A history lesson from Latvia

I spent the last 3 days in the capital city of Latvia - Riga, and have enjoyed my time so much here that I thought it was a good excuse to start blogging again!

Aside from booking flights and hotels, I had done somewhere between f**k all and jack sh**'s worth of research prior to this trip, figuring I could just wing it.  And wing it, I did.  The past few days have been filled with some much needed R&R, some aimless wandering around the city, and a greatest hits tour of the city's tourist highlights.  Let me share with you some of the things I've learned during my trip to Riga (in list form, because apparently that's the only way my brain can communicate information now that I'm a consultant again):

First, before I get to the list, here's a history lesson: the Baltics have a fascinating mix of cultural history, never having been a true superpower themselves, but rather serving as a battleground and eventual prize to numerous empires who have held interests in the region.  Everyone from the Swedes, Russians (obviously), Germans, and even the Polish-Lithuanians have ruled over these lands (have to admit I didn't realize that they were ever a superpower - interesting, right?).  I visited the Museum of War yesterday, and the whole section of the museum dedicated to the 9th - 16th century read like a multi-player game of ping pong, with consolidation of various regions happening over time. The greatest periods of stability (and influence) in modern-day Latvia came from the German teutonic knights in the 12th-16th centuries, then the Polish-Lithuanians and Swedes took turns for a couple hundred years in the region they named Livonia, then finally the Russians kicked everyone else out with a "winner take all" attitude in a conflict called The Great Northern War.  If the *Russians* are calling something a Great Northern War, you better believe it was big, bloody, and bitingly cold. 

Latvia continued as part of the Russian Empire from the early 18th century until World War I, when the borders of Europe once again became suggestions rather than rules, and everybody went crazy with land grabbing.  On top of that, you had the collapse of the Russian monarchy with the Bolshevik revolution, plus the "red terror" that followed to cement the ideological revolution, and then the invading Germany army knocking on Latvia's door and the retaliatory "white terror" that they brought with them.  Interestingly enough, not perhaps not surprisingly, it was around this timee time that the Latvians decided they had had enough of being ruled by others, and that it was time to declare their independence.  So not only did they have to worry about participating in the greatest conflict the world had ever known, but they had to also figure out the whole "how to be a state" thing at the same time. 

They used support from the German military to fight off the Russians, then counted on the Allies to help them beat the Germans so they could officially become a country.  This took a while to get the Russians to agree to, but in 1920 it finally happened with a pinky promise from Russia to respect their borders forever and ever and ever.  They enjoyed two decades of peace and independence before WWII came around and the Russians used that as an excuse to take back their old lands (shock! Stalin?  never!) and punish their prodigal children for leaving by murdering them, conscripting them, or deporting them to the gulags and/or Siberia.  No seriously, a bunch of women and children were just sent to Siberia to die because they weren't considered strong enough to be good workers in a gulag, but they couldn't stay in Latvia because the Russians wanted ethnic Russians to take over their properties.  My guide in the Museum of Latvian Occupation told us the story of his grandmother, who at the age of 19, was packed up and shipped off to Siberia with her step-mother because a next-door neighbor had made up a lie about their family and told the Soviets as some sort of petty retribution for a neighborly dispute.  The lie?  That their family had kept a maid during the period of independence, which makes them upper class, which means that they automatically are enemies of the workers revolution.    Latvia lost 1/3 of its population during this period to either Stalin's machinations or to people fleeing the country as refugees.

It's no wonder in that case that, when the Nazis invaded in 1942, they were greeted as liberators!  The Latvians thought that the Nazis would restore their statehood and help undo the craziness of the Stalinists.  Sadly, their enthusiasm was quickly tempered when the Nazis started doing exactly what they did everywhere else. In one shocking statistic, only ~1,500 of >70,000 Jews living in Latvia when the Germans invaded survived their two year occupation.  Eventually, the Ruskies kicked the Nazis out, and Russia officially appropriated Latvia as part of the USSR shortly after.  The next 50 years were filled with a Russification of Latvia - they were encouraged to speak Russian and do Russian things like stand in bread lines and talk about how great Stalin is.  When the wall came down and the USSR disintegrated, Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania all (finally) became their own countries again - hopefully this time it will stick.

