered throughout the center, the huge market square (200 m side), the district of Kazimierz (the old town of the Jews of Poland) and Saint Mary's Cathedral.

  From the top of this, a trumpeter plays every hour a famous melody (Hejnal Mariacki) culminating in a broken note. It is a symbol of the city, and according to legend was the trumpeter who playing the same tune constantly alerted the entire population of the coming Tatar invasion and therefore saved the city. Unfortunately, a Tartar arrow pierced the throat of the hero, so the song is played unfinished in his honor. The song is played by the Polish national radio every day at noon, and would be a beautiful and poetic story ... if it wasn't a dirty lie. The legend was forged in the 1920s by an American tourist of the various legends he heard from the locals and later captured in a famous book, "The Trumpeter of Krakow," Newbery Award winner in 1929.
Wawel Hill is also beautiful, with its Royal Castle and Cathedral. The cathedral is considered the Polish national shrine, having been through its thousand-year history coronation site of numerous Polish monarchs. Sigismund Chapel, with its gold dome and his masterful Tuscan Renaissance style of the XVI century, is considered one of the brightest examples of architecture from Poland, and many kings and queens are buried beneath the frescoes and sculptures in its splendid interior.

n the afternoon we met with Marta, which whom I had done a nice trip around Europe a few years ago, and we amused ourselves chatting about this and that and trying traditional food. As she could not host us because his mother was in unexpected visit, we wrote a message in the last minute group on CouchSurfing. After 10 minutes received a call from Jacek offering a couch and a few minutes later an email from Egil for the same reason ... So we met Marta and Jacek later and walked through the city to the picturesque district of Kazimierz, the Jewish community center from the s.XIV to the Second World War, now a UNESCO World Heritage and artists' neighborhood, with the best bars in town.

We made a strategic stop in the Singer and Alchemia bars. The first is a beautiful wooden bar lit with candles, beautiful paintings and takes its name from the old sewing machines that serve as tables. We went early, but according to legend after eleven people begin to dance. There's no place, you say? Above the tables then, of course!. The Alchemia is another beautiful bar of those  which are not forgotten. With its decadent wooden interiors, furniture and paintings, and an eternal cloud of smoke highlighting its evocative atmosphere, all lit in the dim candlelight. The entrance to some rooms is done through a small closet, and it feels like time travel to the 20s. From there, cross the street to Plac Nowy (New Square), which serves the best zapiekankas Krakow. We walked to the center, drank a little more, and went to the home of Jacek, to watch some funny videos and talk about anything just before bedtime.

The next day I decided to try another free tour of the city, the Jewish Tour, around the points of the Hebrew history of the city. The guide was much better this time and it was very interesting to find some half-buried history under the sands of time. The Jewish community in Poland before the war was the largest in Europe (3.5 million, or 33% of total) and only in Krakow Jews numbered a quarter of the total population. We passed the old synagogue (the oldest in Poland and the city museum) and Remuh and Izaac synagogues (one active and the largest of Krakow respectively).We passed the place where they filmed one of the most important scenes of the movie "Schindler's List" and cross the river to the Ghetto. Before War II, Krakow's Jewish population was 68,000. With the advent of the Nazis deported most of the city, and 15,000 other 'able to work' were herded into the ghetto again in subhuman conditions. Finally, the ghetto was liquidated between June '42 and March '43. The population fit for work were sent to camps Belzec and Plaszow, the Auschwitz death camps or simply killed in the same streets. From there we went to the 'factory' of Schindler. Or the museum and the office where the inevitable souvenirs are sold. Schindler's figure is highly controversial, and almost everything you see in the film is fake. Rather, it was the American writer Thomas Keneally who invented the figure in the book "Schindler's Ark". The Jews were rather used as slave labor in their factories, and he was not the author of the famous list, but an officer of the SS. To get into the list they had to have some contact or family in the secret services and, according to testimony of survivors, pay the exorbitant sum of $ 5,000. Alas, another nice myth shattered by the cruel reality ...The next day was our last day in town and decided to go with James to Auschwitz.About 40 kms. Krakow was the largest extermination center in the history of Nazism, which is estimated to have been killed between 1.5 and 2.5 million people. The entrance to Auschwitz I grimly held the famous inscription "Arbecht Macht Frei" (Work makes you free).

The facts, details and crowded conditions of the place are too long and horrible to detail here, and gave me goosebumps. Just thinking of the levels that collective madness can achieve and that this had happened only 70 years ago. I had read "Man's Search for Meaning" by Viktor Frankl, fantastic book which details his experiences as a prisoner in concentration camps from the perspective of its psychiatric effects. One of my favorite books, and I was overwhelmed by a feeling of pain walking through the places described in it and thinking about all the life stories prematurely shattered by the brutal stupidity of men