TravelStream™ news feed for member mrcolella on TravelPod's free travel blogs service http://www.travelpod.com/syndication/rss/mrcolella en-us Copyright ©2009 TravelPod.com Wed, 06 Aug 2008 11:47:36 -0400 http://www.travelpod.com http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1216804260/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1216804260/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1216804260/tpod.html Wed, 06 Aug 2008 11:47:36 -0400 World History connections to Europe, Summer 2008

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Florence, Tuscany, Italy

It took an hour and a half to get to Florence; and 3 hours and 40 minutes to get back.
Yes, I contributed mightily to this mistake.
In my self-imposed mad-rush (ummm...we were on vacation, right?)to get us back to our hotel in Rome, I did not choose the Euro-Star train that so wondefully moved us quickly and efficiently in the A.M. On the automatic ticket machine I clicked on a train that was a local, without the refreshment service or clean washrooms of the Euro-Star, a train that stopped at over thirty different towns and didn't get back to Rome until 11:40 at night. I am so glad I had put George Carlin on my MP3 player... Elaine was not so lucky, or as amused.

Anyway, Florence: very walkable, filled with medieval and renaissance churches, paintings, and statues. A lot less people than Rome although enough to cause the usual Disney World lines at the museums. Plenty of shady, quiet alleys and side-streets to explore. The vibe is 180 degrees opposite of Rome. Much calmer. Most people would say, "DUH!" to that last statement, especially in the summertime; however, if you were a martian and landed in the Sahara, you might think that Earth was a very dry place, eh? Rome was all we knew of Italy up until Florence. And, if I may re-state the obvious, I am very glad we saw something else in Italia besides the Roman environs (Ostia Antiqua and Cristofo Columbo were quiet, tiny towns we visited that were among the last few stops on the Roman transit system; Ostia was a large set of ancient ruins, the site of Imperial Rome's harbor at the mouth of the Tiber River, Columbo is a very, very popular beach for 21st century Romans).

Florence's main streets were determined by Julius Caesar's soldiers during the infancy of the Empire, about 50 B.C. The town's italian name, Fiorenza, means "town of flowers".

Bisecting the city is the main water source, the river Arno. There are several bridges that span it, some with houses on them.

Initially, out of the train station in Florence, it is easy to see one's first destination: the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore (Holy Mary of the Flower) is the largest structure in the city. It is topped by a gigantic red-brick dome completed during the High Renaissance in 1434 by the architect/artist Filippo Brunelleschi. This dome is the most recognizable feature of Florence, and it took quite a bit of heartache (15 years of it, to be exact) to construct--- a story for another time. The cathedral and the octogonal baptistry across from it are sheathed in tuscan white marble. The Oriental, dare I say "Moorish", influence to the design makes it all the more striking.

No, we didn't go inside. It is, by all accounts we've heard and pictures that we've seen, spectacular; yet the impulse in our souls to wait for hours in a sun-drenched line was non-existent, so we oohed and aahed outside for several minutes and moved on. The same went for the Uffizi Gallery, a repository for many beautiful paintings including my favorite Botticelli, "the Rite of Spring". I really wanted to see it, but my patience for long, long, long... well, you get the idea. We moved on and happened onto the Piazza della Signoria (plaza of the town leaders) by the Palazzo Vecchio (the old palace).

The Piazza della Signoria is filled with famous statues and is, on this summer's day, a vast open -space filled with tourists. I'm sure I am more world famous after this day because I was haphazardly included in at least twenty photographs involving friends, couples, and entire families snapping pix of each other in front of all the sculptures. "Who IS that guy?" they will say, gathered around the dining room table two months from now... "And how did he get into our group photo?"

After the Bargello Palace, where the artists Donatello, Verrocchio, Brunelleschi, Ghiberti, Cellini, Michelangelo, and the ceramics of the Della Robbia family (Elaine's favorite, for sure) are all represented, we took in the Piazza Santa Croce. It's a sunny plaza with a bunch of artists selling their works in front of the myriad outdoor cafes lining the borders of the open space.

At one end of the Piazza is the statue of Dante Aligheri (of The Inferno fame) perched imperiously upon a 12 foot high pedestal next to the gothic Church of Santa Croce'. This church is the final resting place for three of Florence's favorite sons. Buried here are Dante', that rather obscure artist Michelangelo, and one Nicolo' Machiavelli (the world's greatest apologist for ruthless politicians...). Right outside the church itself there is an insane choir chamber, called the Pazzi Chapel, topped by a dome designed by our ol' pal Brunelleschi that creates a vocal reverb of some 7-8 seconds after one sings a note. It sounds gorgeous in there and it's like singing in the shower times 1,000. There were several tourists trying out their best karoake falsettos (ummm...yeh, I did...) and all inside the dome couldn't help but smile, even laugh out loud, at the results. I could just imagine how otherworldly a trained choir might sound. Almost, it seems, as an afterthought, the Pazzi Chapel features Della Robbia terra-cotta representations of the apostles hanging along its inner walls.

The Piazzale Michelangelo is the place most people end up when visiting Florence. It's across the Arno River and then, straight up. There must be a thousand stairs, or more, leading up to the point where one overlooks the entire city. There was a guy carrying a bike up the stairs who passed me right when I was panting and inwardly whining the most. The view from the height of the plaza is a simply gorgeous 180 of the valley. The old defensive walls of the town ramble on over the hills to the left, the Arno and its bridges weave from left to right. Across the river is a charming, red-roofed city with church bell-towers sprouting up now and then. And, of course, the major landmark: the Cathedral of Saint Mary and Brunelleschi's Dome. The sky is bright blue. There is a stiff breeze that blows Elaine's hair around her face. There are hundreds of tourists up here milling around, jostling for the best spots to view the town and take a snapshot. There are the ubiquitous African vendors pushing tee-shirts, sunglasses, posters of world famous paintings, wind-up toys.