Thanks for sticking with me through the history lesson - I find this stuff really interesting, but if you're more of a buzzfeed type of reader, then here's the promised list of other fun things I learned:

• Riga is a hotspot for bachelor and bachelorette parties from the UK. A lot of hotels and airlines market toward this demographic, and I ran into quite a few groups stumbling down the cobblestone streets wearing matching flower headdresses or holding each other and singing Stand By Me and For He's A Jolly Good Fellow
• Even though Latvia is on the Euro, things are pretty cheap here.  I had a 60 minute massage in my hotel that only cost 40 Euro!  In the states or Western Europe it would be 2x that price!
• Speaking of spa treatments, there is a beer spa here in Riga.  You can take a bath in warm beer while drinking cold beer from a frosty glass.  After that, they put you on a "straw bed" to let your skin "breathe" and absorb all the minerals that apparently beer imparts on you.  You can also spring for additional treatments like a beer massage or a beer sauna, where apparently the wood in the sauna has been soaked in beer.  I was kind of curious to try this until I saw the 100 Euro price tag - if I'm going to pay that much to smell like a brewery, I'll do it the old fashioned way - by going out on Hubbard St in Chicago and ending the night at the Hangge Uppe, thank you very much
• There are still quite a few ethnic Russians in Latvia today - approximately 25% of the population, actually.  This is a consequence of the USSR's policy of resettling Russian people in Latvian lands - a lot of them ended up staying.  The most interesting part of this is that many of these people refuse to fully integrate into Latvian society.  Mostly of the older generations, they hold Russian passports, speak the Russian language, and refuse to call themselves Latvian.  But there is still a movement for them to get the right to vote here, which I admit I find a tad hypocritical
• Latvian women are gorgeous.  Don't take my word for it - the international modeling community agrees.  Apparently Latvia is among the top 5 countries in the world based on the number of models produced per capita
• As this is Eastern Europe, there are some seedy things available to you here.  As a female, I am rarely to never exposed to such things, but two German guys I befriended told me about their taxi driver, who was offering to take them to the best brothels in all of Riga. The driver boasted about how beautiful the women are (model-like, apparently) and how they will make you feel like "a rocket to the moon" (a cringe-worthy expression if I ever heard one).  Plus, apparently sex is very reasonably priced here, according to the taxi driver.  When I asked the Germans if they knew what "cheap" was, they blushed and told me they've never actually visited such an establishment, but according to the driver, it costs 30 Euro for 15 minutes of rocket-worthy fun time.  No idea if this is actually inexpensive - perhaps I'll start asking this question when I travel so I can figure out what the going rates are in various places
• There were a ton of Japanese and sushi restaurants throughout Riga - way more than you would expect for a city of its size.  It seems like 1 in every 3 or 4 restaurants is a sushi restaurant in fact .  I remember noticing this fascination with sushi in Russia when I was there too - maybe the sushi obsession here is driven by the same factors as it is there?
• My taxi driver from the airport told me a story about this large bridge that goes over the main river in Riga (as we drove across it).  The bridge has suspension wires, and apparently 4-5 years ago, a guy climbed up all the way to the top and threatened to jump off the bridge unless someone brought him a donut.  Yes you read that right - a donut.  The authorities obliged this weird request and the guy came down, but later they put barbed wire on the suspension wires so that no one can repeat this performance and demand more baked goods.  Also, now the locals call it the donut bridge 
• I would describe Latvian food as hearty peasant-like food.  Most of the dishes seem to involve one of the three P's: potatoes, porridge, or pork.  They also have quite a few legumes - with broad beans and 'grey peas' turning out to be surprisingly tasty.  To be fair, the tastiness factor benefits dramatically from serving everything with a healthy (or not-so-healthy) dollop of sour cream

That's it for now - onto Lithuania next!  I think I'll be able to skip the history lesson in the next post because the stories of all 3 Baltic countries seem to be quite similar...

Auschwitz-Birkenau: All of the feelings

Posting this today - September 25, 2016, but in actuality this visit took place in July of 2016.  I was hesitant at first to publish because of how strong my emotional reaction had been to this visit, and honestly I forgot about it.  Now that I am traveling again - in Eastern Europe especially - I feel it's time to finally post this piece, particularly because staying quiet about these atrocities is never the right answer.

