After 14 hours in the air, mindlessly watching movies, failing to sleep and desperately trying to stretch my legs, I found myself glancing out the nearest window once the plane’s descent began. The bright sky turned into a blanket of overcast clouds right before my squinting eyes.
I had arrived in Europe, the place where history seems to begin in the West. The place to where I and so many people in North America can trace back their ancestry. I didn’t grasp the gravity of the trip yet. I wouldn’t at the airport, on the train, or when I finally reached our hotel and struggled to stay awake. It was only on my walking tour the next day that Berlin hit me square in the jaw.