Munich part two:

In between the joyous drunken celebrations, I visited Dachau. It was the first concentration camp of the Nazi Reich, established on March 22, 1933 and thus served as a model for all subsequent camps. In the 12 years that Dachau was in operation, over 200,000 people were imprisoned and more than 43,000 died.

The gate through which all prisoners entered Dachau. It reads "work sets you free."

On a warm, sunny morning in between visits to the beer tents at Oktoberfest, I got on a train to the site just outside of Munich. As amazing an experience I had at Oktoberfest, my visit to Munich was just as memorable and incredible.

I got to the camp pretty early in the morning and so there were not a lot of people there yet. Dachau is huge, and so the grounds felt vast and completely barren of life. It was probably the eeriest place I've ever been and even looking back at the pictures as I'm posting them now is chilling. I didn't want to pay for a guided tour, so I just walked around on my own with the complimentary map. There is an extensive museum exhibit in what was the maintenance building, and it looked like a pretty nice display. But I skipped that as well because being trapped inside reading was a little sickening to me at the time. I felt like I should walk around and really feel the place.

 

The picture above is of the camp fencing. There are several parts to it. First is the strip of grass that I was standing on to take this picture. Prisoners were shot at for stepping on to it, so sometimes prisoners used it as a way of ending their life. Next is the rock ditch, a electrified barbed-wire fence, and finally the camp wall.

These are the ovens which were used to burn piles of bodies

The shooting range. Prisoners were lined up against the wall. In the foreground is a small ditch, for the blood.

I'm really glad I was able to visit Dachau, and it did make me think about how much freedom I have and how little I usually appreciate that freedom. At the same time, I guess I was assuming that it would be some life-changing, depressing experience. And it was horrifying, but rather than feeling overwhelmed with death, I was more aware of the power of time to heal things. Plants had regrown on top of the ashes (that's not a cliche, the ground was literally black with the ashes from the ovens), and a few miles away, thousands of people had come by choice to Munich this time to partake in the wonderful celebrations of Oktoberfest. While it's obviously very important to think about and remember the Holocaust, I didn't feel guilty going out to that evening for good fun with good friends, because you only live once and so you might as well live as well as you can.