Yesterday I arrived in Poland for a few days of solo traveling.  I began today with the intention of writing a blog about all of today's activities - the fun exploring I've done, sites I've seen, and my own brand of cultural observations.  As the day is now over, I can't bring myself to write about anything except how I spent my afternoon - visiting the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp. The experience was so moving and emotional that I need to write about it or else I'm worried I won't be able to sleep tonight.  So, here goes.

I've said many times that one of the reasons I love traveling is that it gives me the opportunity to put myself into the shoes of people completely different from myself: people who lived in different times with foreign norms and cultures.  I geek out at the idea of running down the secret staircase Vlad the Impaler used to escape from the Ottomons at his Romanian castle, swimming in the same alpine lake as did Wagner at Hohenschwangau, or watching a fire dance in Bali be performed the same way it has been done for generations. I feel a thrill of excitement from these experiences, and a connection with foreign people and cultures that cannot be simulated in any other way.  Frequently I find myself lost in daydreams about bygone eras and what my life would have been like if I had been born in a different place or a different time.  

I like to travel because it enables me to put myself into other people's shoes, but today at Auschwitz, none of the people whose memories dot the terrain had shoes I would ever want to walk in.  Still, I tried to walk through the museum with the same empathy as I usually approach travel, and as it usually does, the experience evoked many feelings.  Below is my attempt to categorize them.

Before I get to my commentary, let me first give a brief overview of the camps and the museums as they are today.  Auschwitz-Birkenau was divided into three different areas, each built as the needs of the camps expanded and the population imprisoned there grew.  I was able to visit the two main ones today: Auschwitz 1, which was originally a Polish military barracks before being repurposed by the Nazis, and Auschwitz 2/Birkenau, which operated on a much larger scale and showcases the machine-like efficiency with which the Nazis approached their "final solution."  The two camps are about 2 km apart, and a shuttle bus operates between the two.  Auschwitz 1 has been largely reconstructed and turned into a museum.  Inside the rows of brick houses which used to serve as housing, workplaces, or prisons for the unfortunate camp residents, now you can see curated exhibits that attempt to explain what happened here, to whom it happened, and the means with which it was done.  (The question that no museum can answer, but which is rattling around in my brain like an angry wasp, is WHY?  But I'll leave that for later.)  Auschwitz 2/Birkenau is left mostly as it was found when the Russians swept in and ousted the Nazis.  Some of the buildings are still standing, but most of what you see there is the sheer scale of the operation.  The ruins of the crematoria can be found here as well - the Nazis made sure to destroy them before the Russians came, but it doesn't take a very vivid imagination to mentally reconstruct the houses of horror as they once stood.  

And now, my feelings on the experience, in as close to chronological order as I can gather:

Excitement:

Walking in to the complex, I knew that I should expect it to be a downer.  How could it not be?  But still I was excited to see the museum and learn all that I could.  I've always loved WWII history and the stories of the people who lived through it.  The famous Arbeit Macht Frei sign confirmed my feelings - this is a historic place of momentous significance, and I'm excited to experience it.  

Confusion:

Since I was doing a self-guided tour, all of the information I got was from reading the signs posted and walking through the exhibits.  The first sign I read after entering through the camp's gates mentioned that "here" was where the bodies of prisoners who had been executed for misbehavior would be displayed as a warning to others.  Also some people would be executed here too.  My first thought was - "here as in at the camp?  Or here as in this innocuous spot next to a brick wall?"  The site wasn't marked by any gruesome evidence of the terror that took place here.  It's just a corner of a building.  How can such terrible things have happened here - right here - in this spot?  Without this sign present, I would have walked right past and not thought twice about the corner of that building, like I do with so many buildings every day of my life.