It soon comes time to wander back down into the city and find an outdoor cafe for dinner. More than one day needs to be spent in Florence. We missed so much according to the guidebook, but did what we came to do: walk freely in a sun-splashed, story-book beautiful Italian city where world class art is literally everywhere you look. It was a welcome vacation from our vacation in Rome.
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Rome, Lazio, Italy

Been enjoying the Italian experience. It has been challenging. The transportion system will drive anyone nuts. Even the italians from what I have been able to surmise. Each time the loudspeaker from the platform announces another 5 minute delay, there is grim resignation. No one seems to understand, at crucial times, when and which busses are running. If you see an 889, jump on it! You're going back to your hotel and you may not get another chance! If you see a 98 then you are going to go downtown...
...eventually...

Our first day in town, it took longer to get to our hotel than the flight from Munich. We tok a local train instad of the quick train to the Termini (main Terminal in the "central"- it isn't-part of the city).

We enjoyed a sweet one and a half hour ride on the Euro Star train to Florence that got us there in plenty of time to enjoy a full day in that beautiful city (more on that later). However, we don't know how we made the mistake of taking the local three and a half hour train ride back to Rome. Yikes... THAT was brutal.

But other than the public transportation and the odd little features of Roman existence that we encountered now and then (like the Roman fear of toilet seats in public restrooms... there aren't any...so they must be very much despised...), the last eight days have gone pretty well.

Rome, as an object, is overwhelming. It can be described (be sure that I will attempt to do so), in a very cornball way to be like an onion--- it has infinite layers. This is a city that has over 25 hundred years of RECORDED history. And a lot of that architecture is in evidence when you walk down ANY street.

It's, as I said, overwhelming.

There is a humongous set of ancient ruins from 25 BC to your left (the Forum), down the stairs from a government memorial created by the first kingdom of Italy in the 1880s (the Victor Emannuel II Monument in the Venetian Plaza or Piatza Venetzia), built against an old fortress called the Basillica di San Marco that is from the 15th century. These are all incredible sites within the space of a football field!

The different centuries of building styles create outlandish angles and arches fighting for visual recognition against every horizon line in every direction. My first thought concerning all of this clashing geometry was a snobbish, "WHO is your decorator?" Then, without many more spent mental calories, it occurred to me Rome's equally snobbish reply would be:
Michelangelo,
Bernini,
Lambardi,
Borromini,
Fontana,
Di Vinci,
Specchi...

Oh, ummmmm... well, let's check out the artwork around town. What can you offer the public for free? Again, the answer would put any other town in the world to shame: Carravaggio, Rubens, Raphael, Bernini, Titian...

Ok! OK!! But are there places to just hang out and chill? Si! Si! The Trevi Fountain, the Spanish Steps, the great park called the Villa Borghese, the Piazza Narvonna, the Campo Fiori, Trestevere and the Jewish Ghetto and it's plethora of Piatze (plazas) each with their own fountain or multiple fountains...

It got so that at every corner of every building there was some kind of embellishment or monument to see. There was a memorial tucked into this place or a water fountain beckoning one to drink here. Rome would take a lifetime to explore. We have had eight days and had to take two "zero" days where we did very litle but rest in order to stay fresh.

We took day trips to Ostia Antica, the Roman ancient port city off the Tiber river, we went to the beach in this town called Cristofo Columbo. Pretty Mediterranean blue water...thousands of half-naked humans. We took a train to Florence.

We have seen so much history, so many beautiful things. What SHOULD one see when one goes to Rome? Well, there is so much we HAVEN'T seen and that would be a problem in creating such a list. Nonetheless, of what Elaine and I have seen:

1. The Sistine Chapel. It IS that amazing. Go late in the day on a weekday. The ticket office closes at 4pm, so try to go in at around 3:30 to avoid a line that would make Disney themepark veterans quake with sheer terror. There is an entire Vatican Museum filled with enormous treasure that preceeds Michelangelo's (in my opinion) masterwork. Take your time to walk through the Raphael rooms and the Borghese apartments because the guards won't let you backtrack (we learned that the hard way). The frescoes and paintings there are as good as any others on earth. But la Sistina... well Michelangelo wasn't even a painter, he was a sculptor, and he still created the greatest visual aid to Christianity I've ever seen. When you look up, it truly seems three-dimensional, like figures are about to fall down on top of you. The Final Judgement on the wall closest to the entry door is truly one of the most moving works I've ever seen.

2. The Piazza Navonna at night. What a magical place! There are street performers and two luxurious fountains. There are cool little restaurants and cafes to sit and drink in the whole affair. Uh-oh! There's a a group of forty-somethings picking out classic rock! Yet, despite this, the experience was an exceptional use of time.

3. Trestevere and the Jewish Ghetto. Walking around these neighborhoods gives a delightful Italian experience rather than a "I've just been through a tourist trap" psychosis. Take a breather from the heat of the day and stop in the Piazza Soninno to have a tall fresh-squeezed juice: orange, lemonade, limeade, peach...

4. Walk along the Tiber River from the Vatican fortress of San Angelo toward the Piazza de Populo. There are tents with all kinds of shopping and eating opportunities and there is (thank the all mighty), a strong breeze to keep one cool during the stroll.

Well, it's been a great trip. Haven't discussed Florence at all, but I'll save it for the next entry. Back to Munich tomorrow, then a long train ride (11 hours!) back to Amsterdam for two days before flying back to the states.
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Munich, Germany

Took two long walking tours today. Both were worth every step and minute.

In the morning, Elaine and I assembled for our excursions with other english speakers in the main plaza of Munich called the Marienplatz. It is the home of the most impressive building in a city of truly impressive buildings: the Rathaus, the central government building.

