Vergangenheitsbewältigung

I think one of the reasons I like Germany so much is because of the population's amazing ability to cope with all of it's history. One of the ways that I think makes it easier to cope with, is that they make everything quite public. It would be far from correct to call Dachau a tourist destination, but nonetheless it still stands open for the world to see. It is illegal to deny the Holocaust and all of it's contents and a swastika of any kind is forbidden. Parts of the Berlin Wall remain and Checkpoint Charlie has been transformed into a museum. All of these are evidence a former troubled past, but nonetheless Germany continues to function like any normal (ha!) country. Of course I was only there for less than 10 days, and I'm in no position to judge a country nor it's history. The only thing I can compare it to is the fact that I am American. Everyone has history and I'm not exception. Americans are notoriously known for dropping two A-bombs, kicking aside minorities (Native Americans) purely because we believed it was our right, and don't forget the possibility of knowing Pearl Harbor and 9/11 were going to happen but made no action to prevent either. However, all of these were the actions of a relatively small group of people and not America as a whole. The same thing goes with Germans, not all Germans were/are Nazis, not all Germans hate Jews, nor are all Germans amazing beer chuggers. Everyone has their problems and must live with the history/stereotypes it causes.

Kind of random, but sort of related...I recently read a book titled "How to Steal a Car." It wasn't about the actual logistics of stealing a car, but it was a YA novel about a teenager who gets into car stealing. Initially it started off with just picking up someone's keys and taking the car for a spin, but because of that one time she immediately because im/famous for stealing cars and gets sucked into the business. Or so she says, she could have really liked the high from stealing cars...I dunno just thought to get that out there.