Dachau Concentration Camp and Finishing Munich

Dear Mom and Dad,

Day Three:

We started off the day as typical Americans and went to McDonalds for breakfast. Mike was craving eggs and bacon and the only places we could find that were open early enough sold croissants. That wasn't going to cut it as we wouldn't be able to ear again until after our tour, which would have been around 4pm. They don't have sausage here (surprisingly) so Mike settled for a double beef, egg, and cheese mcmuffin. I had a double cheese burger. Normally, I drink black coffee, however, it was way too dark here. I couldn't even drink it with creme.

We paid $26 a person to have a guided tour of Dachau Concentration camp. This included the tour guide and transportation to and from the camp. We had to ride the Uban for 25 minutes and then a bus for 10. Dachau was the first concentration camp in Germany and where they trained all the soldiers to then go to the other larger camps. At least 33,000 people were killed there; however, the number is much higher because they didn't keep the best records and never accounted for the prisoners of war that were there. The camps started as a place to imprison people with different political views as Hilter but then shifted to Jewish people. I'll do my best to explain the pictures but nothing compares to seeing and hearing about the place first hand. The gate reads something like "work is freedom," which freedom wasn't possible. If you couldn't work, then you were killed.

Only men were kept here. Women and children were sent elsewhere. Surprisingly, the women camps were guarded by women. Guards only guarded the place. The prisoners were responsible for working, building the campa, carrying out the punishments as instructed by the guards, and gassing/cremating fellow prisoners. Almost always, the punishments were so bad that death was inevitable. Prisoners could be punished for anything: losing a button off a shirt, not making a bed properly, making eye contact w a guard, stepping on the grass, leaving a finger print, etc. The next few pics are what the cells would look like.

 Priests were on of the first to be imprisoned as well. This was to try and stop them from convincing their church members that what was going on was wrong. German priests were allowed to pray here, but only German priests.

There could be up to 70,000 people imprisoned at a time.

This is a guard tower. You would be shot immediately if you were caught stepping on the grass  as it was viewed as a sign of trying to escape. The guards would then punish the people in your bunks, cells, friends, or family members.

 The electric fence surrounded the camp. Many people would commit suicide by laying in the fence. The volts weren't high enough to kill the prisoners immediately so they would burn to death. They would then be left there as a warning sign until another prisoner was assigned the job to try and remove them without getting electrocuted themselves.

This was the first crematory built by the prisoners. It could keep up with all the bodies so they built another one later. They could go through 5, 000 bodies a day. If you built the crematory, you were then killed to try and keep what was going on as a secret.

 The next pics are where the prisoners were stripped to take their clothes and reuse them.

Then they were told they were going to take a shower. This was to prevent chaos and people trying to not enter.

The prisoners were then gassed and moved to another room before being cremated.

 Each crematory can burn three bodies at a time.

 This is where some of the ashes were dumped. Some ashes were reused in the vegetable garden.

 The bunks looked like the next pictures. It was much better to be on the top bunk because inevitably people would die during the night and their dead body would rid itself of pee and poop which would drop on the lower bunk. This also spread diseases.

 There were showers and toilets that the prisoners were rarely allowed to use. A
When they could use them, they suffered alot of abuse by the guards.

There is so much more that we learned about, but hopefully the pictures help give a little picture of what went on at this camp.

After our tour, we made our way back to the main square.

Selfie with my main squeeze.

I was starved so we hit up the shawarma stand. They shave the meat off the rotisserie cooker and add the fillings. We bought and extra, so Michael could have his midnight snack.

And it was time for a couple cold beers. We went to the Hofstrahouse. You just sit with other people and listen to traditional German music. We found ourselves next to a cute Asian family. Even with the language barrier, we had fun hanging with them and "toasting" after every song. Also, Michael and I bought matching tshirts so get excited for the appearance of those.

 We finished the night by using the free laundry service and having a drink on our rooftop at the hotel.

We made it to Rome, today. It wasn't the easiest 1 hour flight like we thought it was going to be. We reached Rome just fine, but the rain was so hard that the pilot couldn't land. All the flights actually ended up being rerouted. Our pilot thought he had enough gas to just circle above until the rain let up. He was wrong. We had to make an emergency landing in Bologna, Italy. After we refueled, we made it back to Rome and landed just fine. It only took an extra three hours so we just slept on the plane. My blanket I brought gets used everyday!

We have checked into our hotel, and I'll update another post in a little bit.

Love you,

The Italians