Munich is 850 years old. We knew this because our guide informed us that the very next day there is to begin a two day celebration of this anniversary. Munich was ready to party; and also ready to tow away cars, bikes, and people if they were in any way obtrusive to officials or official vendors.

About thirty of us followed our first guide through the streets of the city center. This was the tour called "Hitler's Munich". The guide regaled us with stories about the horrible conditions of post-World War I Bavaria and the subsequent rise of the National Socialist Workers Party. People caried their money around in wheelbarrows, the currency was so devalued, and there was a new violent government takeover every few months or so. Someone new was always in charge in this brand new democracy decreed by the Treaty of Versaille that ended the Great War. It was a shock to every German's system after having been ruled by monarchs for, well, since the beginning of time.

Some Germans appreciated the change, politically, since the Socialist and Communist Parties were quite popular. However, as the workers finally achieved their dream of taking over the means of production, they simply forgot the fact that a large majority of Germany was quite conservative, had enjoyed the pre-war prosperity and stability under the Kaiser and the everyday benefits of the industrial revolution, and wanted that feeling back. Democracy was new, in Germany ineffective, and this style of self-rule had become with the constant anarchy in the country-side and the machine guns roaring in the city streets, frightening.

Plus, there were the insurmountable war-debts Germany had to pay to France, Great Britain, and America. The Deutche mark was in free fall in 1923. Every day the currency was worth less and less. Soon it literally took a hundred pieces of paper to buy an egg. And each day, Germans spent all the money they had because who knew what the mark would worth tomorrow? Inflation got so bad that a legendary story tells of a woman who brought her salary with her to the market in a large basket. Yes, the basket was a strain, and she put it down, reluctantly, afraid someone might steal her hard-earned cash. Soon, manuveuring along the shelves she suddenly remembered to check upon her burden and flew back to the place where she had left it. Yes, someone had stolen it--- the basket that is. The thief had unceremoniously dumped the near-worthless marks on the floor.

It was against this background that the future Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler, began honing his immense public speaking skills in front of the large numbers of inebriated veterans drowning their sorrows in Munich's beer halls. One hall in particular, the Hofbrau House (still around and ready to sell you a hefen-weisen to this day), was situated in the middle of a tight little plaza not far from the Marienplatz. The reverb is excellent. I could imagine that, after a few beers, Hitler's gruff, authoritative pitch must have sounded like your best friend: making problems simple, making solutions even simpler. The Jews were the problem! The Jews controlled the wealth of the world! They controlled the bleh, bleh, bleh, bleh... The Jews in Russia were bleh, bleh, bleh, sending their Communist minions to the Fatherland to bleh, bleh, bleh, undermine the strength of the German people! National Socialism is the party of the working class, the proud German people! We will send you back to work! Bleh, bleh! Bleh! Bleh! BLEH!!!

And as a soon-drunk, penniless left-over from the "heroic" battlegrounds of an epic lost cause, where the issue of life and death was once cut and dry one second to the next, and now few wanted to know or to understand you, what would you say?

"Hey, the Nazis are buying. Why not sit around and listen a few more minutes? It sure is rowdy and fun here at the Hofbrau! Yeh, the Jews DO seem to own a lot of the shops around here... and they don't give us CREDIT! Fraulein! Another Weisen! Yes, the Jews are involved in the government too! Yes, Lenin and Trotsky are Jews AND Communists!!! HEIL!!! HEIL!!! Um, what was that about a job?"

We walked at a pretty quick pace around the inner town. Every so often we would stop and Rolfe, our guide, would inform us with anecdotes and history about the place we were standing upon. As I have mentioned in a previous blog, Nuremburg's Teutonic history was taken advantage of and became the National Socialist playground and annual spectacle for party rallies. Munich, however, was the Nazi Party headquarters. The buildings housing the Party and its auxiliaries (the Hitler Youth, the Women's Organization, the German Labour Front, the Propoganda Office, the Gestapo, the SS, even the German League of Aryan Physicians) are all withing walking distance of each other. People loved the Nazis here.

And they hated the Jews. Most of these buildings were bought well below market value or simply taken from the Jewish population. Out of a population of 6000 registered Jews in 1938, only three hundred survived. The rest were murdered or lucky enough to emigrate out.

Very few of the buildings from the time of the Third Reich are left today for viewing on this tour. Munich was left in rubble, like many German cities, from Allied bombing raids and street to street fighting. There is one building that remains that, at the end of our tour, brought some measure of satisfaction to Elaine and me. The Nazi Party Headquarters, the Brown House, expropriated from a Jewish owner early in 1934, is now a music conservatory. Inside the spacious front foyer with a dramatic marble staircase, one could hear a small chamber quartet practicing in what was once Hitler's office.

The Dachau walking tour was certainly as powerful as Bergen-Belson; probably more so because we had an extremely knowledgable guide and, visually, the camp has been reconstructed somewhat and has several well-known monuments.

Dachau Concentration Camp was created in 1933. Because therewere just too many political prisoners piling up in the jails across the Fatherland, Heinrich Himmler, Hitler's top SS man in Munich, took over an old army depot in Dachau and set up a camp that got a lot of press and propoganda in Germany. It was a place where the German people knew "terrorists" would receive justice. It was also given a high profile to warn the citizenry against oposing the new regime of National Socialism.

Dachau is much older than Munich. Dachau was established back in 1050 AD, and thrived as a trading market for southeastern Bavaria. It never really got huge in size, but it did become a mecca for artists in the late 1800s. There was a German art school developed there that concentrated on landscape painting in the late 19th century impressionist style (Pizzaro, Monet...). In the 1930s, however, Dachau's name became synonomous with quite a different legacy.

