Travels with my niece

Last week I had a very short visit from my sixteen-year-old niece India. She was only able to get over for a couple of days as she had been performing in a local theatre production which took up most of her Easter break (she has a belting soprano voice). As she’s studying A Level history and is fascinated by World War II and Nazi Germany, there was more than enough to keep her occupied. She arrived on a ridiculously early flight on Wednesday morning so we stoked up with a Spreegold breakfast before beginning our sightseeing marathon with a visit to the Topographie des Terrors via Checkpoint Charlie.  It’s impossible to avoid Cold War ‘sights’ in Berlin so we incorporated a few of those into the trip too. I hadn’t been to the Topographie des Terrors for years so I’d not visited the new indoor exhibition before. The outdoor ‘trench’ is still there and features the exhibition Berlin 1933-1945: Between Propaganda and Terror.  Inside there are temporary and permanent exhibitions devoted to the historical site (several Third Reich institutions including the Gestapo headquarters were once located here), the last days of the war, and Nazi atrocities such as the treatment of homosexuals, political opponents and the disabled. 

 

India with her breakfast pancakes

Nearby, in a car park just behind the Holocaust Memorial – a piece of positioning I find wonderfully ironic – is the site of Hitler’s bunker.  India wanted to visit the site as she’s particularly interested in the Führer’s last days. It’s kept deliberately free of razzmatazz to deter fascists from creating a shrine but there is an information panel. 

From there we walked through the Holocaust Memorial, properly named the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. India’s paternal grandfather was the son of Russian Jews who moved to Britain in the 1930s so it’s possible that some of her ancestors suffered Nazi persecution. It’s a very sobering monument but I’m not a great fan, partly because it’s always overrun with tourists failing to accord it the proper respect. After taking a look at the Brandenburger Tor, the Reichstag and the Kaiser Wilhelm Gedächtniskirche we were ready for a rest so, making the most of a beautiful late afternoon we made our way back to Prenzlauer Berg and stopped for refreshments in the Prater. Alan had to leave us there as he’d got a ticket for a Paul Weller concert so India and I went for a walk around the Mauerpark and dinner at an Italian restaurant.

 

Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe

 

The next day we went to the Deutsch-Russisches Museum in Karlshorst whose building contains the room in which the declaration of surrender at the end of WWII was signed. The emphasis here is on the German onslaught on the Soviet Union, the crimes committed against Soviet prisoners of war and, naturally, Germany’s eventual capitulation. 

There were things that we didn’t have time to fit in (Sachsenhausen and the Haus der Wannsee Konferenz for example), but by Thursday afternoon we were a little museum-weary and I didn’t want India to return home feeling as though she’d been on a school trip so we decided to head for the shops. As her flight home was early on Friday morning we rounded off the visit with pizza and an early night.

 

Room in which representatives of Nazi Germany signed the declaration of surrender, ending WWII

Obviously it’s always lovely to spend time with family members even if it’s only a short visit. I’m happy that we were able to have such a great couple of days – the weather was perfect and, as well as a few clothing purchases, India got plenty of photos to share with her history class.