The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Within the world of Second Life there are countless incredible environments to visit.  One of these is the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.  Currently the virtual museum is hosting the exhibit "Witnessing History: Kristallnacht, the 1938 Pogroms".  Comprising a combination of virtual reproductions of actual sites with audio and video footage of witnesses to the events, the exhibit brings to life the personal experience of the victims of that terrible night.

The exhibit begins in a newsroom, complete with filing cabinets, drab, uncomfortable chairs, desks covered with notes, and bulletin boards replete with background and introductory information of the events.  It feels like a standard museum exhibit, until you touch the glowing dossier across the room.  Suddenly, one of the newsroom's walls vanishes, opening onto a virtual recreation of what may have been a German neighborhood as it appeared on the Night of Broken Glass.

Graffiti covers the walls.  Broken glass and books litter the street.  Glowing footprints are scattered all around the streets and inside the buildings.  Stepping over them activates audio recordings of people's memories of the night.  These are the actual memories of witnesses to the pogroms.  Other icons provide various information, from personal histories of the witnesses to reproductions of actual legal documents belonging to them.

The neighborhood includes various buildings one can explore to become better acquainted with how the witnesses' daily lives, perhaps mundane and similar to ours, were directly affected.  Among these is a schoolroom with desks turned over and piled outside its door, a house that has been ransacked by the SS, and an elevator that leads up to a secret hiding room.  Everywhere there are personal items of the witnesses whose stories are detailed in the exhibit.

Among these neighborhood details I found one to be most interesting.  It was a news post plastered with newspaper and magazine cover pages, posters, and legal documents illustrating the racist propaganda prevalent in Germany at the time.  Amongst these is an illustration from a children's primer.  The enchanting illustration portrays a lovely landscape of a lakeside town.  Just outside the town a Jewish family, drawn with stereotypical anti-Semitic features, stands before a sign that reads, "Jews are not wanted here".   How, I wonder, could anyone sincerely present this image to a child?  It truly is disturbing.

Stepping up to the local synagogue triggers an exhibit comprising audio memoirs of the destruction of various temples as well as virtual effects recreating the shattering of glass and burning of the temples.  Walking through the threshold one finds the synagogue has been destroyed.  Various glowing icons cover the floor and walls of the temple, triggering information regarding the desecration of the temples and the holy books of the Torah.

In the synagogue there is an exit that leads into another newsroom.  There you can leave a note  regarding the exhibit and see photographs of the witnesses from the exhibit.  Past this is a sanctuary perfect for contemplating or discussing what you have just experienced, followed by a room where you can watch video of some of the living witnesses of Kristallnacht.

The effect the entire exhibit has is to personalize the events of the night.  The audio recordings tell of how the witnesses' lives, most of them children at the time, were affected.  Their voices bring to life the fear, horror, and confusion they experienced.  Thus this exhibit transcends the intellectual value of a history lesson and becomes an event in which you, the visitor, through the development of an empathic link with the witnesses, have the opportunity to gain a deeper sense of the horror and injustice perpetrated by human upon human on this infamous night.

I am amazed by the opportunities for creativity and learning that Second Life offers us all (so long as we have access to a computer and a high-speed internet connection, that is).  This exhibit is one of many such environments.  There is a whole world to explore, created by people just like you, sitting in front of their computers, working to bring a bit of their personal experiences and desires to this virtual world.  I will continue my journeys and log my experiences here.

This is Pluton Karas, resident of Second Life, wishing you health and happiness.  Take care.