Sachsenhausen

I went few years back to a concentration camp and thought to visit another Lager whenever possible, despite it’s a pretty hard thing to do. Well, I frankly lied to myself, gutless to fell into the same sorrow, and never went to another one.

And then I had my brother living here with me; He is young, he needs to experience and see the differences there are in this as beautiful as scary world. I also wanted him, not German, to learn a piece of history right from the core, a German community, possibly in order to start a critical path of understanding, like here we all are still processing together.

Sachsenhausen was a lager/concentration camp for political prisoners just outside Berlin, northbound, used by Germans first, Russians after (see the huge communist obelisque opposite the entrance). I was overall happy I found time to visit it, I can only suggest anyone who visits Berlin for a couple of days to save some time and see with their own eyes how a camp was, how lethally brutal it was.

Now, I don’t want to lecture or report the story I heard from my audio guide; I just want to leave a general positive impression about the organisation, everything was well-explained. It’s intense and never off-topic.

I was there during a very sunny and windy day, dust lifting from the ground and spinning all over us, emptiness around. I struggled to keep my mind clear from a distinct bad feeling, something I would explain like a ‘darkness in the heart’.

A must seen, whenever you feel ready.

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Jewish Barracks