Standing stone
(At the Holocaust Memorial: Berlin, Germany)
A memorial is not strictly a usual tourist draw, but nevertheless this one is visited by all manner of people; huge school groups, tourists and other interested parties. I have visited this place before on my first visit to Berlin. It was relatively new then, and very barren in the icy conditions. Grit had been poured between all these blocks or stelae and since I visited at dusk, there was not a soul around – there was only the distant sound of traffic and the crunching of ice and grit under me. The undulating ground and the ever increasing height of the blocks was confusing and disorienting.
Much like my visit to the Neue Wache near the Brandenburg Gate, it was an intensely moving experience. When I visited the Neue Wache the last time, there was nothing in the building, save the Kathe Kollwitz statue of a mother cradling a dead soldier. Accentuating the bleakness of the scene, frozen snow had fallen through the perfectly circular hole in the roof, coating them in a film of white, as if they were spotlit by white light. At the time, it seemed to me one of the most desolate and beautiful scenes I had ever seen. I remember writing in my journal at the time that I could feel ‘the war’ was constantly prevalent; I could feel it in my lungs, biting my hands and burning my face.
Even without the knowledge that this memorial is to the ‘murdered Jews of Europe’, there is a definite sombre, warlike clarity to it. The way the stelae are arranged is very deliberate, like troops, towering in dark, cloudy battleship grey. In the midst of them in the half-light, I was anxious and sensed that I might not be so alone – a fleeting dash of movement from the corner of an eye is all I ever managed to see of another person there. This time in the late summer afternoon, it had a different impact altogether. Far less menacing and brooding, but more stoical, as if the weather tempers the mood of the entire place.
Back to the present. Glasgow is damp, or rather, it is absolutely sodden. Today I was on a mission to retrieve flu medication and more tissues from the shops, but during my time outside, it began to rain; first just spitting and then it turned into a full moderate downpour. I was halfway up the hill to home when I heard a cacophony of shrieking from the school girls at the top. I lifted my head in confusion – to see what the fuss could be about – but my face met with a massive slap of water. There had suddenly been a doubling of the rain intensity and it had smacked me square in the chops for looking up. It has reached them mere seconds before me. In the two further minutes it took me to arrive at my door, the ground was under an inch of rainwater and I was soaked to the skin. I dripped all the way up to the stairs to the flat and promptly changed my entire outfit. It was a downpour that was tropical in proportions, but with none of the pleasant properties.
– Today Rosie makes continued attempts to recover and is making cards to send away in Glasgow, UK –
