berlin in the morning and arrival in poland

the weather here is so cold! the sun was shining today but the wind was a bit too much for me and people in my group were laughing at me as my teeth chattered. we woke up this morning and had quite the spread for breakfast with lots of different breads, strange juices and milk, bacon and sausage (which are a bit different than american), fruit, and traditional german breakfast of cold cuts available to us at the hotel. our first stop this morning was outside of a famous synagogue which was saved from being destroyed during the famous "night of broken glass" or kristallnacht which took place on november 10th, 1938 and was one of the first widespread acts of violence against jews in germany. the architecture of this synagogue was very beautiful and it was very ornate. next, we walked to a cemetery that was destroyed by nazi's. they nazi's unearthed the bodies of those buried as they ransacked the cemetery. one tombstone remains and that is of moses mendelssohn who was a philosopher who attempted to secularize judaism and assimilate the jews of germany. it is interesting to see that in front of many of these sites stand german police that guard them, showing their importance and that security of these sites is still an issue in germany. we traveled to the silent heroes museum where the director spoke with us but unfortunately we did not get to stay long to look around, unfortunately. following this, we walked past a beautiful cathedral (i'll try to post a picture!). we continued walking and saw a memorial of a woman and child that is an overall memorial for world war two for remembrance and violence. one of the places i looked forward to visiting was the sight of the book burning. this occurred in the spring of 1933, where thousands of germans united and burned upwards of 25,000 books written by jewish authors. there is something to be said for the symbolism of the burning of the books as it turn out to be the horrifying fate of the jewish people. there is a quote from german poet heirich heine, "Wherever they burn books they will also, in the end, burn human beings.” an ominous quote, as it was written before the 1900's. we got back on the bus and traveled to the  memorial to homosexuals persecuted under nazism. this was an odd memorial as it was a giant concrete block with a small window. when you looked in the window a film played in black and white demonstrating homosexual couples kissing. i'm not sure how i feel about this representation as it solely focuses on the sexuality of homosexual relationships, when we know, like an relationship, there is much more to it than that. also, the small viewing window appeared to be making it a sort of privacy. the video as well as the memorial did not seem to connect to the holocaust that much. when i thought about it some more it was actually very interesting to me to see germany's representation of homosexuality as it is still a current issue in their country, much like it is an issue in ours. we walked across the street where we viewed the holocaust memorial. as we crossed the street we also crossed over the bricks that symbolize where the berlin wall once was. very interesting. it is hard to describe the holocaust memorial as it is a vast amount of concrete blocks. when you look from the street they appear to be the same height. however, as you walk through this "maze" some get very tall and you can almost get lost. it's like i didn't know what i was getting myself in to, much like the jewish people. another thing many members of our group found interesting and almost disturbing was the fact that children were running around playing hide and go seek. however, after listening to henry speak to us later about how after he wasn't allowed to attend school any more (nuremberg laws) he used to play in the graveyard, it added a new and almost fitting perspective. we saw the gateway to berlin, the brandenburg gate and as we stood in front we saw the funniest thing; a "cart"/"bus"/"multicycle" with about 8 men "drove by" singing at a traveling bar at which they drank while they peddled. very hard to describe. i am going to try and draw a picture to show my parents but i thought it was hilarious but unfortunately was unable to get a picture. boarded the bus and headed to lunch where i had my first gyro! i had to use the restroom desperately but the line was very long, so i went in to the men's room and when the other members of our group tried to tell the german civilian there were girls in there, he did not understand... needless to say, it was slightly awkward, urinals and all :P on a side note, the german people were not very friendly to us as they saw we were a huge american group of tourists. anyway, off to poland we went! we stopped after about 2 hours of driving when we reached the border. we exchanged some money to polish currency, zloty. we boarded the bus again and listened to one of the survivors, henry, speak to us about his childhood from 1930-1940. we stopped for dinner and then continued our journey to our hotel. we arrived at about 11:30 our time, debriefed, got settled, and here i am! it is 2:00 here and i have to be up at 7:00 so i will end this post here.
goodnight (from krakow, poland!)
-jill

the synagogue that was saved.

the only tombstone remaining, belonging to philosopher moses mendelssohn.

beautiful cathedral!

the world war two memorial of mother and child.

the gateway to berlin.

where the berlin wall once was.

(it's the row of bricks running through the middle of the road)

memorial to homosexuals persecuted under nazism.

people are peering through a small window that played the film.

inside the holocaust memorial.

holocaust memorial.

if you click on the picture, you can see it bigger.

feel free to comment, i like to read them (:

auschwitz tomorrow, wish me luck.