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    A Kashmiri Haveli in Mathura, UP

    A Kashmiri Haveli in Mathura, UP

    Jharokha

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    The Staircase in Ali Qapu Palace, Isfahan, Iran

    The Staircase in Ali Qapu Palace, Isfahan, Iran

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    Dervesh and Lion

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    Mathura and Gandhara school of Art

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    My favorite artworks from European Museums

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    Gandhara Art in Humboldt Forum: Life of Lord Buddha

    Jewish Heroes Square in Krakow, Poland

    Jewish Heroes Square in Krakow, Poland

    Block no. 4 in Auschwitz concentration camp

    Block no. 4 in Auschwitz concentration camp

    Ottoman tent in Princess Czartoryski Museum in Krakow, Poland

    Ottoman tent in Princess Czartoryski Museum in Krakow, Poland

    The Steam Engine Building, Potsdam, Germany

    The Steam Engine Building, Potsdam, Germany

    Assyrian human-headed winged bull from Nimrud; 9th cent. BCE; Pergamon Museum, Berlin

    Assyrian human-headed winged bull from Nimrud; 9th cent. BCE; Pergamon Museum, Berlin

    Catacombs in St Peter’s Abbey Salzburg, Austria

    Catacombs in St Peter’s Abbey Salzburg, Austria

    St Nicholas Church in #Leipzeg, #Germany

    St Nicholas Church in #Leipzeg, #Germany

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    Gloriette, Schonbrunn Palace, Vienna,Austria

    Matthias Church on Buda Castle Hill, Budapest

    Matthias Church on Buda Castle Hill, Budapest

    The Neptune fountain in Schonbrunn Palace, Vienna, Austria

    The Neptune fountain in Schonbrunn Palace, Vienna, Austria

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    St Peter’s Abbey Church in Salzburg, Austria

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      A Kashmiri Haveli in Mathura, UP

      A Kashmiri Haveli in Mathura, UP

      Jharokha

      Jharokha

      The Staircase in Ali Qapu Palace, Isfahan, Iran

      The Staircase in Ali Qapu Palace, Isfahan, Iran

      Dervesh and Lion

      Dervesh and Lion

      Mathura and Gandhara school of Art

      Mathura and Gandhara school of Art

      My favorite artworks from European Museums

      My favorite artworks from European Museums

      Gandhara Art in Humboldt Forum: Life of Lord Buddha

      Gandhara Art in Humboldt Forum: Life of Lord Buddha

      Jewish Heroes Square in Krakow, Poland

      Jewish Heroes Square in Krakow, Poland

      Block no. 4 in Auschwitz concentration camp

      Block no. 4 in Auschwitz concentration camp

      Ottoman tent in Princess Czartoryski Museum in Krakow, Poland

      Ottoman tent in Princess Czartoryski Museum in Krakow, Poland

      The Steam Engine Building, Potsdam, Germany

      The Steam Engine Building, Potsdam, Germany

      Assyrian human-headed winged bull from Nimrud; 9th cent. BCE; Pergamon Museum, Berlin

      Assyrian human-headed winged bull from Nimrud; 9th cent. BCE; Pergamon Museum, Berlin

      Catacombs in St Peter’s Abbey Salzburg, Austria

      Catacombs in St Peter’s Abbey Salzburg, Austria

      St Nicholas Church in #Leipzeg, #Germany

      St Nicholas Church in #Leipzeg, #Germany

      Gloriette, Schonbrunn Palace, Vienna,Austria

      Gloriette, Schonbrunn Palace, Vienna,Austria

      Matthias Church on Buda Castle Hill, Budapest

      Matthias Church on Buda Castle Hill, Budapest

      The Neptune fountain in Schonbrunn Palace, Vienna, Austria

      The Neptune fountain in Schonbrunn Palace, Vienna, Austria

      The Dohany Street synagogue in Budapest

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      St Peter’s Abbey Church in Salzburg, Austria

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      Something to remember, something to forget: Berlin’s memorials to chilling memories

      inMy Travels
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      Neue Wache

      We left the Museum Island and walked on to Unter den Linden Street. There is no missing a beautiful neo-classical building. Drawn by the crowds there I also went in.

      20121010-010150.jpg

      Originally built as a guardhouse for the troops of the Crown Prince of Prussia, by architect Karl Friedrich Schinkel the Neue Wache ( or New Guard House) building has been used as a war memorial since 1931.

