We signed up for a “hop on/hop off” tour bus deal today, just to get as many stops in as possible. It’s one thing to hoof it, but it’s another to be dropped off at all the joints you are hoofing it to.

We caught the bus thing off Kurfürstendamm, and took the first or second drop off at Potsdamer Platz. Had some chow. Got back on the bus and got dropped off at the Jewish Museum.

Heavy.

I’m just gonna refrain from trying to describe this joint. Beautifully-designed. Powerful.

After the Jewish Museum, we hit the open air Topography of Terror exhibit. It charts the rise of the Third Reich, their systematic expulsion and persecution of all opposing parties, their grabbing of the power, and then how they used it, all the way to the end. 1933-1945. Animals.

Heavy, again.

This stuff just sinks into you in the oddest ways. It’s hard to rebound from this stuff. But I don’t think I’m the only one who’d say, “Every single human being should see this stuff.”

Sorry if that sounds trite, but you walk away feeling pretty down, yet thankful, and scared, and generally awestruck any of it actually took place like it did. For as long as it did. How official it all was. How documented. How America ignored this and that. How citizens turned a blind eye. The fear apparatus. Horrible times, and, not long ago, when you think about it.