The Krzyżowa Foundation takes part in the "Ways of Remembrance" project, under which young people from Poland, Germany and Russia are looking for the families of former concentration camps prisoners. It is a project carried out in cooperation with the Arolsen Archives, which possess the belongings of former prisoners (mostly from the concentration camps Neuengamme and Dachau), which the Allies secured on the areas of the former camps after 1945 and reached the Archives in the early 1960s.
Willing to help the Arolsen Archives, which set themselves the goal of handing over the personal items to the families of the victims, the young people through the Krzyżowa Foundation ask for help in finding relatives of former concentration camp prisoners.
Read more: #StolenMemory - searching for the families of former concentration camps prisoners
From 14th to 18th February the Polish-German online youth exchange „Ways of remembrance” took place at IYMC Krzyżowa. It was a part of the project in which participate 8 schools from Poland, Germany and Russia. Involved in the Kreisau-groups I and II was 70 pupils (age 16–17) and 6 teachers from the German Berufliche Schule des Kreises Stormarn in Bad Oldesloe and the Polish I Liceum Ogólnokształcące im. Adama Mickiewicza in Węgrów.
The pupils worked on a very special historical topic: based on the Arolsen Archives projects documentED and #StolenMemory they had the opportunity to learn about the historical and political background of National Socialism and come into contact with the individual stories of persecuted people and their families. With the help of original documents, they did research on personal destinies and items (so called „Effekten“) of former prisoners of concentration camps. The goal of their work was to search for relatives and, after finding them, hand them over the personal item(s) of their family members. During the whole week, pupils worked in small binational groups and prepared documentation about their work.
Read more: „Ways of remembrance” - Polish-German online youth exchange – 14-18.02.2022
Hosting numerous groups is everyday life in Krzyżowa, but also a challenge that manifests itself, among other things, on culinary grounds. Nutritional issues play an important role both during school exchanges and other stationary projects.
More and more people who eat our meals are on vegetarian, vegan or exclusion diets, and in order to meet their expectations, we are constantly developing the offer of our canteen. For this purpose, on 8-9 February 2022, a training in vegan cuisine was organized by Katarzyna Gubała for our kitchen employees. On her blog you can read the report from this event and see how Krzyżowa looks from the inside.
Read more: Training in vegan cuisine – 8-9.02.2022
There was always something wrong lately - either too cold, or too wet, or too windy, etc. We waited a long time, looking for the sun and friendly temperatures, which came on 10 February at the end. On that day, beyond all divisions, as part of the employee campaign, we started the 2022 garden season.
The main task was to prepare the greenhouse for the first crops - the substrate inside was covered with compost and wood chips, we also tidied up the area around the greenhouse. As part of the accompanying works, we tidied up the old foundation's composter, the existence of which probably only a few knew so far, and we carried out liming the area for the orchard.
Read more: Greenhouse ready for cultivation! Employee campaign on 10.02.2022
