The Long March

Carter had made us quite of lists of sights to see in Berlin. When she sent it to me a few weeks ago I never imagined we would get to them all, but today we knocked out the whole thing. Starting with the Berlin Wall Memorial.

The grey overcast sky’s of Berlin winter made a perfect setting to walk the deadman zone along the wall. The craziness of tearing down perfectly good buildings to put up a wall keeping people apart is nothing compared to the insanity of the SS and the Nazi’s we learned about at the Topography of Terror Museum. I have studied plenty about the Nazi’s through the years, but as an American I never thought it could happen again.

Reading the ways that Hitler and Himmler used populist ways to gain power—Cutting out a free press, oppressing the weak and making people fear “the other” along with justifying eliminating anyone who could not contribute, is sounding a little too familiar to me. Germany does an excellent job at looking at bad things that happened here with the most honesty to say, “these things must be remembered so they can not be repeated.” It can happen anywhere and that is what must be learned.

After the heaviness of so much learning in the morning Russ, Carter and I did a very long walk through some of the nicer parts of Berlin despite the cold. After we got to the point where I could no longer feel my face we stopped to have lunch and then change our tact and visit a Christmas Market. It is always a good idea to go through a Christmas Market full from a real meal so you are not tempted to eat any of the food or drinks they are selling in the stalls. We did decide that the people making Bratwursts have it best because they have a big fire to keep them warm. I was able to find a couple of Christmas ornaments so I left the market happy.

By the end of the day I had done a solid nine miles of walking, which was needed to counteract the sushi dinner. Russ pointed out that we have avoided eating one German meal since we got here. I think that will change when we go out in the country.