Like Sachsenhausen, SS troops were trained here in all the vicious arts of oppresion. Prisoners were rolled in here on trains, beaten immediately off the train, beaten into formations for roll call, beaten for looking at an SS soldier, beaten for not knowing German, beaten for any miniscule reason. Thousands died here and the living never knew what was being cooked up for them from one minute to the next. The inmates were part of an approved Nazi program of labor until death. The prisoners were to work until they dropped. When they did drop, they were executed with a bullet to the head seconds later.

Dachau was sinister for me because I actually walked into the gas chamber which might have been tested, but had not officially been used like the extermination camps. What a claustrophobic nightmare THAT was. The chamber was a small rectangular room with a low ceiling punctuated by round metal plates with holes punched in them. Inmates were told that these were the showers. Here the SS used cyanide gas, unlike the extermination camps where zyclon-B, an insecticide used for roach control in warehouses, was preferred.

Suffice to say that, by the end of the war in 1945, there were so many bodies in the huge room next to the crematorium in Dachau, that U.S. soldiers liberating the camp described them as being stacked high and tight like tobacco. By the end of the war there was just no more coal left to burn the bodies.

I walked around in that room, filming. I like to think that I'm really sensitive to "spirits" or feelings of past people. I usually get some sort of vibe from where I am based upon what has happened there. In that room where the dead accumulated, I felt nothing. I knew I was in an actual room where the bodies of hundreds of murdered people had been entangled like socks in an over-stuffed drawer. But I couldn't feel a thing. Maybe that's what scared me so: the fact that the SS had sucked the life out of so many prisoners, to the extent that there was zero memory, physical or spiritual, that these humans had ever exhisted on the planet.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1216299780/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1216299780/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1216299780/tpod.html Thu, 17 Jul 2008 09:10:35 -0400 World History connections to Europe, Summer 2008

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Munich, Bavaria, Germany

Just getting to Munich today. We don't check into our hotel until 3pm.

As usual, walking around the city, we got ourselves lost. We found ourselves on the composer streets: Beethoven Strasse, Mozart Strasse, streets named after Hayden and Goethe. It's all very inspiring... ...until one needs the bathroom...

Anyway, we'll check out a museum later. We have walking tours in the city and the concentration camp at Dachau planned for tomorrow. Until then...
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Tübingen, Germany

Hung out in the German countryside for two days. We went off of Elaine's fund for a bit to visit her friend from her Peace Corps days. Elaine's friend lives in a small town called Pfeffingen (or something like that...)right outside the ancient college town of Tübingen. It's mostly grassy hills, some old, old churches, small residential neighborhoods, canola farms (harvest was last night, in fact. Lots of tractors behind Jen's house), stud farms, and lazy, meandering rivers.

Pfeffingen is in the southwestern state of Germany called Baden-Württemberg, mostly covered by the famed Black Forest. Elaine's friend, Jenny, and her husband Bill, have a wonderful house with a crazy, overgrown garden that has literally hundreds of blooms. From the rear, you can see rolling hills covered in grain for a long way.

Tübingen, about six kilometers from where we were staying, has been a central hub in the trading routes of central Europe, like Nüremburg, since medieval times. The Alstadt (old town) is simply beautiful. There are several medieval gothic structures (a cathedral, churches, and a castle)that are great photo ops as well as windows into the past. There are also dozens of specialty shops and small businesses tucked away in old-style buildings. Sorry, no outlet stores; but plenty of great deals and good, honest commerce and conversation between consumer and proprietor not seen in the US since before the 1980s and the Big Box stores. We didn't know that much German but we tried and it would start some humorous, most importantly friendly, interactions.

Tübingen is famous for its university, founded just after the invention of the printing press, in 1477. the empiricist philosopher, Hegel, and the astronomer, Johannes Kepler, both earned their cap and gown here. Goethe, a famous German writer, liked to hang out here. It's easy to see why. There are several large, pedestrian squares, with shady benches and outdoor cafes. Plenty of areas to rest and ruminate about the universe within and without.

The Neckar river runs right through the middle of Tübingen and it's very lush citypark. There are gondolas and paddle boats as well as people just splashing about in the sun. There's a large, community beer garden right on the river, underneath some gigantic shade trees that seem to have been there for a few hundred years. The beer garden HAS been there since the beginnings of the town.

There was a lot to like about Tübingen.

We have taken the train ride east into Bavaria, to Munich, for the last leg of Elaine's Fund for Teachers expedition. We are to go to Dachau tomorrow, then a walking tour of Hitler's Munich. The Nazi party has its beginnings here and there was a failed takeover in 1923 called the Beer Hall Putsch that killed several Nazis and landed Hitler and his compadres in jail for high treason. The only reason he wasn't put to death was because he had his trial in front of a very sympathetic judge and jury who who all had National Socialist leanings. More on this in my next post.
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Nuremberg, Bavaria, Germany

An early wake-up and a five hour train ride from Berlin to this "most German of German towns," as the Lord Mayor of Nuremburg, in 1933, once said. Franconia, as this part of southern Germany is called, was a pushover for National Socialism: poor, uneducated, hard-working, very nationalistic, having sent a bunch of their sons, brothers, and fathers to the meat grinder that was World War I. The Weimar (pronounced VY-mar)Republic had been harsh, rat-eating, years (1921-1933). Some used the worthless deutsche mark as toilet paper, others as winter fuel.

We walked along the monolithic architechtural sites created by Albert Speer for the annual rally of the Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (the NSDAP or, as we lay-people say it, the Nazi Party).

FYI:

Nationalsozialistische is a German compound word that means "national socialsim", or a set of national programs that, basically, provide basic needs for a country's citizens (food, water, maybe shelter, but certainly a job in an, idealistically, stable economy that would an allow an individual to work that stuff out on his or her own). Deutsche is the German word for, well, "German". Another compound word (in this language the Germans link together two or more words all the time to create useful meanings that sometimes spread across pages or need to be creatively abbreviated on street signs), Arbeiterpartei, means "worker's party".

