Krakow Wrap Up

Jewish Ghettos of Krakow
We started the next day with a walking tour of the two Jewish ghettos of Krakow. Relatively speaking, Krakow was friendlier to its Jewish citizens then most European cities - that is not to say it was a haven as they were still restricted and taxed heavily. The Jews of Krakow found an early ally in King Kazimierz during the 14th century. King Kazimierz gave Jews more legal protection under the King’s Law - they would answer to the King and not local magistrates. King Kazimierz encouraged them to settle as he found their trades and lending useful. It is even rumored that King Kazimierz was in love with a Jewish tailor’s daughter named Ester. She supposedly had two sons and a daughter with him and was built her own palace. The location of this home is uncertain. One favorite is the current Ethnography Museum which supposedly has a secret passage all the way to Wawel Castle!

Early, the Jewish population settled near the Rynek. However, they were forced from this area and moved outside the city center. Kazimierz became the Jewish ghetto in the later 14th century and is one of the most historically famous Jewish ghettos in Krakow (and yes they named it after the King that was fondly remembered by them). Side note about the use of the word ‘ghetto’ - this Italian term was originally used by the Italians for the Jewish Quarters. In early history this term would be more akin to area/district and these communities were very vibrant. These ghettos were not slums like what Americans associate the word ghetto with today. Of course, the ghettos under Nazi occupation would take on a new and more sinister meaning. But let us get back to the tour…

Our first real stop was where was one of the old gates used to be - Jews were always expected to be back in the Jewish Quarter after sunset. The courtyard off of Jozefa Street is a neat little enclosure now with a few cafes on the ground floor and apartments on the 1st. However, this area, and all of the Jewish Quarters we saw, were in extreme disrepair until as recently as the 1980s. In fact, Spielberg used this courtyard in the film Schindler’s List with little need of dressing it down - it was a ghetto as we now use the term at the time. The filming of Schindler’s List in Kazimierz helped to revitalize this area. Although Kazimierz was not the Jewish ghetto at the time of the Nazi occupation, Spielberg mostly used this area for the film.

Another interesting fact we learned from our guide at this point was the Jews living in the ghetto were in a largely isolated community. Speaking Polish only outside the walls for business, the language spoken in the ghetto was Hebrew. It would not be uncommon for those who did not work outside the walls to not speak any Polish at all or very little.

We next visited the site of the old market, Plac Nowy. Today it hosts a continual flea market during the day and restaurants with hip jazz clubs overtake the sidewalks at night. The center building you barely see peaking out is the old kosher butcher.

Most of the Synagogues in Kazimierz are museums now. The Isaac Jakubowicz Synagogue was stripped during the Nazi occupation. After the war, Jews from Russia used this as a home. It later fell into disrepair and was not adopted by a historical society until 1980s. This brings up another interesting side fact we learned on the tour. Many homes and buildings were vacant after WWII and Poland’s borders were shifted when it was again formed into a state. With all the movement of people, it became common for people to take up residence wherever there was space. Our guide’s own family moved into an empty building after the war. They still live in this building today. It just struck me at how much turmoil this country was in where ownership went back to the basics of ‘if it is empty, make it yours.’

As we walked, we saw more examples of just how deteriorated the Kazimierz ghetto was around the time Spielberg started to film Schindler's List. The second pic shows how rapidly the neighborhood is being improved.

Here is a surviving example of the old wall that used to surround the Jewish ghetto of Kazimierz.

From here we walked across the river to the site of the Nazi formed district of Podgorze, this is the ghetto of Nazi occupied Krakow. Sometimes as many as 18,000 people were crammed into 320 one to two story buildings. Jews were moved to concentration camps from here starting in 1942 and then on March 13 & 14 1943, the ghetto was ‘liquidated.’ If not killed on the spot or transported to Auschwitz-Birkenau, they were moved to another concentration camp, Plaszow, a forced labor camp and the home to ‘Schindler’s Jews.’ These pics are a replica of the ghetto gatehouse, the empty chair monument to those liquidated, and finally the front of Schindler's factory (now a museum).

Part of the wall of the ghetto still stands today. The Nazis purposely made the fence with the dome on top to remind those inside of Jewish cemetery stones.

Before WWII more than 64,000 Jews lived in Krakow. Today the community stands less than 1,200 and many of them displaced from other countries than Poland.

Archaeology Museum
The last day in Krakow was a Monday, when most museums are closed. However, the Archaeology Museum was open. This is a small museum overall but has a great collection of Egyptian and Peruvian artifacts. For Polish pre and early history it has an easy to follow timeline. But for me, my favorite was viewing this beautiful carved 'Swiatowid' pillar up close. This four faced deity is from the Ukraine but a common figure among the early Slavic pre-Christian peoples (before 10th century in this area). The deity is often seen in archaeology of this region but relatively little is known about it today. (The first pic is just a shot I had to take of the beautiful garden before entering the museum)

Goodbye to Poland
We said goodbye to Poland and took an evening train for Prague. Before we left we had more touristy food. Here are some pics from the last two days - lard and bread (yes lard and yes it was gross - I couldn't eat it), assorted platter and borscht!

The night train was not nearly as nice as I remember. I had the top bunk and was tossed forward every time the train came to a stop - I'm much too old to sleep through that! So I had a lousy night of little sleep :( Add on the fact that our conductor was very adamant that we should keep all three (yes 3!) locks on our door firmly latched as there was a danger of gypsies stealing on board during the night on our route! Of course I then got the song "Gypsies, Tramps and Thieves" stuck in my head for the remainder of the trip! All joking aside, that was a wake up call as I had read about the problem with gypsies on the trains in guidebooks but had yet to hear of anything concrete until our very strung out conductor told us. (I must say, he would be my stereotype for a former gypsy - bald, earrings, and blood-shot eyes - maybe that was why he was assigned our route?)