Behind the rotating bookshelf that leads to the steep wood staircase to the top – from liberty to bondage, from light to Dark.
In the attic of the back house at Prinsengracht 263 in Amsterdam, the eight Jews lived in hiding from the German Nazis for almost two years until 4. August 1944. Here is the Jewish girl Anne Frank wrote her world famous diary. As a result, the Jews got tracking for many young people worldwide face of the girl from Amsterdam.
behind the house is a Monument and Museum at the same time. Now, almost 75 years after the end of the Second world war, it has been transformed. “We tell Anne’s story,” says the Director of the Anne Frank Foundation, Ronald Leopold. “The young visitors to be able to understand today.”
every Year, more than 1.2 million people visit the Anne Frank house, most of them are younger than 30 years old. “Many of their grandparents did not experience the war,” says Leopold. “The interest is large, but many of them know hardly anything from the world war.”
Now, the Museum tells the story of the Frank family chronologically and explained to her the example of the history of the persecution of Jews in Europe. “The hiding place itself is virtually unchanged,” stresses Leopold.
The front of the house, in which, during the war, the trading company, Opekta Anne’s father, Otto, is now the backdrop for the story of the family. She emigrated after Hitler’s seizure of power in 1933 in Frankfurt am Main. Almost seven years the Franks lead a relatively carefree life until the German the Netherlands in 1940, the Wehrmacht occupied. Now the persecution of the Jews starts there as well. When Anne’s sister, Margot, 1942, the threat of Deportation under the family. Anne is 13 years old.
The stairs behind the bookcase leads to the hideout. While in the lower rooms, natural light, top of the window is sealed – no one was allowed in the submerged see or hear. The creaking of the wooden floorboards or the toilet would have you can tell.
The narrow bottom chambers are simple Goldenbahis and empty, just as in 1944, after the RAID of the Nazis. The walls of Anne star photos had been glued to the faded Wallpaper: Greta Garbo, Heinz Rühmann. On a wall you can still see the pencil marks, with father Otto Frank had, how much his daughters Margot and Anne, were grown.
Only photos on the walls show how it there are times Annes looked. Quotes from the diary let the visitors to the threat, feel the fear, the tensions but also the hopes. Up to the last.
The hiding place is betrayed in 1944 and deported to the eight people in hiding – with the last Transport from the Dutch camp Westerbork to Auschwitz. Anne is mountains, as well as her sister, Margot, in the concentration camp of Bergen-Belsen die, only a few weeks before the liberation. Anne was 15 years old.
Only her father Otto survived. He returned after the war to Amsterdam. Helpers rescued Anne’s diaries. Otto published it in 1947.
The tour ends in the diary room. Here, too, the light is attenuated. Anne smiles in the photo on the wall – curious and full of life. In the showcase, the red-and-white checkered small booklet, her first diary as a precious and very vulnerable treasure.
The rooms are very sparsely equipped with only a few photos, and documents. The last postcard written by the family to relatives. A Box with marbles, the, Anne of a friend shortly before the dive to the Store. The report of the death of Anne’s.
The story is told mainly from eye-witnesses, with audio recordings of Otto Frank, the helpers, previous Girlfriends. And, of course, Anne with quotes from her diary.
The economical setup is a conscious decision. “The Empty Symbol,” says Director of the Leopold. “It reminds us that Anne is there, she reminds us of the 70,000 inhabitants of the lost city of Amsterdam.” Anne also stand for the millions of Jews murdered by the Nazis, says Leopold. “Anne’s story is to touch us and to Think about moving.”
dpa