Out of all places on planet Earth, where is one of the last locations many would expect to see a shower of any kind – even one that just shoots mists of cold water for overheated visitors?
Probably the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.
However, that was the scene this weekend at what is now the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Poland. As temperatures pushed toward 100 degrees Fahrenheit on Sunday, some visitors waiting in the museum’s long lines appreciated the shower sprinklers, which released cool mists of water. Others, predictably, found it insensitive.
“As a Jew who has lost so many relatives in the Holocaust, they looked like the showers that the Jews were forced to take before entering the gas chambers,” Meir Bulka, a 48-year-old Israeli, told The Jerusalem Post.
Bulka spoke with the museum’s management, who told him “it was a good way for people to cool off on a very hot day.”
“They said they were sorry if I was offended, and I told them that there is no way to apologize to the victims of the Holocaust,” Bulka said.
Over a million Jews at Auschwitz were killed by the Nazis during the Holocaust in nightmarish poison gas chambers that were disguised as showers.
The Auschwitz memorial museum is now a major tourist attraction, drawing millions of visitors each year.
There is no word yet on whether the showers will stay through the end of the summer.
