My friend Zuzia was born in Poland. She and her sister and parents moved to Chicago when she was about 2, and she has lived in America all her life, but she has a very strong connection to Poland and her remaining family there. She speaks fluent Polish and is visiting right now on a three week trip. I miss her a lot and want her to come back soon, but right now I want to share something she wrote to me with all of you. It’s about a place in Poland she has always wanted to visit, and it’s about a rather extraordinary man whom I have not met, but would like to. So, here’s the first guest writer ever at Cloudwrangler, Zuzia Jarzebska.

“Auschwitz is really surreal.

My grandfather was a prisoner there in 1943. He was once given an assignment to paint a picture on a wall in one of the barracks. After the war (he actually escaped from the camp in 1944, but thats another story…) he went back to the barrack, found his picture and signed it with his name and the number he had tattooed on him. The picture is in barrack #8, which is closed because the museum doesn’t use that building for anything. But my grandfather called ahead to the museum director (who he is buddies with) and arranged for them to open barrack #8 just for us. So today I saw a painting my grandfather painted as a prisoner 59 years ago. ”