I remember "arbeiter" from the wrought-iron letters welded onto the barred gates that welcomed prisoners to the Sachsenhausen concentration and death camp several miles north of Berlin: "Arbeit macht frei", work makes you free. Boy, did that have a sinister set of connotations...

Sachsenhausen...

...the training camp from 1933 for the SS, Hitler's elite guard. This is where the SS learned to humiliate, work to death, experiment upon, gas, millions in other camps across Europe. Sachsenhausen did the worst, first. They hung people up like the Spanish Inquisition (a prisoners arms were put behind his back and he was hung that way, excruciating pain and eventual dislocation of the shoulders and elbows). They played extremely loud classical music in the camp, then led selected prisoners to a specially constructed pit outside the walls to shoot 70-100 political prisoners at a time. The SS experimented with carbon-monoxide on Russian prisoners here; then, as Jews began to fill the camp, with a gas called Zyclon-B, an insecticide used by German warehouses to keep roach populations at bay. Zyclon-B became the gas of choice at Aushwitz, Treblinka, Dachau, Mathausen, and Buchenwald...

...lastly, the SS learned, during the mass extermination years from 1940 to 1945, how to cover their tracks. They burned bodies day after day; sometimes, and I wish was lying, thousands a day. It was prisoners who would pick up the bodies after whatever method of execution; prisoners who would yank out the gold teeth, collect bifocals; prisoners who would stuff the naked bodies of, maybe, their friends into the furnaces several at a time. After about five or six burnings, the ash receptacles would be full and these same prisoners on crematorium detail would empty the ashes of their comrades outside the prison walls. We walked along those grounds yesterday, I kid you not. We walked upon the remains of thousands of German political prisoners, German homosexuals, the mentally retarded, the physically handicapped, Russian soldiers, Polish soldiers, Eastern European Jews, and who knows how many other categories.

There's grass growing there now...

Anyway, today I was videotaping for Elaine on the old Nazi rally grounds; you know, the ones that you see in the nightmarish clips of Hitler in front of hundreds of thousands of Germans with their arms raised, and umpteen thousand Nazi flags flapping in the wind...

...well, unbelievably enough, I was there today. Was I proud? It's really macabre, but I have to admit I was. That's pretty horrifying to admit out loud, isn't it? I mean does it make me as bad as the people that swallowed the Nazi propaganda? Here's the thing: two hours later, I saw a film in the Nuremburg Documentation Center and there was ol' Adolf, walking across this concrete slab, in front of these flashpots, these burning flames, the same exact pillars where I had been filming earlier... I mean I walked in the exact footsteps maybe...AAAAAAGGGGGHHHHH!!! WHAT'S WRONG WITH ME???? It's like I'm Luke Skywalker about to go over to the Dark Side of the Force!! What is the fascination? What is the pull of this cult of personality that draws me like a moth to a flame, to the power of this monster, whose plans for world domination drastically changed the lives of more than 100 million people?!

The simply outstanding exhibit at the Nuremburg Documentation Center, an architectural masterpiece combining old and new, avant' garde construction forms is entitled, "Nuremburg: Fascination & Terror". This museum could not have summed up my feelings in a more succinct manner. The exhibits (interpreted via a personal sound device available in several languages) covered the history of Nuremburg, explained the construction of the humongous granite sites, and discussed the composition of the annual week-long rallies that infused Nuremburg with thousands upon thousands of swastika-flecked tourists between 1927 and 1938. As well, the exhibit ended with an extensive bit on the Nuremburg Trials, the first global litigation against a world power and it's citizens for crimes against humanity.

There was also a section on the European work camps, stories concerning the hapless prisoners who dropped like flies from the bestial conditions they encountered in the granite quarries. These prisoners of war, "enemies of the state", Jews, Gypsies, and a host of other Nazi targets, literally worked on crusts of bread, clear broth, and very little water, until they died from exhaustion; all for the Nazi rally grounds that were abandoned before construction was finished once Germany attacked Poland, September 1st, 1940 to start the war. Sad... ...very sad.

There are plenty of older people here in Nuremburg. People who would have been alive when General Patton's tanks first rolled into town. I wish I could speak German well enough to ask a thousand questions. The Americans would have seen an ancient town obliterated by allied bombing. The films of 1945 Nuremburg that I saw today were simply haunting. There was literally not one building that didn't have at least two of its walls reduced to rubble. And this is a town a little smaller than Portland, Maine. What would these natives of "the most German of German towns" have to say? Was it worth it to be the cultural centerpiece of the Third Reich? For over a decade these people had been high-living burghers in the most important small-town in Europe.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1215804660/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1215804660/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1215804660/tpod.html Sun, 13 Jul 2008 13:22:46 -0400 World History connections to Europe, Summer 2008

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Berlin, Germany

Berlin was a pain to negotiate when we first hit town. The transit system isn't half as easy as London (by far the easiest in the world), Paris, or Amsterdam. For an English speaking only individual, I would rate it easier than most Asian public systems just because one can read a western alphabet here and make inferences. I could swear I picked up Seoul's system much more quickly, though. Anyway...

Berlin seems to be mostly under construction. There are streets blocked off here, a series of four lifting cranes crowding a vista there, scaffolds covering entire buildings... every five minutes or so, one walks underneath these scaffolds to negotiate the strasses (streets). It's almost as if there should be a giant apology sign at every intersection: "PARDON OUR MESS!"

We did warm up to the city a bit last night and today though.

