Our final day in Poland started with history and ended with celebration. We were prepared to experience the World War II museum of Gdansk as an universal exhibition of World War II history by presenting factual, unbiased tracings of what led up to the war, what occurred during it, and the aftermath. It was useful to learn about other countries because although World War II was an immense part of our course, we were learning about all things Polish history. Our course gave me the perspective that Poland is critical to having a complete understanding of World War II, while this museum reminded me of the global scale of the war. I realized the relevance of the Spanish Civil War to fascism and later World War II and was fascinated by the propaganda on display. As sexual violence and women’s issues have been a topi of discussion in class, I learned about the abuses of “comfort women,” who were Asian women kidnapped by the Japanese army and forced to perform sexual favors. The Holocaust exhibit, in my opinion, did not express the severity of Germany or the Soviet Union nor did they clarify the complicity of Poland and other countries during the war. However, I appreciated the gallery of portraits of murdered Jews presented, as it brought humanity back to the exhibit. Additionally, because I expected the museum to be very unbiased, I noticed biases and subtle nationalistic phrasing throughout, which could be an issue of their translations to English, or a result of the government’s influence over the museum (or both). Clearly, the museum was valuable in some ways, but potentially problematic in others.
After a unexpectedly delicious lunch at the museum’s cafe, the day continued with a tour on the way to the train station, where we saw a statue of Jan Heweliusz and a mural with astronomical designs, pictured above. We had the chance to see more of Gdansk on the walk over, outside of the main streets of the Old City.
Sopot, Gdansk’s beach town, is a charming, though commercialized place. Despite the rain, it was enjoyable to see the Baltic Sea and breathe some ocean air after being in cities for the duration of the trip. We continued our tour to walk along the beautiful residential streets with grand, old houses. An interesting thing we learned was that many of these houses remained untouched during the war and with communism because communist leaders enjoyed staying in them for their vacations.
After our closing meeting, we went to our farewell dinner at Swojski Smak, where we enjoyed beetroot soup among other delicious Polish dishes. It was a lovely evening to conclude an incredibly enriching trip from (Frankfurt to) Krakow to Warsaw to Gdansk!