Biosciences Bonn: In the land of Germany and a time of change...the destiny of a great kingdom rests on the shoulders of a big city, its name...B E R L I N

If you get the reference, you are like one of my favorite person ever! So about my time in Berlin.....

Berlin is "Geschichtstrachtig" meaning pregnant with history, says our tour guide. A statement which is in fact very accurate. So we began our journey to Berlin on an overnight bus ride on Friday night. We as in Emily, Izzie, Lexie and I. We arrived in Berlin at about 8 am, and made our way to my host parents' apartment in Berlin, which they so kindly let us use. When we got settled in the apartment, we headed out to our walking tour. The first point of the tour/where we met was in front of the Brandenburg gate. It was so so cool to see this gate as we talked about it in our History of Medicine class. The Brandenburg gate is so beautiful, even more beautiful at night! Walking across the gate, it was cool to know that this was the same gate where German's soccer team walked across after thier 2014 World Cup victory. On the walking tour, we were able to see the British Parliament, the Jewish Holocaust exhibition, the Charlie checkpoint, we walked across what was known then as East to West Berlin, we saw the museum island, and the tallest building in the whole of Germany (the tv tower). Our tour guide, Georgia was such an amazing tour guide. She is from Scotland and her accent was very nice to listen to. We liked her so much to the point where we signed up for another tour with her to Sachsenhausen concentration camp. I am just kidding, it all just worked out that way! I will talk about Sachsenhausen in a little bit. After the tour, we were so hungry and walked around trying to find somewhere to eat. After so much walking and an unpleasant encounter with a waiter at one of the first restaurants we stumbled upon, we ended up at a burger place called Momo tavern, thanks to Izzie. The meal was so delicious, I particularly really enjoyed the fries! After this we walked around the museum island for a little while, where we got photo-bombed by a group of guys. We also photo-bombed their picture too so it was all good! After, we then went to the Deutsch museum (the German history museum) which was pretty interesting! It displays Germans' history up to the First World War. After this, we just continued walking around the city of Berlin and admiring its beauty. Trying to save up a little, we went to Rewe City and got some frozen dinner! I got spaghetti and Bolognese, fruits and a smoothie. We just relaxed and talked and shared our deepest darkest secrets with each other lol, well kind of. We all got really tired and before we went to bed, we signed up for our tour of the Sachsenhausen Concentration camp the next morning.

The Sachsenhausen tour was not the most exciting tour but it was a very important one to partake in. This camp housed about 200,000 prisoners, some of who included actual prisoners and people like the Jews and Homosexuals, who did not deserve to be there but were only there because of who they are. On entering into the camp itself, on the gate, it's says "Arbeit mach frei", which means "work and be set free." Our tour guide told us that the statement fooled many prisoners as it gave them false hope. They would assume that in order to get out, all they had to do was work really hard. However, that's not the case as the only way work could set them free is by them working to the point of death. She described to us how before entering into the camp gate, the process of dehumanizing the prisoners began as they were stripped off all their belongings, for those who managed to smuggle some in up to that point. All their body hairs was shaved off and they were publicly stripped naked, and often, a prison is randomly chosen and beaten for no reason at all publicly. After this, they are given the uniform and on the uniform, they are triangles of various colors (like badges) that indicates the prisoners rank. So as a prisoner you get a triangle of a certain color on your uniform based on your "crime." If I remember correctly, green was for political prisoners (crime committing criminals), and pink was for homosexuals and so on. The color division was a plot to make it harder for people in different ranks to interact freely thus limiting any group plans for escape. Other ways they prevented the prisoner's escape was by using them for the upkeep of the camp. The prisoners were made to wake up so early in the morning and work so hard without resting, and go to bed really late. In addition to this, they were fed very little as well. This means that in most case they didn't have the energy to work as hard as they were made to. In the camp there is a section were the Jews were kept. The accommodations were so limited for the numbers of Jews they kept there. Imagine about 400 people waking up so early and having about 30 minutes to get ready in the same restroom (picture below) at once. The tight space increased the spread of diseases and only made life more miserable for them. This tour was unlike any other tour I have been on because it deals with a very bad time in German history as opposed to display of the beauty of Germany. However it is important to see and know this because in order to move forward and not make the same mistakes as the past you have to consider, know the past and not hide away form it, and learn to not make the same mistake again. A quote from Andrzej Szczypiorski below explains this idea best. I am so glad I went on this tour because it taught me a lot new things I didn't know about this era in Germany's past and it reinforced the fact that the absence of love can lead us to do drastic things, and also that no matter where one is, it is imperative to look out for other people and try to stand for what is right regardless of oppositions. This lesson is mostly drawn from our tour guide's last comment, a poem from Martin Niemolle:

"First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out—

Because I was not a Socialist.

Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Trade Unionist.

Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me."

After our visit to Sachsenhausen, we wanted to end our time in Berlin at a happier mode, and so we had a super snack lunch session as we devoured a bag of pretzels, chips, cookies and so on. After snacking hard core, we were ready to go to the Reichstag, which is a political edifice. It was so pretty to be in the Reichsag; it was built to a perfect height that gave us the chance to get a glimpse of the city of Berlin! It was relaxing to climb all the way up to the dome and just rest and stare at the open ceiling, kept open for ventilation of the building. We walked around some more and got some good pictures by the German flag. One of my favorite pictures was of us in the front of the Reichstag that a professional photographer took of us! We sure did ask the right person. After this, we went to the Berlin Wall (East side Gallery) which was cool. We took some cool pictures with some of the graffiti on it. After this we went back to the Brandenburg gate, got dinner at a restaurant called the Berliner. After dinner we went back to our apartment, cleaned up and headed to our overnight train back to Bonn. Berlin is such a beautiful city that I would one day like to visit again. I have no travel plans for next weekend seeing that the upcoming week is our spring break trip to Paris.

Looking forward to a chill weekend and will keep you posted.

Bis spater.

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