Last night, Thursday, we hit the row of five museums on the island where Berlin was first settled that sits on the Spree River. It was proclaimed a UNESCO world heritage site not too long ago. We happened to walk up the stairs to this massive, ornate complex that turned out to be the new Egyptian museum. Coincidently, on Thursday nights from 6pm to 10pm, it is free to the public. We took advantage and saw all kinds of great ancient Egyptian, Greek, and Hellenistic (post Alexander, mixing Greek, Indian, Persian, Egyptian, and any other culture that happened to fall under Alex's boot). We actually saw a copy of Homer's Iliad, the page on the death of Hector, from 230 BC. Pretty neat. There was also a bust of Pericles from the island of Lesbos and one of Queen Nefertiti of Egypt. They're pretty famous sculptures and one would recognize them from history books. It was very cool to stumble upon them on the other side of the world.

The sculptures in Berlin are everywhere (hanging from the sides, tops, and bases of buildings, in the middle of streets) and they are dramatic copper and bronze works that give the impression of great strength and fluid movement. They're truly beautiful and moving. I would say Berlin ranks right with Paris as far as public works of art that create classic, world reknown vistas. We go to Rome in a week and a half, so I'll definitely get back to you on that. Berlin's ranking might fall a bit...

Today we visited the Anne Frank Museum and the Holocaust Memorial. A pretty heavy day in a series of heavy days devoted to this subject of genocide.

The Anne Frank Museum exhibited dozens of pictures covering Anne's childhood from birth to just before she and her family went into hiding. You can see her in the classroom, at the beach, playing with her sister, Margot (there's plenty of pix of Margot as well), and hanging out with her buddies. Anne is portrayed as a very normal, fun-loving child. It sets up the second part of the exhibit which documents the rise of the Nazis and their occupation of Amsterdam. We had seen much of this history in the Anne Frank House and the Dutch Resistance Museum in Amsterdam.

The difference in this Anne Frank museum was the multi-media presentations including present day children of Anne's age. They talk about their dreams and aspirations, what they think about war and different cultures. Then, a voice that is supposed to be Anne's comes on and interacts with their points of view. This makes Anne relevant and it was a nice touch at the finish of the exhibits.

The Holocaust museum blew me away. The memorial can be seen on line if you like. I've got about two minutes left on this internet cafe card. Suffice to say that the museum is broken up into several sections and the photographs and videos are brutal and unflinching. The most powerful set of pictures were of entire villages being shot to death in ditches after being made to strip off their clothes.

Ok. going to add to this abit, a couple of days later... Yeh, there were pictures of what I just mentioned and they were raw, like getting hit in the face with a below zero, icy wind. The humiliation, the fear in these pictures... ...you could smell it. There was nothing these people could do against a company of automatic weapons. They were rustic, plain, simple folks, living their lives day to day for generations while events they could not have fully believed were edging total destruction closer and closer. Finally, the trucks pulled up in the dusty village square where the water pump was.

The barking of orders in harsh german... The rifle butts crashing in doors... the wimpering of the women and children and the protective shouts of the village men, who could do nothing, least of all protect...

The villagers were rounded up in trucks and brought to a remote area. Or, up until 1942, they were stuffed into the backs of trucks, and while the trucks were driving, carbon monoxide was pumped into the compartments asphyxiating sixty or seventy peope at a time. Then the trucks backed up to pre-dug ditches. Those natives who dug the ditches were then also shot.

How those hideous days unfolded must have been the stuff of the worst human nightmares...and there were literally hundreds of those days, all over Europe, from 1939 until 1945.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1215701040/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1215701040/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1215701040/tpod.html Fri, 11 Jul 2008 15:30:40 -0400 World History connections to Europe, Summer 2008

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Celle, Lower Saxony, Germany

Celle was a town that was founded in the early Renaissance. It is probably much older, but the Alstadt (the "old town", in Germany, usually a pedestrian area these days) had 1520-something painted on its oldest building. It is pronounced "tz-ell-uh". It was a town we chose to stay at because we were able to get to it by rail and it had busses to Bergen, and Bergen had a bus to Bergen-Belson Concentration Camp.

Yes, it was rather tricky to get to Bergen-Belson. The guidebook said that we would have to be very determined and, I knew, Elaine at least was extremely determined to get there. Bergen Belson is the place where Anne Frank's life ends.

But one thing at a time. We had, the day before, gone to the place Anne and her family were first sent once they had been captured: Westerbork Transit Camp.

The Westerbork Camp is a bit northeast of the tiny town of Westerbork itself. We've been really lucky about getting to these places, because they're off the beaten path. It took three trains and a bus to get to Westerbork. Once we checked into our hotel, we rented bikes to get to the camp itself. It was about an 18 kilometer ride one way (you do the math if you would like miles, sorry). We ended up doing about 25 kilometers there because we missed several turns and didn't go far enough at one point. I'm getting winded just thinking about it. The bike paths are incredibly beautiful and there are few cars as the trip unfolds along corn and grain fields, hundreds of horses, cows, pigs, and sheep.

Westerbork Camp is out in the middle of nowhere. It is no wonder that the Jews were taken there. They were completely isolated. The museum is seperate from the compound itself. There are ripped up train tracks set up as a memorial, several partial walls left from the blockhouses where prisoners were kept, and a few ominous watchtowers still in place in the shady corners of the complex where the machineguns were kept.

The museum is several kilometers past the compound and concentrates on daily life as a Jewish prisoner. The Nazis wanted the Jews to fall into a complacency, a false sense of calm that, to us today, seems absolutely sinister. There were schools for the kids with Jewish instructors, sports activities, movies, clinics and hospitals run by Jewish doctors and nurses. At the beginning, in 1940, the camp featured relatively clean and comfortable barracks with beds for all.

