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Audiology - an unexpected update

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In Flanders' fields


Sweden didn't actively participate in either world war so Armistice day, when we reflect on the end of WW1, isn't a day that it marked in the annual calendar like it is in large parts of the world. I spent my whole life abroad & going to international schools however, so my education has been very imprinted with studies on both world wars. In particular during my years in Egypt & Belgium (the latter was filled with visits to battle grounds, graveyards & concentration camps both in Belgium & neighbouring #France). 

My most memorable Armistice day I will have been a tween. We lived in Cairo & travelled out to one of the military grave sights, can't remember but I think I went with the choir I was in. An eerily beautiful & peaceful place despite the reality of death being so evident with the endless rows of stones. The day is one that's stuck with me, not just because one of the other students fainted as we stood still for so long. It was just impossible to not feel it's importance with the place full of soldiers; dead & alive.

My 5 years of education in Belgium was very strongly influenced by the events of the world wars too. With it being the home to Flanders' fields we spent a lot of time on the poem & there were multiple trips to Ypres, the trenches & graves that remain in the wider area. If you've never been it is worth passing through one day - I was in my teens for all of these trips & the sorrow & pain is still so palpable even today. Did I find them the most riveting of school trips? No of course not, but they were hardly meant to be. The Flanders Fields museum in the town is an important legacy & you can feel the #history that has marked the place even when you walk around in the town. 

I don't know if you've ever been in a war trench, but it makes you feel very small & humble knowing that young men dug, fought & died there in the mud that you stand in. I think I've been touched by every scene of such horror (although never more so than when we visited a WW2 concentration camp outside Mechelen) & everyone should experience it at some point to see that we must do more to prevent the horrors still going on world wide. 

We must do better.

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