Come along to Germany (English)

[Music] This video is a special addition to my original video, Come Along to Germany. This was originally recorded in Yiddish. So, a lot of times in the video, you might see me speaking Yiddish, but I'm re-recording everything in English, so more people have access to this interesting video of the history of the Holocaust. First leg was from JFK to London. And of course, after the landing, I had to go to compliment the pilots on their butter smooth landing. And of course, take a picture in the cockpit. Duh, I'm a pilot as well. Well, not really a pilot, but I really want to be a pilot. All right, focus. And after flying for 3 hours from London, I finally made it to Munich, Germany. I was very excited for this trip because it was my first time doing a lot of things that I haven't done before. It was my first time really exploring Europe. It was my first time backpacking all by myself. And it was my first time traveling that was relying solely on public transportation. And I also crossed the border of a country on a very unique way, which you might see in a different video. I got there late in the afternoon. So on the evening I went to check out the local shu as well as a Jewish bookstore, a kosher cafe and a kosher restaurant which I had dinner and it was absolutely delicious. [Music] The buildings are interconnected underground with the tunnel and it was really interesting to explore a modern building that was built on the traditional European style. I got there just on time to Davin Mena. A beautiful huge shaw with very high ceiling and big windows. Who in their wildest dreams would think 75 years ago that this could exist in the heart of Germany? After a full day of traveling and exploring the locals, I finally retired in a local hostel in Munich. Good morning from Munich, Germany. The weather was a bit rainy and cloudy, approximately 50° F. After having some coffee and breakfast at a local cafe, for the first stop of the day, I went to explore the city center in Munich. It's a typical nice European city with the big stone structures, lots of cool shops, and just lots of busy people. Of [Music] course, I went into a local souvenir shop to get a shot glass. [Music] All right. And here we are. Wow. This place is called Marine Plots. This is the city center of Munich. It used to be the old town hall, now just a very popular tourist attraction. I then took a 45minut train ride from Munich to Dao. I then took the local city bus and finally got to the Dhao concentration camp memorial site. Upon arrival at the welcome center, they have a souvenir shop and a Jewish bookstore. These are the original tracks that brought the Jews to the concentration camps. And this is the famously well-known Nazi slogan, Arbot Mah Fry. [Music] These are the barracks. These are the houses that the Jews were sleeping and living in during the war. These two are still standing. But here going forward, you can see the foundation of 34 more barracks. Originally, it was built to accommodate 6,000 people, but towards the end of the Holocaust, the Nazis brought here more than 32,000 people, which is more than five times the capacity that it was originally built for. [Music] These are pictures of exact displays, what it looked like 75 years ago. Here [Music] I was able to go in and see what it actually looked like to live inside these barracks. These are the beds or shelves where the Jews were sleeping. This is where the Jews used to hang up their clothing. And on this little shelf, they put all their personal belongings. Originally, this area was built as a common space. But towards the end of the Holocaust, when the place got too overcrowded, the Nazis built these portable beds to store more people in air. The Nazis tried painting a picture to other countries that the Jews were living very comfortably in the concentration camps. So here in the middle, they built a nice and big oven with a fully stacked kitchen with all supplies. But as it says here, most of the time there wasn't even enough gas to operate the oven. [Music] These were the bathrooms for the concentration camps. These 12 toilets had to be enough for the hundreds of people living here in this barrack. This was only another tactic of the Nazis to degrade and torture the Jews. In 1944 and 45, when it started to get really overcrowded, the Nazis started doubling up two people in one bed. And obviously when so many people are living so congested together, it started spreading a lot of viruses between the Jews. And unfortunately a lot of Jews were dying only from those viruses. This was the concentration camp's main building. Also a storage building and a maintenance building. When a new shipment of Jews got here to the concentration camp, the Nazis brought them into this room where they had to go through in between two tables and take off all their clothing, jewelry, and personal belongings and give it to the Nazis. Here you can see the schedule of the prisoners here in the concentration camp. In the summertime, they had to get up at 4:00 in the morning and work all the way through 6:15 p.m. with only a 30-minut break. Another way for the Nazis to torture the Jews was that they did crazy and brutal medical experiments on the Jews and that unfortunately killed or permanently injured a lot of Jews. [Music] In 1937 and 38, the Nazis surrounded the camp with the barbed wire fence. They also built seven of these watchtowers and they put their guards that would shoot on anyone that is trying to escape or even get close to the fence. And as it says here that sadly a lot of Jews purposely went to defense knowingly that they're going to be shot to take an end to their pain. [Music] And just here outside of the camp you can see the unfortunately well-known crerematoriums. These are the original crerematoriums. And between 1940 and 1943, the Nazis incinerated here more than 11,000 bodies. But in 1943 and 44, when the original crerematoriums outgrew the capacity that it was originally built for, the Nazis built this bigger building, which included a lot of gas chambers and bigger crerematoriums. [Music] These are smaller gas chambers. According to witnesses, these were used when the Nazis wanted to kill a smaller group of people, like 10 or 15 people. [Music] Here they had a small group of Jews going inside. They sealed both of the doors from both sides and they put in a small canister of cyclone B gas and very quickly it choked them all to death. And before the Nazis opened the door, they had to ventilate it in order it shouldn't kill them. This is how powerful this gas was. [Music] Sometimes when they killed so many people in a short period, there would be laying here piles of dead bodies. In order for the Jews not to resist going into the gas chambers, the Nazis lie to them that they're only going to take a shower. Here in this room, they told the Jews to take off their clothing and leave everything behind and told them to go in here in this next room. Here on the ceiling was installed fake showerheads to fool them that they're only taking a shower. sometimes in groups of 150 people at a time. [Music] Once they were all inside and the doors were locked, the Nazis put in a cyclone BG gas through these showerheads and within 15 minutes they were all dead. Afterwards, when they opened the doors and all the dead bodies fell out, they piled up here, piles of dead bodies. And then one by one they took them here into the crerematoriums to burn the bodies. [Music] They took one body at a time, put it on this stretcher. They then pushed the stretcher into the oven and closed the doors. And every 15 minutes the body was burnt. Here in the bottom is where they put the coals for the ovens to burn. [Music] This here was a pistol range. When the Nazis wanted to shoot someone, they told him to stand here against the wall and they coldbloodedly killed them. This here is a man's grave. Right here under the soil is buried the ashes of thousands and thousands of Jews that were burnt in the crerematoriums. [Music] Hi, never again. [Music]