Gedenkstätte Deutscher Widerstand

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Our museum for today was the Memorial to the German Resistance, commemorating those who resisted National Socialism through demonstration, writing, speaking, helping the oppressed, or just refusing to participate.

We slept in today, because we were up late watching Fußball, so we missed breakfast at the Pension, and when we did get up, we had a bit of a lazy morning writing blog posts and reading up on things we were going to see and watching Big Bang Theory in German. Once we set out, we headed to La Piazza, where I tried their pizza (delicious) and Cheryl tried a pasta dish with pesto and lamb (also delicious) and we had Radler to drink (called Alsterwasser in Berlin). Our waiter correctly figured out we were Americans and chatted with us a bit; he had lived in New York for a time some years ago, and couldn't believe the figures he was hearing for rents now. All in all, a very pleasant lunch.

We walked up toward the Zoo S-bahn stop, because we wanted to see the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church. The church suffered some pretty bad damage in the war, and it has been left as it was (other than being made safe for people to be inside), and a new church has been built adjoining it. This is another church which received a "Cross of Nails" from Coventry Cathedral. After looking around inside the old church, we went and sat in the new church for a bit. It's a pretty modern (meaning 1950s - 1960s) architecture, and has a very large amount of mostly blue stained glass, and comfortable chairs rather than pews. It is an interesting contrast to the Neo-Romanesque style of the old church.

After the Gedächtniskirche, we headed for the Gedenkstätte Deutscher Widerstand by bus. The museum is located in the Bendlerblock, which contained some offices of the German army, and just outside is the courtyard where the army officers who attempted to assassinate Hitler were executed. The museum was begun as a memorial to them, but has grown to include other groups (e.g. The White Rose, Social Democrats, and Communists).

At the very beginning of the memorial, there is a plaque introducing the memorial which I excerpt here: "To begin with, the fight against Hitler was led above all by the workers' movement, by liberal and left-wing intellectuals, and by Christians."

Let that sink in. Then, please, oh please, tell me again how worthless liberals and the left are.

The memorial is very long, with a lot of text to read, and I'm not going to describe it all here, because, frankly, you had to be there. What I do want to note is that there were at least two school groups there today, and in the one we had the most contact with, all of the students had to get up and present something about one of the people or groups in the exhibit, followed by a short lecture by the teacher, and what that tells me is that there's no whitewashing of history going on here; those kids were learning, as much as it is possible having not been there, what actually happened, and how, and why.

We could do with a little more of that, and a little less of George Washington and the cherry tree, and a lot less flag-waving in the States. Just how the fuck is it that I didn't learn about the genocides perpetrated by our government until I was an adult?

So, the memorial just left me kind drained and depressed, so much so that I asked Cheryl if we could try to find something fun to do the next day; she laughed, and then took me to the Berliner Dom, which is a gorgeous old church on Museum Island. We got pictures, and it was nice and quiet, and after that we headed back to the Brandenburg Gate, where we sat in a Starbucks and had iced coffee drinks and watched it rain.

On the way out from the hotel in the morning, we walked by a place called Sausalito's and made note of it. Cheryl had checked the reviews and they seemed favorable, so we decided to go there for dinner, which is where we went after Starbucks. It was a pretty nice place, with a pretty strange take on Mexican food, and piña coladas I actually liked (not frozen, more like on the rocks). Strangely, the did not have margaritas. Cheryl had some fajitas and I tried the chicken burrito, which ended up being like the fajitas but pre-constructed, and then grilled to give the tortilla that something extra. We had a really nice time, and the food was perfectly acceptable.

After, we went back to our room and watched the Netherlands-Argentina match, which I did not make it through because I was so sleepy, but Cheryl tells me it went to penalty kicks and Argentina's goalie won the game for them.

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Photos

Gedächtniskirche
Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church

Altes Museum
It houses Greek and Roman artifacts

Berliner Dom
Inside, facing the altar

Berliner Dom Orgel
It sounded very nice.

Comments

[J&J]

Dome
The Berliner Dome reminds me so much of the Karlskirche (St. Charles's Church) EWSC performed at in Vienna. Thanks for being our "feet".... walking us through all the interesting places. Can't share the food though!