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There are no signposts, guidebooks or visitors centres for Rajsko.
What is now a dilapidated garden centre was once a Nazi concentration and extermination camp, one of over 40 satellite camps that surrounded Auschwitz-Birkenau.
The Rajsko subcamp was an experimental botanical station used to grow dandelions for the production of latex. Kate Ferry-Swainson, the author of our latest Insights long read found herself there while she was on the trail of Convoy 31000, the only transport to Auschwitz-Birkenau made up entirely of women deported from France for political activities.
In particular, she was seeking traces of the people which the writer Charlotte Delbo records in her literature because only snapshots of them have been captured by the archival record. Ferry-Swainson managed to discover the true identity of one of the women Delbo had written about, and how, conversely, working at the subcamp appeared to keep some of them alive.
Elsewhere, a linguistics expert is trying to unravel the mysteries of the Singapore Stone, a sandstone slab which carries an unknown writing system transcribing an unknown language. And did you know that around 6% of people have an extra nipple? According to this article, having extra body parts – including fingers, toes and testicles – is surprisingly common.
If you have a curious kid then you might want to share with them our new podcast, which aims to answer those frustrating questions you feel you should know how to respond to but can’t quite find the words for. This week’s episode: if rainbows and the northern lights aren’t magic, what are they? It’s the last in this season so, if you’ve not already done so, do go back and check out the previous episodes.
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