Through the pages of history, A visit to Jewish Museum, Berlin

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Jacob Bronowski, the British mathematician, biologist, writer, presenter and great humanist is believed to have pleaded to the UN general assembly to keep the ruins of Hiroshima undisturbed. He felt that such a memorial would remind future generations about the horrors of nuclear warfare. Unfortunately his cry went unheard. Large investments very pumped in and Hiroshima was reconstructed.

I visited Jewish Museum, Berlin, last October. It is one such attempt to keep the tragedies of past alive. I got an opportunity to look closely into things which I had read in history books, things which had moved me when I had watched Schindlers list or read Anne Frank’s diary.

Jewish Museum, Berlin

It is a recent structure inaugurated in 2001. It was designed by Polish born American Architect Daniel Lebiskind., the architect who is designed the 9/11 memorial. It is a very thoughtfully designed structure and as architect himself puts it “its open for different interpretations”.

The museum has three axes, the axis of continuity, the axis of emigration and the axis of holocaust.the pic below is the junction for the axis of emigration and the axis of the holocaust.

Junction -- Axis of holocaust and Axis of Exile

The axis of the holocaust slopes gently upward to an empty, 24 meter high space called holocaust tower, it is unheated and lit only by natural light falling through a diagonal opening in the wall. It is interpreted as a space for holocaust victims.

Holocaust Tower

The axis of emigration opens to the garden of exile. Garden of exile is the only rectangular structure in the building, 49 columns filled with earth arranged in a square, standing vertically on a slanting floor. It is like a maze of sorts. Olive willows grow out of the columns (Olive being the symbol of peace?). The stones on the ground are angular. Here we are expected to walk alone.It is supposed to contain the uncertainties of going into an exile. The apprehensions of going into an alien land not knowing what is in store. The maze confused and left me with an odd dizzy feeling. I think thats what it feels when you go into an exile..

Garden of Exile

All along the axises there are photographs, personal documents and keepsakes that have been donated to the museum. If we were left with only 10 minutes to wind up everything we have and run for our lives, I think photographs would be one of the few things that we would take.

Gallery

Its rightly said that a photograph conveys what thousand words cant convey. Every photograph had an amazing story to tell. Stories of tragedy and hope. I have shared some such stories below.

THE SMUGGLED LETTER
At the age of 25, Hans – Peter Messerschmidt was deported from Berlin to Auschwitz. Shortly after his arrival, he managed to smuggle out a letter to a friend, in which he writes about the conditions of Auschwitz. Hans Peter Messerschmidt survived.

Smuggled letter

"The daily routine goes like this: 4 a.m. wake, Make beds( Straw mattress with 2 blankets) Get dressed(1 shirt, 1 shorts, 1 striped trousers, 1 striped jacket, 2 threadbare socks, 2 wooden clogs), enough to freeze in. Then breakfast, standing in open air: 1/2 loaf = 350 gm, 1 small piece sausage or margarine or cheese. 2 * a week 1/2 loaf long work time additional ration ( meat 200 gm per week). 6am roll call for about 4,00 prisioners. then march out to the different working places on the building site of the Buna wall belonging to I. G. Farbe"

IN MEMORY OF A FRIEND
These are the last photos of Alfred Tworoger. They are from an album his girlfriend, Marga Gussinoff, carried when she was deported. Marga, a Berliner, survived the Bergan- Belsen concentration camp and managed to save the album. The photo was taken in 1941.

Alfred Tworoger

Marga remembers “…. it was the only day we went out ‘wityhout wearing our star’…. very risky. We were yound, and dint know what the next day would bring …. We were lucky that nobody recognized us.” Alfred Tworoger took his own life in prison in 1942.

MY DEAR BOY !

In 1939, fifteen – year – old Gert Berliner went to Sweden on a children’s transport. In his luggage was his stuffed toy monkey. Gert’s parents, Paul and Sophie Berliner, remained in Berlin, and in 1943 they were deported to Aushwitz and murdered there.

Gert Berliner

In Novemeber 1941, Paul and Sophie wrote a letter to their son. Parts of it were censored – probably because they alluded to the deportations that had just begun. “I cannot write much [censored] terrible conditions I am. Daddy told you about the details. As long as we’re here, we’ll continue to write [censored] chin up. With God’s help, we’ll be reunited.”

In 1947, Gert Berliner emigrated from Sweden to the USA, where he became a painter, filmmaker and photographer.

JEAN HEINEMANNS’ NOTEBOOK
Jean Heinemann fled from Berlin to Paris in April 1933. In 1943 he was arrensted in Marseille and deported to Auschwitz. In the Jewarzno satellite camp he performed hard labor in brickworks until the camp was evacuated in January 1945. He survived the war and wrote his memoirs during a stay in a sanatorium in 1946. Jean Heinemann wrote down poems in this small notebook during his imprisonment in Jewarzono camp.

The Notebook

If we don’t use our physical and mental capabilities, we lose them. I notice in conversations that I have to look for words that i often used in the past but can’t remember now because I no longer use them ….. Life in the camp shrunk us physically and mentally.”

Axis of Continuity

The third and the longest axis is called the axis of continuity which is a long, confusing, and a never ending corridor. It takes us to various floors of the museum, showing various facets of Jewish life and society and gets you back to the exit. It is meant to represent the vitality of the Jewish society to withstand all onslaughts.

Voids
There are empty spaces in the museum which extend vertically through the entire museum called ‘voids’ which represent the absence of Jews from the German society. One of these voids contains over 10,000 faces made of Iron covering the floor, which is a dedication to all the innocent victims of war and violence by Isreli artist Meneshe Kadishman, who calls his installation “Shalekhet” in Hebrew, which means Fallen Leaves.Hope we don’t have such fallen leaves in future.

I visited The Pergamon museum a couple of days after I visited the Jewish museum. The Pergamon has the reputation of being one of the best museums in the world. It has artifacts from Greek and Roman era. I wasn’t that impressed by it. Everything seemed so artificial and fake; I couldn’t somehow identify myself with it. Although I am not a Jew, although I am not an European I could identify with the Jewish Museum. I feel, the trauma and struggles the Jews underwent are universal and not rooted in any particular geography.

The museum was inaugurated on September 11 2001, the day when the twin towers were blown up.Ironical isn’t it? History repeats it self if we don’t pay enough attention to it and we need more things like Jewish museum to remind us of the depths of human shallows and its possibilities.