“Somewhere within each of us there is a survival kit. We never know where it is, or what is in it, until it opens at the critical moment. It contains no drugs or bandages, just firm instructions about what to do – and the necessary strength to do it. That immense, mysterious strength that we never knew we possessed wells up from hidden depths … we don’t understand where it comes from, or by what miracle it helps us to achieve the impossible.” – from ‘The Tin Ring’ by Zdenka Fantlová

It’s been a month since I walked the grounds of the Auschwitz-Birkenau camps. I’m still trying to process it. (I don’t think I ever will.) But, in all honesty, my thoughts and feelings on the experience don’t matter. What’s really important are those who lived through the atrocities first hand. I’ve just finished ‘The Tin Ring’ by Zdekna Fantlová. It’s the story of a woman who survived not one, but SIX concentration camps. I recommend reading it. The Holocaust might be history, but the lessons it stands to teach are still powerful and relevant today.