Munich: Don't let history repeat itself

After recuperating with the relatives for a few days, Faeth and I headed to Munich, Germany (second time’s a charm!). This time, we had hostel reservations waiting for us and a clear itinerary of our three-day visit. And I must say, it felt really good to know where we were sleeping at night and when we’d be touring famous landmarks.

The first day, we took a tour to Schloss Neuschwanstein, the famous Swan Castle nestled deep into the Bavarian Alps. It looks like something out of a fairytale. If the picture seems familiar for some reason, it’s because this is the castle that inspired Walt Disney’s logo and also the castles of Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and Cinderella. It was built in the 1800s by King Ludwig of Bavaria, an eccentric art lover trying to recreate the romantic age of King Arthur. This particular castle was never finished, since Ludwig ran far over budget and eventually was forced into an insane asylum by his family, where he eventually died under “mysterious circumstances” that the government has never fully disclosed.

Schloss Neuschwanstein 

When we were planning our trip to Germany, Neuschwanstein was top of our list of sites to see. My mom had visited the castle when she was a little girl and told us stories of its charm and beauty, so it was a given that we’d visit, too. We found a tour that took us there, which was far easier than trying to organize the trip ourselves. After a 2-hr train rain, a bus ride, authentic bratwurst for lunch and a 1-hr hike up the side of the castle’s mountain in pouring rain, we arrived at the gate. It was every bit as gorgeous and ethereal as the pictures I’d seen, yet there was something hollow and fake about it too—probably because it was fake, a pretty bauble constructed by a crazy king and never meant to function properly as a fortress.

Still, the visit was a lot of fun. We walked through corridors painted in glittering gold and hung with giant tapestries of knights and fair maidens. We saw intricate stone carvings and gorgeous era furniture. And, everywhere, there were swans: swan paintings, swan carvings, swan statues, swan doorknobs… The king adored swans and used them as his personal banner, referencing a Norse myth about a magical swan and knights of old. The royal emblem only appeared in one room, since the castle was really created as a love letter to the king’s favorite composer, Richard Wagner (who, incidentally, wrote an opera about that swan myth).

The castle was one man’s testament to everything noble and beautiful in the world, which was a stark contrast to the next place we visited: Dachau Concentration Camp. Faeth is very interested in World War 2 history, so we found a concentration camp near where we were staying (it isn’t difficult to find such camps in Germany, which had more than a hundred camps and sub-camps). Dachau Concentration Camp wasn’t a death camp like Auschwitz, but it was the first concentration camps the Nazis set up in Germany and their template for the camps that came afterwards. During the 12 years it ran, from 1933 to 1945, more than 100,000 prisoners (mostly men) came through the camp, and at least 30,000 of those never left.

Dachau Concentration Camp

 

Walking through the concentration camp was a somber, thought-provoking experience. We saw the yard where prisoners lined up for roll call, a reconstruction of the barracks where they lived, the crematorium, the gas chambers and the infamous front gate with “Arbiet Macht Frei” (“Work sets you free”) written on it. Along the way, we heard tales of inhuman cruelty and unspeakable determination. We spent the whole day at the camp, but, as I stepped back onto the bus to head back to Munich, I felt like my mind still hadn’t absorbed everything I saw and heard. I felt guilty for not feeling more depressed after visiting a site where thousands of people had been murdered. I think, perhaps, the human mind can’t comprehend so much evil and suffering in such abstract terms. Hearing that 30,000 people died is like hearing a statistic; until you witness it with your own eyes, you’ll never be able to understand.

What made me think the most, though, is the statistics I heard regarding life after World War 2. The Allies beat the Axis powers and overpowered Nazism, yet neo-Nazis still try to steal artifacts from Dachau and other prison camps. People still deny the Holocaust, and groups such as the Jews and the Kurds are still discriminated against. Our tour guide talked poetically about the evil of Hitler’s soldiers, yet the same thing is happening today: genocides in Africa, religious persecution in China, and wide-spread racism and discrimination against the Romani (also known as gypsies) throughout Europe—with one prominent British politician going so far as to say gypsies are “scum… [who] do not deserve the same human rights as my decent constituents” (http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/westminster_hall/2002/jan/15/law-of-trespass).

With this kind of attitude blinding people all over the world, this lack of empathy and even outright hatred towards others, this refusal to acknowledge people as human beings, there is little doubt in my mind that another Holocaust is coming. It is our responsibility to teach respect and love, to open people’s eyes and show them how we’re all part of one mankind. Otherwise, the horrors of WW2 will be repeated again, and again, and again.

"Honor the dead, warn the living"