Blog: I was very nervous and apprehensive as I waited for the bus, and a group of teenagers noticed my discomfort. One of the boys reassured me, telling me, in German, that they were all going to Belsen, where they apparently lived, although they were attending school in Celle. I wondered how it must feel to live less than a mile from the location of a former concentration camp where 100,000 innocent victims of the Nazi regime lost their lives.
I got on the 12:05 bus and told the driver that I wanted to go to Bergen-Belsen. He asked me in German, “Which one, Bergen or Belsen?” Although Americans talk about Bergen-Belsen, there is no such place today. Bergen and Belsen are two separate towns and each of them has several bus stops. Thank God, I knew the German word for Memorial Site (Gedenkstätte) or I might never have made it there because the driver spoke no English.
On the bus, I observed a sign that said “Rote Karte fur schwartze fahrer 30 EURO” That means that the fine for riding without a ticket is 30 Euro. A person who rides without a ticket is called a “black rider.” I wonder how long it will be before this term is changed because there are now a lot of African immigrants in Germany.
