A trip through Europe 

During the trip we saw a lot of very interesting stuff and experienced many different things. It was so funny, one of the best things I've done and we made a lot of new and long-lasting memories and we definitely came closer as a group. We also met a lot of people. Two, I think we are all going to remember, were the guides from the bike tours in Berlin. The guide in my group was named Jack. He was from England, so he talked the language very well. He really wasn't that tall, but his hair was huge so it definitely gave him a couple of inches. He was really good at his job and wasn't that serious about everything that most guides usually are, which made the tour so much better. I think that's the reason why so many in the class liked it as much as they did and everyone kind of fell in love with him as well. Besides from the many tours and visits we made when we came to a new city, we also had some free time. I had personally planned a lot of shopping. I wanted to bring home as much as possible from the new countries that we went to, and I think that was the goal for almost everyone. There were two kinds of shopping that we did; the old town shopping in the small, cute boutiques, and the big shopping in the huge and impressing malls. My favourite was in Krakow. We had like three hours to go around and look in the shops, and we needed about one and a half just to go through it all. I really love to shop so it was like heaven for me.

Except for the shopping I really liked to just go around in the cities looking at the beautiful houses. It's kind of sad that we don't have that kind of old architecture here in Gothenburg; we just have a few such houses in the inner city. It was a church in Prague that was magnificent. It was so big and tall, and the carvings on the walls were just insane. There were details everywhere and I can't imagine how long it would have taken to do it all.

 
After we had been in all three cities there was just one thing left to do: to visit Auschwitz. We had already seen cells and a jail kind of looking place on tours before, but I think everyone still wondered how it would be to finally see it. I mean, we had read about it for such a long time and no one knew how they would react. Would they burst into tears or would they not feel anything? When we arrived we stood a while waiting for our turn to go inside. It felt a little weird, because in one way you felt sick because you knew that exactly where you were standing right now hundred thousands of prisoners had been walking and working hard and possibly been dying or murdered, but in another way it was hard to understand. What you saw played with your mind; it was a nice sunny very hot day, green vegetation all around and a lot of tourists. It was strange to know that you were in the heart of the annihilation of the Jews.
 

We walked around the concentration camp a while. Everybody was just taken by the moment. We saw the houses where the prisoners had been sleeping and ”living” if you can call it that. The Nazis had been extremely cruel to their captives. We saw all the stuff that they had taken from the people that were sent there; suitcases, prosthetic arms and legs, toys from the children, brushes and shoes, whole rooms filled with shoes. It really hits you, seeing those things. Personally I reacted hardest to the hair. They had collected tons of hair. Some of it was still made as braids. It was horrible.

After Auschwitz the long way home lay ahead of us. Even though it was scary to see, I think it was good that we visited the camp. We should know what human beings are capable to do to each other, and make sure it does not happen again.