May 31, 2007
The Yale women's basketball team is in the midst of a ten-day tour of Germany. Different team members will be providing accounts of their experiences each day on yalebulldogs.com. In today's installment, Brittani Nichols and Ashley Easley talk about their tour of Munich and powerful visit to the Dachau Concentration Camp.
Guten Tag,
This is Brittani coming live from Munich. Today is Day 3 of our trip and we started off with breakfast in the hotel. There was nothing too unusual. I tried what Melissa (Colborne) told me was a nut paste, but it tasted and looked like chocolate, especially when it was all over her mouth.
Once breakfast was over, we headed to the bus for a three-hour tour: two hours on the bus and one on foot. We'd all noticed what a high percentage of the cars here were BMW or Mercedes, but we did not realize how serious it was until we saw the war of the buildings. Mercedes-Benz recently finished a new building and in response BMW is building a very futuristic BMW World next to their headquarters and museum. We saw the classy shopping area and Bohemian coffee shop scene. The most exciting part of the tour for me was when we got to walk around the Summer Palace for the ruling family of Bavaria. This place makes mansions from MTV Cribs look like shacks. Three generations of the only family that ruled in Bavaria contributed to this residence. It was amazing not only because of the house, but because of the park in the back of the living area. In this park there were countless statues of Greek gods and goddesses and a fountain. When I first pointed out there was a statue of a man (Cronus) preparing to eat a baby, it took some convincing that that was in fact the scene being portrayed. Unfortunately along with the lively and historically rich areas, we got a glimpse of Germany's cruel past.
While on the bus we drove past many buildings that had been destroyed or damaged from World War II. Some of the museums had not been completely redone, but rather only the damaged parts revamped. These parts were built in a way that they were obviously different from the original parts of the building. It seemed as Germans vowed to never forget just as the Jewish have. We saw Adolf Hitler's office, which was not damaged because of camouflage put on the roof before bombings, which made me wonder why they had not done this for more of the buildings. Only recently has the synagogue been rebuilt within the city. At first this news was shocking and seemed slow moving (coming from a country where high schools still have segregated proms) but brings hope at the same time.
Munich has been great but judging from local yokels' reactions they just aren't ready for YWB. I don't care who's in your town, when the Midwest shows up, all of Munich shuts down.
Signing off,
"B" of B-Easy Enterprises
Guten Abend,
This is Ashley, attempting to wake myself up to write this summation after Brittani took 25 minutes to write hers -- but I'm not judging.
Anyways, after taking the tour of Munich, we were given free time to explore the Market and eat lunch. Some used the time to shop, while others of us explored German food. Being the picky eater that I am, I accompanied Brittani to a German restaurant in order to buy pizza -- quality decision.
After devouring a 30 centimeter "Pizza Margharite," we met in front of the hotel to continue our sightseeing. We took a 45-minute bus ride to the Dachau Concentration Camp. The concentration camp was incredibly intense. We walked through barracks, viewed movies about the prisoners and the history of the concentration camps, and listened to audio clips about specific places on the campgrounds. Perhaps the most powerful area of the concentration camp was the crematorium. In the crematorium, we were able to walk through gas chambers and we viewed the wooden beams in the crematorium where prisoners were hanged. It was impossible for us to fathom the pain and suffering that had occurred on the grounds of Dachau Concentration Camp, and we all left the campgrounds touched by the experience.
We boarded the bus for the 45-minute trip back to the hotel. On the way back, our tour guide, Robert, shared more facts with us about landmarks (such as the Allianz Arena where the last World Cup was held). Other than this landmark, I can not speak of any other things he described, as jet lag finally caught up with me and I took my fourth nap of the day. After returning to the hotel, we all prepared for dinner. Well, they prepared for dinner and I slept. We were given more free time to explore Munich and eat dinner at a place of our choice.
That brings us to now. Right now it is 11:30 p.m. and I need to pick the clothes up in my room and place them in their rightful place since we are leaving Munich tomorrow. We will travel to Wasserburg to play our first game of the trip at 2 p.m. and then continue on to Bad Reichenhall, where we will stay for a couple of nights.
As Brittani previously mentioned, when the Midwest shows up, the city shuts down. Prepare yourself Bad Reichenhall -- we're coming.
And I'm out,
Ashley Easley
"Easy" of B-Easy Enterprises