Visit to Munich

Thursday, October 14th, 2010

There is a lot to do in order to leave for a trip: plan, reserve, eat perishables, get your mail covered, pack, clean, etc.  These things took me way longer than I had expected and I went to bed quite late in preparation for a very early morning.  I picked the 5:41 train out of Rimbach so I would arrive in Munich early enough that I could do quite a bit.  Waking up, I actually felt pretty alert, though that feeling would not last the full day.  I changed trains at Weinheim and Stuttgart and arrived in Munich a little after 10:00.  After having a coffee at Burger King and using its restroom, I put my things in a locker at the train station and set out for the center of town, Marienplatz.  I walked down a pedestrian zone to what is the center of the city with much of the sights I wanted to see (me and many other tourists).  I saw three churches, St. Michael's Church, the Frauenkirche and St. Peter's Church.  I was also able to see the New Town Hall and the Old Town Hall, though I did not see the Glockenspiel run on the former.  I also toured the extensive Residenz where the Bavarian royalty used to live, their treasury and the Cuvilliés Theater.  After seeing these I was decidedly exhausted and went to my hostel to check in.  I got into my room, which I shared with five strangers, and took a nap.
I later went to the Hofbräuhaus for some traditional (perhaps touristy) dinner (Weisswurst) and beer.
Many of these sights sustained some form of damage in World War II and Munich decided to restore them.

The hostel's atmosphere was very young, though this hostel has no age limit.  I did get a chance to meet some interesting people.  One of my roommates was an Australian man who was traveling, another was a German who is between homes and jobs.  In this place, everything was in English first and German second, if the German was provided at all.

Friday, October 15th, 2010
Today I went to see the Dachau concentration camp.  It was a powerful experience I would recommend.  I was very interested in the evolution of the camp as it changed throughout its twelve years of Nazi rule.  I found a professional tour guide who was well worth hiring (Gordon's Tours).  Having studied the Holocaust in depth last semester, the subject was very much fresh in my mind and it was helpful to see in person many of the things I have read so much about.  I am especially interested in exploring questions about why things happened the way they did and what were the motivations behind them.  What was known about the concentration camps to the average German?  What about the average American?  Why wasn't there greater opposition to them?  Why were the inmates evacuated to the western camps (like Dachau) toward the end of the war?  One of the biggest messages was how much the Nazis and the SS were interested in Public Relations.  They were so careful and active in trying to send the right messages to achieve their goals.  A big part of the museum is also the history after 1945 and the many things that have happened at the camp.  One new thing I learned about was the terror of the clean camp at the beginning.  Of course it was terrible as conditions deteriorated towards the end of the war, but the clean camp was terrible because it was clean because of the fear put into the inmates.  Things had to be in order, or a lot of people would get punished.  It was an extremely interesting experience that of course can be a quite difficult one, encountering so much evil and human suffering.  Especially difficult was seeing film from 1945 of dying and dead inmates.  If this had been the only thing I saw on my trip, it would have been worth it.

I also went around the city and saw the English Garden and the outside of the Pinotheks (they were already closed by the time I got there).  Another long day and I was exhausted.  Time for a night train to Budapest.