Couch Surfing, in its most basic definition, is essentially spending a night in a stranger’s house, which they offer for free. You find them through the couch surfing website, where both you and they have a profile.

Before I go any further, I would like to say to my mother, who is likely more than a little worried at this point that couch surfing is a very legitimate way to be housed for the night and is quite safe. I am convinced that she believes I do the craziest things, but is not really surprised. Pastor Chris sent me a quick email, saying that he added me to the prayer list and that my mom told him that if I went to the moon, she wouldn’t be surprised. Just so long as I call home when I get there.

Even so, there is little worry about couch surfing. On the website, www.couchsurfing.org, both people who are willing to open their homes and people looking for a place to stay create profiles about themselves and what they are looking for. The homeowner describes their home, when it is available and usually about themselves and what kind of people they want to host. They also include what the sleeping accommodations are like. The traveler creates a similar profile, about who they are, where they come from, and where they are going. The homeowner can then accept or reject a request from the traveler.

Almost every place we looked at in Saarbrücken (in Saarland, which is bordering France and Rhineland-Pfalz) seemed fine. Well….except for one. This particular guy wrote that he is only looking for hosting guys, you would sleep in the same room as him, and he requests “interesting and curious men”. No thank you.

It turned out that couch surfing was the best choice we made. Our host Elen met us at the train station and gave us a ride to her place, which was much appreciated after trekking all day with our heavy backpacking packs. She took us around the city and told us the places of interest, good bars and clubs, and some historical background. We even got to go into Saarland’s parliament and sit in the state president’s seat. Awesome.

Matt and I, who had to work on a class project on Saarland, arrived at about noon. We were a bit curious about how Elen could be spending so much time with people that she just met on a work day. It turns out that she is a police officer in the city, and was working later that night. Well Mom, you don’t needn’t worry about my safety on this trip!

The three of us went to a beer garden and chatted about the differences of life in America and Germany. Elen has never been to America, and even as a cop she could not believe that just about anyone can own a gun. Hurray second amendment! As a thank you for hosting us, we bought her dinner at a nice restaurant with amazing local food. I had about the best sauerkraut in my life.

Afterwards, Elen left for work and we headed on back home, and turned in for the night. She was asleep in the morning, but bought us French baguettes with chocolate on and in them. She was very thoughtful.
One more difference between America and Germany: as I hopped into the shower, I realized that the hot water heater was literally on the wall above the tub. As you turn the hot water on, you can see the flames heating the water. Strange.

Our trip to Saarbrücken was very pleasant, mostly due to Elen’s kindness. I would certainly recommend couch surfing if you are looking to save some money and want to meet new people. Possibly not for the faint of heart, but Mom knows that has never been me.

Today we had a guided tour around the concentration camp of Sachsenhausen outside of Berlin. Starting out, we walked down the path that all prisoners would have had to travel down. It was really fascinating to think of all the people in the city that would have witnessed the prisoners being forced to work for their lives. Most people in Germany were led to believe that these prisoners deserved to be put away for the sake of the country, but it is hard to imagine that nobody could see through this false facade.

Our tour guide, Joe, was really insightful on all things about Sachsenhausen and many concentration camps in general. The camp served as a forced labor camp rather than an extermination or death camp like Auschwitz. This made the overall experience different than I expected. Rather than gruesome pictures of medical experiments and astronomical figures of casualties, the camp was much tamer than many stereotypes about concentration camps would assume.

However, this does not take away from the contemplative nature the site has to offer nor the devastation that was brought to many of the victims. We got to walk through a reconstructed bunker that housed hundreds of prisoners; these included political prisoners, social hazard ones, homosexuals, prisoners of war, and Jews. Conditions were horrible, and the lifestyle unimaginable.

It is hard to imagine that such terrible atrocities took place in the last century when the world was supposed to be more modernized and humane. Therefore, it is important to see these kind of sites first hand to try to understand everything that happened so nothing similar happens again. Our tour guide closed with a really powerful quote from Edmund Burke that I will repeat here. “All that’s necessary for the forces of evil to win in the world is for enough good men to do nothing.”

Berlin, Germany isn’t what I expected.  Then again, I don’t really know what exactly I was expecting.  It’s a city very different than anything I’ve experienced, both structurally and historically.

This morning’s tour of Berlin was everything from strictly informative to highly emotional.  We were exposed to many historical aspects of Berlin, including the Brandenburg Gate, the Reichstag, the President’s home, and various embassy’s.  It is always so enlightening to be able to physically see what the textbooks have historically taught.

The more emotional part of the tour was the viewing of the Holocaust Memorial.  What one tends to imagine about a particular memorial isn’t at all what Berlin’s Holocaust Memorial is.  The memorial consists of over 2,500 cement blocks, all of different shapes and sizes.  When introducing us to the memorial, our tour guide informed us that the architect of this particular memorial had no underlying purpose in its creation; he wanted it to be up to each individual viewer to pursue their own inspired meaning.

When walking through this vast memorial, I was consistently contemplative about what coherent meaning I could create about the memorial.  My interpretation is as follows:

The simplicity of the cement blocks that make up this memorial are seemingly complicated; they have no order.  No single block is like another.  These individualistic cement blocks represent the various generations that are faced with their shameful German history.  No one generation could possibly feel the same as the next; for some are far more removed from the tragedy than others.
The memorial isn’t necessarily beautiful in the sense that it is pleasing to the eye, but upon profound thought and ample reflection, it becomes such a beautiful representation of what constitutes the German people.  Even though they wish they weren’t a part of their inevitable dark history, they realize it is just that: history, and it cannot be changed.  Instead of ignoring what was once a shameful time, they humble themselves by allowing such an interpretive monument to speak for the whole of the German people; all the while allowing it to speak to each German individually.

What a beautiful experience this was today, and a true preparation for tomorrow’s horrific, yet necessary journey: Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp