Two memorial sites (and some currywurst)

After leaving the Reichstag building, we crossed the road into the Tiergarten, in order to see the Memorial to Europe’s Sinti and Roma people murdered under National Socialism.

The memorial takes the form of a circular pool of dark water, surrounded by the words (in German and English) of a poem „Auschwitz“ by Roma poet Santino Spinelli:

Gaunt face
dead eyes
cold lips
quiet
a broken heart
out of breath
without words
no tears

The triangle in the centre of the pool represents the triangular badge the Sinti and Roma were forced to wear in the concentration camps.

The site is dedicated to the memory of over 200,000 Sinti and Roma murdered by the Nazis, in labour camps and death camps. Estimates vary as to the death toll but is thought that at least 25-50% of the Sinti and Roma population in Europe were killed.

Although small and in a corner of the busy city park, it was moving in its simplicity and the horrors of what happened to so many people.

We then continued out of the Tiergarten, past the Brandenburger Tor, to find somewhere for lunch. A kebab and wurst shop served up three delicious plates of currywurst mit pommes while we sheltered from a brief shower.

We headed across Unter den Linden (it’s a little like the Champs Élysée but with lots of lime trees) on our way to the Friedrichstraße railway station.

This station was an important crossing point for civilian pedestrians crossing between West and East Berlin during the time of the divided city.

Today, we needed to catch a train to the Zoologisher Garten quarter. However, we weren’t going to the zoo or the swanky shops of the Kurfürstendamm (this is really considered to be Berlin’s Champs Élysée).

In fact, our next destination was the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gedächtnis-Kirche (Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church), just next to Kurfürstendamm.

This church was rather pompously dedicated to the memory of Kaiser Wilhelm I (of Prussia and then the German Empire) by his grandson, Wilhelm II, in 1895. When it opened, the memorial hall on the lower floor was unfinished for another 11 years.

In November 1943, the church was badly damaged in a bombing raid. The ruins were briefly used by the church after the war but then it was decided that the ruins were unsafe and so the church needed to be rebuilt.

After an architectural competition, German architect Egon Eiermann designed a radical new church and bell tower, initially without retaining any of the remaining building. After an outcry, Eiermann adapted his design to retain the damaged spire and memorial hall below, which now stand between the new buildings.

The restored memorial hall is richly decorated with scenes from Wilhelm’s life and the Prussian royal family in mosaics on the vaulted ceiling. As a centrepiece calling for peace and reconciliation stand a damaged sculpture of Jesus, which used to stand on the altar in the original church, and a Nagelkreuz (Cross of Nails) from Coventry. A daily service also uses the words of the Coventry litany of reconciliation. This was indeed the church recommended to us yesterday by the man on reception at our hotel. At the opposite end of the hall is a gallery depicting the original church, its destruction and re-building.

The new church was built in the 1950s and is an amazing building. The vivid blue stained glass designed by a craftsman from Chartres Cathedral includes some patches of yellow and red, and covers all 8 walls of the octagonal building. This creates a breathtaking effect as you enter the room. A large copper figure of the risen Jesus hovers above the altar, in stark contrast to the seemingly glowing blue walls.

We sat in the peaceful quiet for a few minutes, taking in the stunning beauty.

The new church also features a memorial to the Evangelical Christians who died at the hands of the Nazis given by the Catholic Church, and the original of the charcoal drawing known as the Stalingrad Madonna, drawn by a German soldier, Kurt Reuber, during the battle of Stalingrad in 1942. Copies of the drawing are held by each of the cathedrals in Coventry and Volgograd (formerly Stalingrad).

Just outside the new church is a much more recent memorial to the 13 victims of a terror attack on 19 December 2016, when a truck was driven into the crowd at a Christmas market next to the church. A further 56 were injured. A gold-coloured metal alloy fills a crack running down the steps of the church and across the pavement, marking the spot where the truck came to a stop. The alloy stands proud of the pavement surface in order that the passing footfall polishes the metal, ensuring it stays shiny.Read more