I hadn’t been to Findorff for some years. It is still the same, a village within the city of Bremen, North of the Central Railway Station, and West of the big Park (Buergerpark). The people are pretty much the same, too: stout and with their characteristic rugged friendliness.
The buildings hadn’t visibly changed either. But right on the historic turf canal, where turf from the Blockland further to the North had been shipped into Bremen, there used to be bunkers. People had sought shelter here during the bombings of the Second World War, and as it would have been hard to demolish them (and maybe because people were waiting for the great Russian attack during the 1950s to 1980s), they were left there.
But one of the bunkers had changed. It had got windows. Two big penthouse flats had been built into it.
Weird. We know what happened above the clouds, and we know what happened underneath (Granny’s account of it). I mean, bunkers that sheltered the civilian population are hardly places with the best Qi of the world. Maybe good enough places to serve as store rooms, or for some Rock bands to have their sessions without disturbing the neighbourhood.
But do people really want to live, work, sleep and make love there?
What’s next? The submarine bunker Valentin as a shopping mall, with a snazzy prayer breakfast room to remember those who drowned in the North Sea and the Atlantic, torpedo-struck?
Anyway. Chacun a son gout. I hope Bremen got a good deal of money out of selling the bunker.
Tags: Bremen, Britain, Findorff, Germany, history, Memphis Belle, military, USA, ww2
