Cold contemplation

Today was definitely a day for remembrance and thinking about the ease with which humanity slips into the behaviour of evil. Our two and a half hour guided tour of the Jewish quarter and the ghetto showed that that evil goes back many centuries. The modern Jewish quarter was once a separate town outside of Krakow’s city walls to which the Jews were exiled in the 17th century after being blamed for a great fire that destroyed much of the city. That town (Kazimierz) is now a suburb of modern Kraków and an area that is seeing a rare resurgence of a Jewish community, with visitors from all over the world and a thriving counterculture.

This is Jan Karski, one of many Poles who tried to thwart the Nazi extermination programme.

As well as the guided tour we visited the museum describing how the holocaust devastated Jewish communities all over Poland. Very poignant and contemporary.

The older I get the more I think that life is a battle between good and evil and the rational and the the angry side of people.

Had a great vegan kebab from Vegab and lots more snow. But today I definitely felt like I was treading respectfully in the footsteps of the dead...