Cynicism:

After walking past a few more identical brick buildings, I see one has an open door.  The sign above the door explains that what lies inside details the significance of the camp and the war in Polish history.  The exhibit inside details the invasion of Poland, the rapid deterioration of conditions within the state, and the horrific treatment of its people.  Photos lined the walls showing Polish soldiers off to face an enemy superior in size, resources, and weaponry.  Maps showed placement of the Jewish ghettos, concentration camps, extermination camps, and battle sites. Other photos showed  emaciated corpses and brutally beaten prisoners, soldiers holding guns to the heads of civilians who kneeled above a pit filled with bodies of those who had died only moments earlier.  Other walls displayed data around the Polish underground resistance movement and uprisings like the one in the Warsaw ghetto, boasting of the heroism of those who fought against their oppressors.  However, on the same wall, photos commemorate the lives lost in direct retaliation for the resistance activities.  Would those people have lived if the resistance movement had not been so active?  What was the point of symbolically rising up against an oppressor who exhibited such ruthless sadism?  Because there was no way that the Poles would actually would have kicked the Germans out themselves - they were outgunned at every turn, and starving to boot!  Of course I don't mean to diminish the significance of their heroism - and heroism indeed it is - but the practical side of me wonders how many more would have survived if they had been less resistant - like the Danish people were, for example.  

Shame:

How could I ever think that??  I'm in no place to judge anyone for their decisions during that time.  The hardest challenges I've faced in my life are peanuts compared to what these people dealt with!  I'm sure some would prefer to die in a valiant but futile effort promoting freedom and democracy rather than live long enough to die of starvation while waiting for rescue that may not come.  Shame on me for presuming to impose my 20th century viewpoints on people who lived through more tragedy in 5 years than I will likely experience in my entire lifetime.

Disbelief:

The next building I enter into displays what the barracks looked like for the prisoners.  I feel like I'm walking through a scene in a Spielberg movie.  The bunk beds look small and uncomfortable; the fabric scratchy and homespun.  But because this reminds me of a movie, it doesn't feel real to me.  Clearly this is just a movie set that I've stumbled upon.  Right?

Sadness:

The walls of the museum - in each cell block - are lined with mug shots of prisoners taken when they arrived at the camp.  Beneath each photo was the birth date of the prisoner (if known), their date of entry into the camp, and their date of death within the camp.  Of the 1.3M people who entered as prisoners, only 200K were alive when the Allies liberated the camp.  The rows upon rows of photos make me realize the enormity of what happened here.  Each person here had a life; they had a family, a job, problems and drama, dreams and aspirations.  They were like me - maybe not exactly, but in the most fundamental of ways they were.  And then one day their entire life was uprooted, and they were sent to Auschwitz to suffer and die. Why?  I can't answer that question.  No one can.  But their faces now line the halls of the walls that once imprisoned them.  The expression on each face is some combination of anger, sadness, and defiance.  The uniformity of the photos - with their freshly shorn hair and identical positioning within the frames, makes it seem like they weren't truly individuals.  Like they weren't truly people.  What a waste.  What a sad, tragic thing that can never be undone.

Anger:

I peer into a room showing what the living conditions were for the SS officers who ran the camp, and it gets my blood boiling.  These men are living in luxury compared to their wards!  They have larger, higher quality beds, plenty of space to themselves, and personal luxuries like bathing facilities and reading materials which were denied to the prisoners.  Who were these men?  How could they possibly have slept at night, given the terror they inflicted on other human beings?  What monsters!

Grief:

The next building houses artifacts that prove the crimes perpetrated here did indeed occur.  When the Allies liberated the camps, they found warehouses filled with the possessions of the people who had come to die here.  I see piles of spectacles, clothing, and a room filled with shoes.  The shoes are dirty and mistreated - many people had traveled a long way before their journey ended at Auschwitz.  I find myself trying to identify a shoe's mate in the pile, which is admittedly a weird way of attempting (and failing) to make sense of the disorder and loss.  In another case I see piles of empty suitcases with names and addresses painted onto them.  These people had been tricked into thinking that they were only being relocated, not exterminated.  The hopefulness with which these people must have written their details on this luggage, imagining that one day they might return to the addresses from whence they came, brings tears to my eyes.

Annoyance:

Another visitor going through the museum in front of me keeps taking photos of these things when there are signs everywhere clearly showing that you're not supposed to do that.  Show some respect, punk! 

