Berlin O philia

The next few posts will deal with a subject close to my heart, and one of the things that first attracted me to this magnificent city. That is, the memory of the Holocaust. I have already mentioned here before I have personal interest in this subject, being what is known as “third generation to the Holocaust”, and obsessed about the issue.

My particular obsession is focused on learning from history, making sure such things never happen to anyone, anywhere. One of the aspects of learning from history is the issue of dealing with the memory. Being a descendant of victims is not an easy thing. There’s a lot of unremitting pain involved, a lot of distress, a lot of very tangible loss, still very much alive. But I always thought that being a descendant of the perpetrators is even harder.
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As we were walking along the 17th June Street towards the Brandenburg Gate, we came across a familiar name on one of the street signs – Yitzhak Rabin, our former prime minister, who was assassinated on November 4th, 1995. I was there, in the demonstration after which he was shot by Yigal Amir, the disgusting fanatical extreme right winged law student, may he burn in hell (if only we Jews believed in hell, that is). It was a great national trauma, and afterwards things have started to go downhill, and never recovered. So I was both glad and sad to see his name there.

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As we promised, we made the excruciating journey to Jerusalem to bring you some real-time photos of the lovely “United Buddy Bears” project, which came here in the beginning of August. We came back home exhausted and probably a bit dehydrated (it’s much dryer there, so we tend to drink less. Big mistake), but with lots of beautiful pictures (Click on the picture to enlarge).

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