Berlin can keep you off-kilter with contradicting emotions.

On one hand, the metropolis is an exciting and progressive place that is ever-evolving through the work and dreams of its people. On the other hand, the ghosts of the Holocaust and World War II are still present all these decades later (at least for us).

To understand this discordance between past and present you could visit the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, a grouping of cement blocks and monoliths that vary in height and form a maze for you to explore and contemplate.    

But we think a better starting point for a Berlin visitor is located at Auguststrasse 11-13 in Berlin’s Mitte section.

At this address you will find the site of the Jewish Girls School, where most of the children and teachers were deported to concentration camps in the late 1930s and early 1940s.  

The architect of the school, Alexander Beer, was also deported and died in a camp in 1944.

All these decades later, the children, their teachers, Beer and the school are not forgotten.

The still-standing brick building is now home to two adored restaurants on the ground floor (Mogg and House of Small Wonder) as well as a small wall-hung exhibit by the old stairwell explaining the building’s history to the public.  

One black-and-white photo on the wall features children from the school playing in the courtyard.

Today, in that same courtyard, you can order food and drinks.

The first time you visit the building you may be deeply moved and find it hard to see how people can be eating and drinking in a place so solemn.  

We know we did. But we’ve visited the building a couple of times since then and started to grasp how the past and the present can co-exist.

Now, with each visit, we wonder if the skinny tree in the picture is the thick, large mass of a tree providing us comfortable shade. We think of the students smiling and playing. And they remind us to make a better world in their memory.

We know it’s not your typical first stop in a city. But this destination will situate you, ground you, and challenge you as you prepare yourself for your Berlin adventures.

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