Treblinka consisted of two camps, the first one being known as Treblinka I. this was a labour camp that became a huge cemetery for several thousand people, mostly Poles. They had to work exceedingly hard for their oppressors, were subjected to constant beating and dying from bullets or illness.

Treblinka II was specifically built to function as a mass extermination camp. When trains with the unfortunate ones arrived, people were separated according to sex, ordered to undress and prepare for a shower. In reality, they found themselves in gas chambers. After 15 minutes they were all dead and their bodies were immediately burned.

Among the victims of this death factory was a well-known pedagogue and a friend of children, Janusz Korczak (real name Henryk Goldszmit). He made a decision not to abandon the children from the orphanage he was running in the Warsaw Jewish ghetto and they all ended their lives in one of the 13 gas chambers.

Altogether, there is not much to be seen in Treblinka, certainly no powerful exhibits, no reconstructed gas chambers, and no local guides. Still, on the territory of the former concentration camp you can view 17,000 granite stones representing places that the victims came from. A visit to Treblinka is recommended for those wishing to understand the holocaust more fully. You will never be able to shake the memory of this place where so many people met pain and death and where birds are still afraid to sing.