Hello bloggers. Today, we only had one event on our scheduled itinerary: a visit to the first ever concentration camp in the town of Dachau. I know it is a very sensitive topic to talk about so today’s blog is going to be less detailed on purpose. But, it is still an important part of history that needs to be talked about and address.
Our day started with hotel breakfast. I had two croissants and a hard-boiled egg, eating as much as I can before it was time for our early departure. The hotel breakfast is still really good, even after one whole week of eating it.
After breakfast, we headed to Dachau by bus. The bus ride was around 30 minutes so we all took a nap after the long day yesterday in Munich. Once we arrived at the camp, it was at first covered by a lot of trees so you couldn’t see any of the camp until you entered through the gates. Being so enclosed did not prepare me for what I was about to see.
We started our morning at the camp with a tour. I’m not going to go into that much detail because it would not be appropriate to do so, but I will outline some of the main aspects of the camp. In summary, our tour guide showed us the opening gates, the watch towers, the prisoner’s housing, the officer’s main meeting building, the fence system, Barrack X (can look up for yourself), the infirmary (medical experiments performed here), and the bunker (clergy and special prisoners imprisoned here). Around the camp there were many memorials, too. Our tour guide was very knowledgable and informed us all about the rental system (prisoners could be rented by families to do work), Bavarian history, other camp locations, deeds performed at which camps, etc. On the bright side, not that many violent deeds were performed at Dachau.
This morning was definitely an eye-opening experience. I was speechless the whole time and didn’t know how or what to feel, but it was uncomfortable to be there. Nevertheless, it is important to learn about this because it is a part of history and humanity needs to learn from their mistakes from the past. I learned a lot of history today and I am thankful for the wonderful tour.
After the tour, we walked around the museum for a bit and then had lunch at the cafeteria there. I had currywurst and french fries. Like yesterday, the currywurst was really good and the meal was a good way to end our time at Dachau.
Once we left Dachau, we had the rest of our day to ourselves. We were all tired so we didn’t do anything except catch up on sleep, work on our final company analysis presentation, and go to dinner. For dinner, some of us guys went to this hole-in-the-wall restaurant called Snabo.ba. We all ordered these sausage links which were placed in between two pieces of bread and it was really good. I can’t tell you though what it was called or what meat it was. After dinner, we went to Tutti Frutti, again, but this time I got white chocolate ice cream with Nutella. It was amazing, like always, and a great way to end the day.
Tonight, we are all resting and getting ready for the week. Tomorrow, we are heading to the city of Regensburg.
Nicholas Monetti