Building Bridges Using the Five Senses: July 2013

In June students from ks. Kwiatkowski School in Bychawa visited the WARSAW RISING MUSEUM. The museum commemorates one of the most tragic moments of Polish nation's history - the uprising which broke out in the Nazi occupied Warsaw in August, 1944. The Museum is a tribute of Warsaw’s residents to those who fought and died for independent Poland and its free capital. The exhibition depicts fighting and everyday life during the Rising, keeping occupation terror in the background. Complexity of the international situation at the time of the Rising is portrayed, including the post-war years of the Communist regime and the fate of Insurgents in the People’s Republic of Poland (PRL). The museum holds a huge number of exhibition items, photographs, films and sound recordings. Visitors are guided through the subsequent stages of the Rising until the time when the Insurgents left Warsaw.

Visitors can also see the story of Allied airdrops. Its highlight is a replica of a Liberator B-24J bomber. Much of the exhibition has been devoted to the Germans and their allies, showing their actions in Warsaw as documented in official texts from the time of the Rising and in private notes. A movie theatre shows films about the Rising on a panoramic screen.

Our students were impressed by what they saw. The young generation who know the war time only from the history books and some films could not often believe what they saw in front of their eyes. They could hear the sounds from that time and touch the objects and weapons originally used in the fighting. They could experience a bit of what was everyday reality for their grandfathers and grandmothers.

After that we went on top of the Palace of Science and Culture (Warsaw's highest building) where everyone could compare images of the war-destroyed city remembered from the museum with a contemporary view of a modern thriving European capital.

The memory wall with the names of so many young soldiers...

3D film showing the city just after the fighting stopped (reconstruction)

Liberator B-24J bomber plane used for airdrops

The insurgents used such under-street sewers to move around the city

Students from ks. Kwiatkowski High School in Bychawa celebrated this day by staging a play which they had prepared together with their teacher Monika. All students who gathered in the school's garden first listened to a short introduction which made them familiar with the idea of the day and then they watched a play titled "In the name of freedom and equality". It's a story of several young people coming from different religious and cultural backgrounds who discover that, all in all, the most important things in life are love, friendship and willingness to help other people.