In my previous visits, I have never gone inside the underground memorial centre - and that is really a missing piece in the conceptualisation of the memorial. It is with the context provided that the seemingly endless rows of concrete blocks turn to unmarked, anonymous, numerous, markers for the many that perished.
It is also strange to see the stark numbers - that the most of the Jews that were murdered were not German, but rather more Polish, Soviet, Hungarian, Czechoslovakian and Romanian Jews died than German Jews. The operation of persecution seems more of a hunt, than just neighbors turning on each other.
Ultimately, the sadest commentary for me was in the very beginning - a quote from Primo Levi "It happened, therefore it an happen again: this is the core of what we have to say". Given what has happened since - Serbia, Rwanda and what is happening now in Syria - as the human race we haven't learnt anything. As the saying goes, history repeats itself.
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