Horror:

The final group of artifacts hits me the hardest: the children's belongings.  Tiny baby clothes - many too small for my 1 year old nephew to fit into, dolls with smashed ceramic faces, and discarded pacifiers are delicately arranged in a display.  Who were these children?  Who could they have grown up to be if they were given the chance?  Were they even allowed to have names?  I know that some children were born within the camp's walls - were they just assigned a prisoner number at birth?  Also - the fact that the Nazis saved the clothes of babies who entered into the camp is horrifying.  All of these goods were collected with the intention of being sent back to Germany for reuse.  Can you even imagine being a German mother receiving a used baby bonnet or sweater for your infant, knowing that it had been harvested from the corpse of a murdered infant?  I don't even have the words.  

Despair:

One of the most sacred places in the museum is the killing wall between Blocks 10 and 11.  This is where the execution by shooting of thousands of prisoners - mostly the "troublemakers" - were carried out.  The wall now serves as a memorial to them, with flowers and candles laid at its base.  These people never had a chance.  They were the ones who tried to escape, who fomented rebellion, and kept ties with the outside world.  They were the ones who whispered of rescue and kept hope alive.  I approach the courtyard with solemnity and respect, but feel hollow with the realization that so many brave efforts to rebel were made in vain. Evil people inflicted evil deeds upon others here, and nothing I do or say will ever change that.  

Anger (again):

I walk past the room in Block 11 from where the "summary judgments" were issued by a kangaroo court of SS officers.  Almost always the sentence was death by shooting in the courtyard outside.  The room contains a simple rectangular table and a row of wooden chairs.  From these seats were so many atrocious and amoral decisions made, seemingly without conscience or consequence. Ugh how could those men do that to fellow human beings?!?!?!?

Amusement:

There are two rooms in which the prisoners about to be executed would disrobe (entirely) before being led outside to their fate - one room for men, and one for women.  I wonder why on earth the Nazis cared about giving them separate dressing rooms?  What were they trying to do - preserve the prisoners' dignity?  BAH.

Anxiety:  

I'm going downstairs to the lower level of Block 11, which served as the prison within a prison.  The walls are clearly thick, and the ceilings are low.  The narrow stairway and hallway are overcrowded with tourists, and I feel a lump of anxiety forming in my throat.  If this is how I'm feeling, I can only imagine how the prisoners felt when they entered.

Shock:

I see the "standing room only" cells, which were purposely constructed to be so narrow that a prisoner could not comfortably lie down in them.  In fact, I'm not sure that a prisoner could even comfortably sit down in them.  They were completely walled in except for a small grate at the very bottom of the cell, through which the prisoner entered and the guards presumably provided food.  It must have felt like a cold, dark, vertical coffin.  How long did people survive in these?  I can't even imagine what that would have been like.

Awe:

I walk past the cell of a pastor who voluntarily died by starvation so as to save the life of another prisoner.  

Relief:

I'm out of Block 11 - that building was awful.  There are some other buildings in Auschwitz 1 that I haven't yet seen, but I'm running short on time and am frankly glad to have the excuse to leave to go to Auschwitz 2.

Curiosity: 

The buildings that I am skipping appear to mostly be dedicated to country-specific struggles of the Holocaust.  There's a building for the victims from the Netherlands, from Bohemia, and Hungary.  I wonder about the other countries whose citizens died at the hands of the Nazis - are they similarly represented (and I just haven't walked past their particular buildings)?  

Amazement:

Stepping off the bus at Auschwitz 2/Birkenau, I am amazed at the sheer size of this facility!  Rows upon rows upon rows of buildings (or the ruins of buildings) reveal the scale upon which this facility operated at its peak.  Auschwitz 1 felt cramped and small by comparison.

Sadness (again):

I undertake the long walk from the entrance of Auschwitz 2 to the back of the property where the crematoria were located.  Jews, fresh off the train, would walk along this same path.  First they would be sorted according to whether they were fit for the back-breaking work required by the camp (most weren't).  Those who were deemed unfit would be herded en masse along the same route I am following to be killed immediately upon arrival.  Wooden guard towers are positioned every 50 meters or so, serving as constant reminders of the loss of freedom that these people endured.  

Thankfulness:

After walking around the ruins of the crematoria for a few minutes, I realize that the camp is about to close so I should start heading back to the entrance.  As I start my return journey along the path through the center of the camp, I realize that so many people were never afforded the privilege of making the return journey.  Suddenly I'm flooded with feelings of gratefulness for being able to live the life that I have.  It's not something that I ever want to take for granted.

Exhaustion.