Day 37 - Mauthausen

Concentration Camp at Mauthausen

Too many to a bunk...

Gas Chamber

Room for surgery; removing tattoos and things

Oldest Standing Oven on the Grounds

Quarry

Schloss Hellbrunn

Hidden Water Spouts

He spit on me

Cool Moving Stage Powered by Water Alone

Today we are heading to Vienna, because Dom’s flight is at 10:00 am tomorrow. Too early to take a train, so Tante Carole is going to drive. She needs to get something from home anyways. We wanted to squish in one more thing before Dom leaves, so despite the rain, we made our first stop at Schloss Hellbrunn. The small palace really is very beautiful. But the coolest part about the palace is the trick fountains. All over the grounds there are hidden water spouts and little moving characters all powered by water, that were designed and built hundreds of years ago. Pictures don’t really do it justice. You have to be there. It’s like...the original water park...for the rich/famous people. (Because no one else would’ve been allowed onto the palace grounds.) Then I slept a bit in the car before we stopped at the Mauthausen Memorial. Dom didn’t want to something quite so depressing, so I went alone. I suggest doing it, but don’t go alone. After awhile I just had to shut the audio-guide off. Way too many details; it made me feel sick. Then I saw the ovens and a pit started to form in my stomach. The final straw was the shower room though. I walked in, not realizing where I was going, I just wanted to get out of there. I can’t even imagine having to live here. Well, first off, it’s a men’s work camp. The only way a woman would be there is if she was brought from the women’s camp to work in the brothel. This place made me feel so sick inside. I knew it existed, but it’s pretty different seeing it in real life. Then I walked through all the memorial monuments put up by countries from all over and down into the rock quarry where the men were working. The pictures look great. It looks like beautiful, peaceful scenery. Then you remember how many men jumped/fell/were pushed off the rock face. How many of them died trying to carry rocks weighing 50 kgs each up the uneven steps back to camp, with the guards yelling and pushing them the whole way, probably with sticks or guns. It is a sad place. It made me feel weak all over. And sick, so sick. How can someone do that to another human being? I don’t think I could intentionally cause harm to another person. Then we went to Tante Carole’s favourite restaurant in Vienna. It was called Rudi’s Beisl. ‘Beisl’ refers to something like a greasy spoon restaurant. The food was delicious. It was a nice little place. Then we did absolutely nothing for the rest of the night, except read, and Dom wrote some postcards.