Breakfast and the Jewish Cemetery

Our last day in Salzwedel we had a delicious and enormous breakfast fit for royalty, cooked, prepared and presented by Roland, the proprietor of the hotel, who also performed a magic trick with our apple.

On the way to catch the train we stopped by the Jewish cemetery. The cemetery was lush and peaceful, due to the fact that most of the markers are overgrown. Apparently, friends and families are responsible for keeping the foliage trimmed and since there are very few Jews left in Salzwedel . . . It should be noted that the non-Jewish cemetery was equally overgrown. Most heartrending at the Jewish cemetery was the line of graves of people who had died just days after the liberation of the camps.

Stolperstein

The purpose of our trip to Germany was to lay Stolperstein ("stumbling block") stones in front of the store/apartment which was the last place my grandparents, Tobias and Betty Bachenheimer had lived as free citizens. Stolperstein are small stones, hand-made by artist Gunter Demnig, for each single victim of the Nazis. Although my father and two uncles escaped Germany, they too were victims, so we included stones for them as well. Gunter told us that he has put in over 25,000 stones so far.

The laying of our Stolpersteins had been set for noon on Saturday. Unfortunately, through some tight scheduling, we ended up getting there at 11:55. Upon arrival we observed about 30 people, including townspeople, elected officials, and numerous print and broadcast journalists. When we saw that the installation had begun, three of us burst into tears. (I can't wait to see those pictures from the newspaper.)

Gunter fit the stones into the cobblestone sidewalk in front of the building, adding a pebble that Ra'anan had brought from his father's grave in Israel. It was heartbreaking and poignant for all of us.

A couple of hours after laying the stones we attended a ceremony in a former church where a youth choir sang, Toby, Gina, Ra'anan, Idan and I read tributes, Herr Kaiser and Dr. Ernst Block* spoke. The whole time we were in Salzewedel we were treated like visiting diplomats.

Paste into your browser:
http://www.salzwedel.de/stadt/oeffentlichkeit/100626stolpersteinverlegung.html

If you hit “Translate” at the upper right, the article is rather comical.

*Dr. Block has written a painstakingly researched book about the Jews of Salzwedel entitled Wirwareneine Glückliche Familie . . . I have the book, which contains numerous Bachenheimer photographs and documents, including Uncle Kurt's picture on the front. The book is written in German.

Salzwedel

On Friday, the six of us took the train to Salzwedel, where my dad had lived with his mother, father and two brothers. Salzwedel is a hamlet of approximately 20,000 citizens located in the north of Germany, near Hamburg. Upon our arrival, the town archivest, Mr. Langusch, who had been corresponding with Gina, took us on a walking/dragging-our-luggage tour of the 750 year old city. It's easy to imagine that Salzwedel looks that same as it did 100 years ago: the streets and sidewalks are cobblestone, the building façades are old-fashioned and there are few cars to be seen. The clothes and shoes in the storefront windows seem to be throwbacks to the 70s. (OK, they're not 100 years old, but could be.)

Salzwedel is famous for its baumkuchen, a cake shaped like a tree (which I liked a lot). Our quaint, but newly-remodeled hotel is across the street from the Bachenheimers' last apartment/store (although the building had been demolished and replaced). At dinner in a local restaurant we lit shabbat candles, recited the blessing and said the kiddush over German wine.

The next morning we met a woman who had owned and run a bookstore across the street for over 50 years. She remembered playing with my dad and two uncles and also remembered seeing their store windows shattered and contents plundered the day after Kristallnacht. We then took a more comprehensive walking tour with Herr Kaiser (the vice-mayor) and his English/German speaking daughter, Pia, which included the actual apartment where my dad and his family had lived in the late 1920s and early 1930s.

Trains of No Return

Friday morning we surprised Ra'anan and Idan when they arrived at the airport. After dropping off their luggage at the hotel we set off for Platform 17.








