Room 5: Uncertain choices

Under Nazi occupation, each person faced a dilemma: support or resist, conform or distance oneself. It’s an exceptionally challenging choice to make when millions of people around you are dying.

The fact of Nazi occupation was living amidst nothing but prohibitions, whose violation posed a grave danger. Human behaviour under extreme violence was volatile and inconsistent.

One and the same person could first be a passive observer, then a culprit, a saviour, a victim or the other way around. There could be several days or even hours between changing of those roles. This choice was often exceptionally challenging.

Not everyone who lived in occupied Ukraine was a victim of Nazi mass violence. However, each of them had to choose how to behave. These behavioral patterns were very different: someone helped the Nazis persecute their neighbors, someone on the contrary – saved.

This room presents different patterns of behavior, which often could not be so unambiguous. On the wall are copies of original posters from the Nazi occupation. Biographies of people with contradictory behavior are on three metal stands. It is impossible to understand without reading both sides of each story. Also, you can hear nine stories about life in the occupation through a special phone.