Traveling in Time: A Peak into Oma's Life

Today was another productive day.  I'm probably using this label too lightly, since I am not really writing anything (or reading much for that matter), but I am being constantly blown away by what I get to see and witness.

The day started slow, in bed.  I think I'm going to like these mornings.  I spent my first hour awake watching a German tv show, which helped me get practice without having to step outside my room.  It is 30 degrees today... (and now snowing a bit). After that, I started looking at Oma's stuff again.  My main focus right now is on the letters and correspondence she had later in life with people in Prenzlauer Berg.  This material involves a lot of narrations about the neighborhood, descriptions about life in Prenzlauer Berg, and even detailed descriptions of the layout of her life here.  Every discovery involved me flipping from letters from the 1990's, to a travel journal from 1961, to letters from the early 2000s.  Once I get everything she describes mapped out, I will start focusing on the actual letters again.

At noon, I headed out to meet Colby at Helmholzplatz to start our walk around Oma's neighborhood.  My first observation was the beautiful in tune singing in the apartment bellow us (it was clearly someone's birthday).  Before leaving my block I stopped at Kaiser's, the supermarket next door, to buy some almonds.  Once I found Colby we headed straight to Kollwitzstrasse, which was priorly names Weißenburger Straße,  also known as the street where Oma, my grandmother, was born on March 28th, 1924. The address was 75 Weißenburger Straße, so we found the address and took pictures.

Weissenburger Strasse 75

 It is crazy to think that this is the actual place... but then again, they could have changed the house numbers.  That is why I am spending so much time deciphering what she wrote in German and comparing it to current maps.  I want to make sure that I have everything right.  After that we moved to Kollwitzplats, which was called Woerther platz when Oma lived here.  There was a precious market and I ate Bratwurst I promised to eat! It was delightful!

Market on Kollwitzplatz

View of Jewish Cemetery

 We also went into an antique store.  While in there, I couldn't help but giggle, because I remember seeing most of those things in Uspallata (my grandmother's house in Uruguay). After a quick walk around the park and the market, we headed to 41 Woerther Strasse.  Sadly, we didn't find the building with that number, because it is a school, but this definitely made me realize that the numbers on the houses has changed.  I am almost positive that this specific building was hers, but I can't be positive just yet! I will keep investigating.

Woerther Strasse and the clock where Oma looked to make sure she was on time for school! 

From Woerther Strasse we continued to the water tour, and the synagogue in Rykestrasse, where my grandmother attended.  I haven't figured out if I can get in, but I will!

Oma's synagogue on the right and the water tower straight ahead

Synagogue

Sign at the synagogue 

After that, we headed to the Prenzlauer Berg Museum.  I have been soooo excited to visit and it was truly unreal.  First a lovely lady showed us into the exhibit where they have object from the neighborhood from all decades.  There I found these signs...

There were a million things with Garbaty on them.  And.... that would be my grandmother's relatives.  I have read so many stories about the couple that owned this cigarette factory/store.  They turned their backs on my grandmother's family and did not help any of them get the money needed to flee Germany.  My grandmother's mother's name was Garbatti, but since her great grandmother could not pronounce it well in German, they spelled it Gorbate in many of their documents.  The spelling of their last name saw many variations due to poor pronunciation, which makes it near impossible to track the people.    At the museum, which was tiny and precious by the way, one could go to a computer and put the number of the item and it had a description.  Then it was tagged by subject.  There were like 27 Garbaty items, which is a lot for the size of the museum.  Also, the tags were Jews in the neighborhood, deportation, and things of the sort.  There was even a description of the family history, which I of course took a picture of and took with me.

Family description

After viewing the exhibit I found that they were selling the book on German Jews in this neighborhood published by the museum itself.  I have the book in the U.S., but fork some reason did not bring it with me, sooo... I bought a copy and am thrilled to keep reading it.  The lady was thrilled that I was buying the book and made sure to point out the exhibit across the way that was on the Jewish school.  She also advised me on who to contact about accessing the archives (I had already emailed her, but will be calling her next week). All in all, it was a wonderful experience.  In the other exhibit I saw report cards like the ones I have for Oma, I read some Sutterlin, and recognized many familiar photographs.   It was awesome and here are a few pictures to go with it:

After the museum we headed back to Helmholtz Platz to get some coffee and tee and then walked back to Kaiser's to buy our dinner and food for tomorrow.  I invested in some delicious Brie, rice cases, a delicious cream cheese, and some sparkling water! I feel like if I had some marmalade, I could be having breakfast with Oma, she loved all of those things. 

 Now again in my room, (warm) I can't wait to keep discovering new things through material that I have had! I only wish I had a printer... hahahah!

Bis morgen!!