I am in Darmstadt visiting my friend Cliff. We were walking the perimeter of the city the day before the anniversary of one of the worst days in the history of this German city: the bombing known as Brandnacht (fire night) was the night of September 11/12, 1944.
We began at the area where the three formations British bombers coming from three directions crossed paths to begin their bombing runs. After that point they dropped the bombs that would destroy most of the city.
Just as we were entering the area, we saw a group of forty or fifty people with red and white flags across the street. Cliff and I crossed to see what they were protesting. We talked to Vanessa and Leon. They said they were protesting for higher wages for entry-level jobs.
We talked for a while about how wages for blue collar workers had stagnated in America. I was sorry to hear their experience was the same. We had kept them from the group so they hurried off to catch up to their protest group.
Cliff and I then walked more of the bustling city on a Saturday afternoon, noting the vast contrast between the vibrant city around us and and the wreckage in photos such as these:
Two years ago, I wrote about the bombing. Cliff told me one reason the British selected Darmstadt was it had a lot wood structures. Darmstadt and the state of Hesse were also very conservative and very strong supporters of the Nazis. Hesse is the site of the first concentration camp in Nazi Germany. Cliff and I visited that camp in 2017.
Most every time I have visited Cliff since 2017, we have visited concentration camps and Holocaust memorials. Since we did not visit any camps on this trip, we did manage to visit a disaster site.
We also met young people standing up for a better life for themselves and their fellow workers. It was a good day.
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