Remember Dachau

Today I spent the afternoon at the Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site in Dachau Germany. 

As I approached the perimeter wall, a wall built of stone block topped with razor wire and peaked by guard towers at 50 foot intervals, I instantly felt the oppressiveness of the place.  I walked the entire wall from the outside, each step more foreboding than the last.  Upon turning into the entry avenue, I was surprised to find a quaint little community tucked in along the walls of the one of the most notorious places on earth, but there it was.  A few brick apartment homes jutting out perpendicular to the prison wall.  Each with their little gardens and pathways leading to people’s homes and presumably happy lives.  Considering the atrocities that have taken place on the other side of that wall, it was a disconcerting site.

Passing the houses I turned into the entrance of the memorial site.  It is a lovely winter day with snow on the ground and the sun shining brightly overhead.   I brace myself for what I am about to see, what I am about to feel, how I am about to be sickened by what I know my fellow man is capable of.  I forge ahead.  It is important to be here, to know this, to #neverforget

The self-guided tour begins by passing through the gate of the jourhaus (guardhouse) building.  Inscribed in iron are the words “ARBEIT MACHT FREI” or “work will make you free”. Once through the gate you overlook the roll call area, a huge open area where suffering and death occurred on a daily basis.  On this day, the open area was covered with snow.  It was cold and I, unlike them, was wrapped in a warm winter coat, hat, and gloves.  I have nothing to want for, yet here I stand in a place where so many have suffered.

I walked through the barracks and grounds and museum, but nothing prepared me for the crematorium.  I have no words for what I felt as I stepped foot into this place.  I will not go into detail, but this place was built for death, for death and destruction of people.  I could not complete this part of the tour.  I couldn’t willingly stay in a place built for death. 

My experience today was profoundly moving.  As I walked out the gates out of Dachau into a freedom that I often take for granted, it breaks my heart to know that the leader of the country in which I live is taking steps to persecute those whose religious view differ from his own.  And even more alarmingly, the Americans who are not yet up in arms over the #MuslimBan.  

I urge you to educate yourselves.  Look back, learn from history. We must never let this happen again.  #resist