A prisoner here could not possibly have known what was about to transpire in several weeks time: when they would be sent to one of the many extermination camps. In fact, 102,000 people transferred out of the Westerbork Transit Camp were murdered. I know, I saw some of the records left for descendents who are encouraged to check.

The memorial at Westerbork is very understated to the casual eye. It is composed of square, wooden blocks of various sizes, upon each a brass star of David. They seem set up in random groupings of thousands, laid out upon a huge blacktop in the middle of a field. It wasn't until I got to the museum that it was explained to me that the groupings formed into the shape of the Netherlands (from a bird's eye view)and that the different sizes stood for the different ages of the over 100,000 Jews that were removed from Dutch soil during the Second World War. The stars also catch the heat of the sun. That is to remind a visitor that these symbols represent people, real warm-blooded, people, not just numbers.

Yesterday, we traveled to Bergen-Belson. This place is not for the faint of heart. Bergen was not an extermination camp, like Dachau, or Aushwitz. It was a "concentration camp". That means people were collected there, for a variety of reasons: they were prisoners of war, like the thousands of Polish or Russian soldiers who were there; they might have been political prisoners from within Germany or from the many occupied countries that Germany destroyed; or they may have been Jews.

In a way, it was worse than an extermination camp because these people died very, very slowly...

People were just left there, imprisoned without water, food, or shelter. The SS who were assigned there would walk around them and, for kicks (I kid you not), would shoot someone in the head, another through the heart, another through the leg just to watch them bleed to death. Both the men and women members of the SS would routinely beat to death with clubs and fists a number of prisoners each day. And then, they would leave them alone. Some parts of the camp had no facilities of any kind. In fact, the tent Anne and Margot Frank were sheltered under blew away in a storm soon after they got there from Aushwitz. There was never a replacement. Margot caught Typhus and died a couple of months later, lying like hundreds of others, in her own filth. Anne is reported to have passed a couple of weeks after that, five weeks before the liberation by the British army.

When the British arrived they had already been able to smell Bergen-Belson from six miles away. During the several weeks before they had made it to the camp, it has been estimated that close to, or over (no one seems to have been able to count) 40,000 people just dropped dead on the ground and were never buried.

That is the most powerful image at Belson: the mass graves with the stone monuments on the front of each. 1000 total bodies buried here. 2,500 bodies buried here. And there aren't just a few of these. There were twenty to twenty-five mass grave-sites that I walked around along the lengthy path set within the memorial site. At first, the captured SS guards were made to bury the dead, one by one throwing them with bare hands in the massive trenches dug for the ordeal. That got old after a couple days and the British brought out the bulldozers.

We saw many memorial sites at this camp. Certainly one of the most powerful was Anne and Margot Frank's memorial. No one knows where they were buried; but it meant a lot to put a friend's face on the mass extermination that occured there.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1215368760/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1215368760/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1215368760/tpod.html Sun, 06 Jul 2008 16:17:18 -0400 World History connections to Europe, Summer 2008

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Amsterdam, Netherlands

It must have been a long, cold, anxious walk in the pouring rain.

Today, my wife and I took that walk on the 66th anniversary of that horrible day when the the Frank family inhaled their last breaths of fresh air before 25 months of confinement inside "The Secret Annex". We began at the Frank family's Amsterdam residence, one in a series of municipal looking flats about 15 minutes walk from our hotel. We knew we had arrived when we spied the slender onyx statue of Anne in the wide, grassy commonspace between the apartment buildings. Some flowers, even a line of Buddhist prayer flags, surrounded her.

On this date, Anne Frank and her mother and father, all wearing heavy coats displaying huge yellow Stars of David that might as well have been targets, over several layers of clothing, weaved their way from home two and a half city miles to Otto Frank's spice factory.

Anne's older sister, Margot, had earlier made the trip by bicycle with family friend Miep Gies. Jews were not allowed to ride bikes or go outside without the Star of David on their clothing. But Margot's situation was desperate and she had broken both laws to escape the consequences of an official letter the family had received the day before. Margot had recently turned sixteen and the letter bluntly informed the family that it was time now for her to go off to the work camps. Otto Frank knew what that meant for his oldest daughter and none of it was pleasant.

Otto had been preparing for this awful eventuality for some time, months in fact. He had trusted employees to help him prepare the old warehouse in the rear of his factory (he had earlier signed over his company to his non-Jewish friends in order for them all to continue his highly successful business). The warehouse annex was stocked with furniture, food, clothes, necessities, everything Otto felt was needed for a stay of indefinite measure. At all costs, he had wanted the family to stay together.

As Elaine and I tried to pick the routes that Anne and her parents might have followed, we remembered Anne's diary entry of July 9th, 1942. She recalled that it had been raining hard and cold (that's something I can relate to because the cloudbursts here in July have happened exactly that way; we were trudging in one about an hour ago). She reported that people on the trams, in cars, in store and cafe windows, stared at them and the Jewish stars emblazoned on their jackets; and then quickly looked away, ashamed that they could, in no way, offer help. The Franks' was a determined exodus, trying not to be stopped by the Gestapo, German soldiers, or the Dutch police. There were so many things, harsh laws in the Dutch books and plain mean people, that could have derailed their escape, gotten them arrested, deported, even shot that day.

This early afternoon, I just kept looking at the thousands of windows in the narrow Amsterdam streets.

Paranoia was creeping in and I didn't have anything to be afraid of.

I felt Otto's stomach loosening as his perspiration mixed with the downpour, assertively moving his wife and youngest daughter along, trying to look calm, not too frantic, "Hey, it's a little rain, we Jews can handle a little rain! We have for centuries." He was a dignified, straight-backed, tall, pencil-mustached man who habitually wore a suit and tie to manage his company each day. The only way he was able to go into hiding within Nazi-occupied Amsterdam (not only with his own family but with the three Van Pehls and Mr. Pfieffer as well!) was because he had the deep respect and love of his employees. And they would not let him or the others in that Annex down for 25 months; even when most of the food and materials in the Netherlands were being hijacked to Germany and the ration cards cost more and more and brought less and less.

