Arbeit macht frei…

So I went to Dachau today. Not exactly on the `let´s have fun` list, but more of something I felt I had to do… just like visiting the Sachsenhausen camp when I was in Berlin.

So Dachau was the first camp ever laid out and the only one that lasted the full twelve years of the third Reich. An example for the others, it was not an extermination camp like Auschwitz, but rather a work camp and the training grounds for the SS, where they would learn the ´Dachau spirit’.

The visit in itself was very well documented. The guide walked us through the memorial museum, explained us the rise of the Nazi party, the opening and early ages of the camp, the second stage after Kristalnacht and Austria was conquered and the third one when the prisoners had to work even harder to provide munitions for a war that would be lost… We then walked to the two still standing barracks (reconstruction of what all  34 of them used to be) and again saw the progression through the various stages and how the overcrowdiness made everything even harder for the prisonners.

We made our way through the 34 foundations of the barracks all the way through the old crematorium (were 11,000 were burned) and the großes crematorium and the gas chamber where even more people found death.

It was truly a visit that no words could even begin to describe. This visit might have even been worse than Sachsenhausen for many reasons:

1. The sun was shining… a complete non-sense when thinking of the 200 000 prisoners who suffered greatly within these walls
2. The place is now surrounded with big trees and flowers… especially the crematoriums area.
3. The birds where singing…
4. You know you are standing on grounds were the whole concentration camp system was designed, where hundreds of SS were trained to firmly believe prisoners were sub-humans, inferior beings…not humans beings. Just beings…

When I got back to the city, still shivering, I headed to the only beer garden owned by the city to think and read the camp book – bavarian style (with a beer). I then made my way to Sendlinger Tor, the only gate to the city still in its original state and to Asamkirche which opulence alone makes the visitor forget about the fact that it truly is one tiny church. Afterwards I had dinner in a bier hall dating from the 1400s and walked my way back to the old town.

Tomorrow`s plans are TBD. Nymphenburg Palace maybe? This would lead me in a whole new part of town… Sounds promising!

Tschüss!

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