      Nothing prepared me for what I saw inside. Its a huge bare room with an open roof. Under it sits the Käthe Kollwitz sculpture Mother with her Dead Son and the oculus, which exposes the sculpture to the elements.

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      The oculus or opening in the roof for the elements to pour in, seemed to me to symbolise the enlightenment of those who pause to reflect on the ravages of war.

      Interestingly enough since Unter den Linten was in the Soviet part of Berlin , in 1960 the repaired Neue Wache was reopened as a Memorial to the Victims of Fascism and Militarism. In 1969, the 20th anniversary of the GDR, a glass prism structure with an eternal flame was placed in center of the hall. And the remains of the Unknown Soldier and of an unknown concentration camp victim from World War II were enshrined in the building.
      Something which seemed quite incompatible to many!

      Book Burning Memorial
      In Berlin, some 40,000 people gathered in the Opernplatz / now Bebelplatz to hear Joseph Goebbels deliver a fiery address: “No to decadence and moral corruption!” Goebbels enjoined the crowd. “Yes to decency and morality in family and state! I consign to the flames the writings of Heinrich Mann, Ernst Gläser, Erich Kästner.”
      On 10th May 1933 members of the SA (“brownshirts”), SS, Nazi students and Hitler Youth groups burnt pver 20,000 books.

      20121010-021205.jpg

      Bebelplatz with the Opera House on the left ( being reconstructed) , the Catholic Church, St. Hedwig in the centre , and end of square and the law dept of Humboldt University on the right

      20121010-021604.jpg

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      Just near it a line of Heinrich Heine is engraved, stating “Das war ein vorspiel nur wo man Bücher verbrennt, verbrennt man am Ende auch Menschen” (in English: “Where they burn books, they ultimately burn people”)
      Heine was one of the authors whose books were burned that day.

      Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe
      There are many memorials in Berlin and most of them symbolic.

      The most famous of these is the memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe also known as the Holocaust Memorial and is a memorial in Berlin to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust. it is designed by architect Peter Eisenman and engineer Buro Happold. It consists of a 19,000 square metres (4.7 acres) site covered with 2,711 concrete slabs or “stelae”, arranged in a grid pattern on a sloping field.

      20121010-015054.jpg

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      There are many explanations for this design . To me it seemed like so many tombstones but apparently according to Eisenman’s project text, the stelae are designed to produce an uneasy, confusing atmosphere, and the whole sculpture aims to represent a supposedly ordered system that has lost touch with human reason.
      According to s 2005 copy of the Foundation for the Memorial’s official English tourist pamphlet,the design represents a radical approach to the traditional concept of a memorial.
      I suppose like all symbolism it depends on the imagination, scope and understanding of the viewer.

      20121010-193144.jpg

      Topography of Terror

      The most feared address in Berlin was the building located in the former Prinz-Albrecht-Strasse,now Niederkirchnerstrasse.I was easy to go in but almost impossible to come out. This was the Headquarter of the dreaded Gestapo and S,S the principal instruments of repression during the Nazi era

      During WW2 this location was heavily bombarded and whatever was left of it was later razed to the ground after the war.The boundary between the American and Soviet zones of occupation in Berlin ran along the Prinz-Albrecht-Strasse, so the street soon became a fortified boundary, and the Berlin Wall ran along the south side of the street.
      Today there is an outdoor museum alongside the longest segment of remains of the outer Berlin Wall .

      It chronicles the horrors and atrocities of the Nazis from the period 1933 to their fall in 1945.

      This was one of the successful escapes from East Germany to West Germany using nylon ropes,

      Soviets patrolling Berlin after the war

      Watch the video here: Berlin In Your Pocket – Topography of Terror

      Its only when we openly admit our mistakes that we can redress them.a
      India can you hear me?nd wounds can heal and we can move forward like Germans have.

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      Rana Safvi

      Come, explore and fall in love the Beauties of Delhi (Dilli ki Ranaiya’n) and the World with me, Rana Safvi

      I have a masters in medieval history from the prestigious Centre for Advanced Studies, Dept. of History, AMU. A firm believer in our Ganga Jamuni Tehzeeb, I am passionate about gaining and sharing knowledge and these days I am doing it via the social media platform.

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