The walk took us two and a half hours. We went leisurely, videotaping Elaine's thoughts on the walk for the documentary she is making for her 8th grade English students. Hundreds of people were milling around the "straats". There were infinite masses of brightly colored flowers popping out of boxes everywhere: from stairways, balconies, bridges, store and cafe fronts... the sun was playing games behind the clouds, the temperature changed dramatically every few minutes. Commercial cruiseboats meandered nonchalantly through the canals with their payloads of champaigne weilding passengers. At times, a bit of drizzling rain would add a rainbow to the vista. The last thing I wanted to do today was go inside. The last thing I wanted to feel today was afraid. Today was a perfect Amsterdam day!

We walked back to our hotel and I tried to smile as much as I could. I tried to enjoy the moments of sheer freedom as much as I could; for tomorrow, we go to Westerbork Transit Camp.

I knew Otto would understand.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1215275820/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1215275820/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/mrcolella/1/1215275820/tpod.html Sat, 05 Jul 2008 14:18:59 -0400 World History connections to Europe, Summer 2008

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Amsterdam, Netherlands

What would you do if a foreign power invaded America? Now, don't answer so quickly.

Or without thinking of your situation before the invasion.

Your country has been ripped apart by large scale unemployment, inflation, religious intolerance that has lead to widespread violence and inconsolable hatred. There are food shortages even if you have a job to pay for what you wish to eat. Top it all off: you live in an out-dated, inefficient, elitist government system called a monarchy.

The most succesful countries in Europe have socialist governments, and they seem to be, presently, the most powerful: Italy, Germany, Russia...

In May, 1940, The Nazi war machine invaded their neighbors to the west: the Netherlands. The Dutch had been experiencing all those above-mentioned problems for quite some time. They, as a military and as common people, defended themselves the best they could.

First, the German airforce bombed Rotterdam, the Netherlands' main port and business center. After that, they gave the Dutch five days to surrender. You would say, "NO!" too, wouldn't you? That was your initial answer, right?

The Blitzkrieg was too much. German paratroopers, tanks, artillery, warplanes, and hundreds of thousands of stormtroopers poured into the Dutch countryside and cities. They cut off bridges, took over factories, and walked up to the buildings of Dutch government carrying the most lethal weapons known. The Dutch fought, saw the situation as hopeless for their children and loved ones, and surrendered.

At first, the Nazis played the benevolent conqueror. Through massive assaults of print, radio, and social propaganda, they toasted the benefits of National Socialism, played up the Germanic relationship between the Reichsland and the Netherlands (we have so much in common!), employed people and provided markets for Dutch goods.

But underneath that exterior, well, you know... ...they were Nazis! The Germans took Netherlands resources at will, outlawed opposition politically and socially. They began registering all individuals based on ethnic origins and religious beliefs...

The Dutch government was left in place to maintain order and they were given an order to follow: comply or leave office and maybe, face the consequences of arrest. The Dutch nationalist politicians felt that it was better that they were in charge rather than the NSB, the Dutch Nazi Party (the Germans had already promoted a whole Hitler-adoring Dutch structure with political activist organizations, youth clubs, you name it, and all in a few months). Each suceeding month seemed to bring a new law handed down from Berlin.

At first it was the registrations. Then there were the bans against the Communist party, then the Dutch nationalist political parties. A couple of months later, all trade unions had to belong the Nazi Party's single union. Then artists and actors had to swear allegience to the Fuhrer. Then certain laws about the Jews passed, growing more severe until, by 1943, the Jews could not go to the markets, could not ride public transportation, drive or ride in cars, could not ride bicycles. All Jewish property was inventoried, by law. Jews had their property confiscated and they were forcibly moved to one particular area. They were sold the gold stars of David they had to wear under penalty of arrest and, later, execution. They were rounded up and deported to concentration camps. Eighty percent of the Jews residing in the Netherlands were murdered by the Nazis; well over 100,000 people.

The Dutch Resistance Museum documents the efforts to throw off the Nazi yoke. The Dutch had an underground resistance that attempted to undermine the Nazi rule. The effects were brutal. Thousands of innocent Dutch people were hauled out of their houses and shot. Then, they were left to lay there as warnings against sabotage. Many government leaders were also murdered during the occupation, some by the Dutch Resistance when these politicians developed fascist habits.

The Resistance Museum packs a lot of punch into a small, single floor space. There are attention getters over what seems every square inch. Many of the photos and exhibits are seen through slits and half concealed openings in the kiosks. This presents a 3D, shadowbox effect throughout the museum and it also makes you feel like you're spying on something. Sort of a paranoid, looking-out-the-window-at-something-menacing-coming-to-get- you, feeling.

The Museum covers the resistance efforts and the Jewish experience during the occupation. It also covers daily life under the occupation with movies, radio broadcasts, a clandestine printing press, and sound effects of starving children and brutally beaten victims.

Today, I think many of the Dutch would agree that, if it hadn't been for the Allied armies defeating the Nazis in other parts of Europe, the Netherlands, by themselves, would not have been able to lift the occupation. The retaliations against the Resistance were insane. The male populations of entire towns were hauled out to fields, made to dig their own graves, then shot. People were arrested for no reason to fill a general pool of victims; then when sabotage against the Nazis occurred, these unlucky ones were also murdered.

The Dutch Resistance Museum was a lesson about how a population will often look after their own best interests, fall prey to an insidious political agenda that seems to promise attention to those interests, and then after thousands of friends and family have died or been sent to work as slaves in a foreign country, this population realizes it has made a big, big mistake.

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