Today we took a trip out to Dachau to visit a concentration camp. I had never been but I had an idea of what to expect from history classes and such. We bought audio guides and just wandered around the area. There was an overload of information but the things that stuck with me most were the bunker, the barracks, and the crematoria. The bunker was where "special" prisoners were put and were most often made to stand in itty bitty rooms. Some of the stories of what put people in the bunker were ridiculous-- one man found a newspaper when he was clearing out rubble and was put in the bunker for the possession of a newspaper. The rooms were tiny but I was surprised that there were toilets in most of the rooms. I also learned that concentration camps were referred to as re-education camps. It was claimed that those who were sent there just needed to learn how to be a good citizen, and after that happened, then they would be released--obviously that wasn't really what happened. Mostly it included hard labor and occasionally they did science experiments on the prisoners. Even in the normal areas it wasn't good--it was overcrowded and they were undernourished.
The crematorium was the worst. They would take them there by telling them that they were showering. They would disrobe and then walk into the room titled "Shower Room" (in German of course) and walk into a room with tons of shower heads on the ceiling... totally reasonable right? Then they would all get closed in there and gassed-- then they would take their bodies, two or three at a time, and load them into the cremation oven. We walked through this building and it was just eerie thinking about all those who had walked through before... and not walked out.
The rest of the day was uneventful-- mostly just eating and blogging and walking. It's hard to have an upbeat day after visiting something like that. Well it's late, and we are leaving for the BMW plant early in the morning.
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