What to do on a rainy day in Germany? How about head to one of countless museums where admission is free? As you might guess, that�s exactly what I decided to do one not so fine Sunday in January. It never seems to snow here, it just rains and rains all year. At least you can stay dry in the Canadian winter. But that�s neither here nor there. For a bit of a change of pace, Michelle and I decided to venture outside of Cologne and south to Bonn. As the former capital city, it�s full of national (ie. Free) museums. On this occasion we decided to visit what translates as �The House of the History of the Federal Republic of Germany�. (link) It�s a very new museum which deals only with the history of the past 50 years. I actually thought it was really well done. It has a lot of video and audio displays since it's a new museum, and it's designed to flow chronologically along a walking path as you move through the exhibits. It also tries to incorporate as much 'material' as possible. There are clothes, cans of food, records, commercials and all kinds of things from the periods to help create the appropriate atmosphere. I've read volumes of German history, and I've even lived here for nine months now, but in the museum you really feel what it might have been like to live in Germany's history. They have reconstructed rooms with notices and posters that you might have seen at the time. They also have a few exhibits concerning pop culture which I was never really taught in school. I realize that Lili Marlene was famous, now, but I had never read or heard about the song before. Here they had a whole section of the museum detailing he movement of the song, and the various phases of its incorporation into the war efforts of both sides. . Definitely worth the price, that's all I can say.