Our visit to Platform 17 was unsettling. Jews who had been relocated to Berlin boarded the box cars that would take them to the extermination camps at Platform 17. Except for the memorials, Platform 17 looks like it did in the 1940s. There are hundreds of placques on the ground indicating the number of Jews transported on each particular day; some placques list 50; some over 1,100. My grandparents, Tobias and Betty Bachenheimer, were transported from Berlin on 14 April 1942 along with 65 other Jews.

Paste Ofra Haza into your browser at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u61zE-0mb_4&feature=related

Yeah, yeah yeah, we need the rain
Yeah, yeah yeah, to wash the trains
Endless nights
Tortured days
Trains of no return

Law-El ani agraw aneni
Avka bachawl lailaw aneni
Ten tal umawtawr aneni
Oh aneni Oh
[To God I call, please answer me
I cry every night, answer me
Give us dew and rain, answer me
answer me]

Oh, don't let them grow again
Oh, no not again
Don't let them roll again
The trains of no return

Yeah, yeah yeah, we need the rain
Yeah, yeah yeah, to wash the trains
Endless nights
Tortured days
Trains of no return

Law-El ani agraw aneni
Aneni, aneni
Sham za'aku kolot anenu
Sham za'aku kolot anenu
Ba'aru orot anenu
Ba'aru orot anenu
Ba'aru orot anenu
Netzach Yisrael anenu
Hu lo y'shaker
Kawl ha'or kawl hachoshech
Sheyoter mikawl ra'u eich
Din ha'Elohim molech
Hem gam mevakshim
[To God I call, answer me
Answer me, answer me
Their voices cried out, answer us
Lights burned, answer us
Eternal One of Israel, answer us
He will not fail us
All the light, all the darkness
Which more than anything, saw how
The law of God rules
They also plead]

Yeah, yeah yeah, we need the rain
Yeah, yeah yeah, to wash the trains
Endless nights
Tortured days
Trains of no return
Don't let them grow again
Don't let them burn again
Don't let them roll again
The trains of no return
We need the rain
Don't let them grow again
Don't let them burn again
Don't let them roll again

Hotel Hansablick and Walkin' the Walk

The Hansablick, which had been recommended by Gina who had stayed there numerous times, is a turn-of-the-century Old-Berlin townhouse which has been transformed into a hotel and art gallery. We found our friend Peter or the "The Pretty Guy" at the front desk. Peter was just fabulous, but was too shy to allow a photograph. The Pretty Guy was mostly nice and pretty.

In the morning Toby and I headed off for a tour, where we joined Berlin Walks with Jakob, a Hugh Grant look-alike and probably the best tour guide in Berlin. Jakob took us to the Berlin Wall, the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, Bebelplatz (scene of the Nazi bookburning), Ghost Station, the War Memorial, and many, many other places. Along the way he fed us an encyclopedia of facts, was informative and entertaining. Jakob managed to handle a lot of delicate subjects with discretion and tact.

Later we met Gina at the Jewish Museum, where we saw an exhibit on Jewish creators of comic books and graphic novels. After a short rest we had a long* dinner with Gina and John at a wonderful Italian bistro where the propietor took the "beans" out of the fish before he served it to us.

*Germany was playing football.

Sachsenhausen

On Wednesday Toby, Gina and I visited Sachsenhausen, the Nazi concentration camp just 35 km from Berlin. Although our visit was necessary, it was disturbing for countless reasons. On the train we passed pristine forests, turned sinister by the memory of the death marches. Taking the short walk from the train station to the camp we passed houses that were there in the 1940s; prisoners walked the same streets to the trains and factories, passing homes occupied by families, every day.

Over 30,000 people died at Sachsenhausen due to overwork, illness, exhaustion, disease and extermination. There is a grassy area near the entrance set aside for memorials erected by families of the victims. These days the camp is somewhat sterile, with most of the buildings, including the barracks, laundry, mess hall, infirmary, morgue, prison and guard houses turned into museum-like exhibits.