My hometown, Będzin in the southern Poland, is a very interesting city historically speaking. It has a fourteenth century castle, very early eighteenth century palace and dungeons supposedly built by the German during WWII. Before the war half of Będzin's population was Jewish and it was called the Jerusalem of Zagłębie (the district of several medium-sized cities in the area, bordering with Silesia). There are several remnants of those years - pictures of Jews and catholics living door to door with each other, photos of a beautiful synagogue that had stood near the castle (burnt during WWII), a small synagogue in a basement in the city centre, called The Mizrachi Synagogue and a nineteenth century Jewish cementary on the castle hill (sadly very neglected).

Recently there has been a major discovery in an old tenement-house in the city centre - it turned out that it used to be owned by a very rich Jewish family - the Cukermans - and that in one of the flats there used to be a private synagogue. The frescs had been covered by a layer of ugly plaster, though. My former high school (which on itself is a historical monument - it's been here from 1902 and many of its alumni fought both in the first and second world war) took the responsibility of bringing it back to its former glory and the students volunteer to clean up the walls and uncover the frescs. Even though I've gradutated, I'm helping a bit as well :) I love the history of my hometown and this is a wonderful way to involve myself in it... Feels really great :D