Ich bin ein Weimarer

Right after the seminar in Wünsdorf, I took the train down to Weimar with Elena, a volunteer from Russia who will be living and working with me for the year. There we met our two German flatmates, Marlene and Fabian, who had prepared a picnic to welcome us.

We're living in an apartment right in the middle of the city, not that location is a big issue in Weimar - nothing is more than a fifteen-minute walk away. What is important, though, is that the bus to the memorial site goes right by the front door.

Despite being home to only 65,000 people, Weimar is a hugely important city in German history and culture. Two of Germany's most celebrated writers, Goethe and Schiller, lived here and they're remembered by a large statue in the centre and countless plaques around the city claiming that one or the other had once breathed in a particular place. They also both have the honour of having shopping centres named after them.

The city was home to Luther, Liszt and Bach at different times and it's here that the constitution of what would become known as the 'Weimar Republic' was ratified in 1919. The original Bauhaus school was also opened here in that same year.

However, Weimar also has a darker side to its history. It was chosen to be the location for one of the 'Gauforen', large complexes that merged the ordinary civilian bureaucracy with that of the Nazi party, making the city an important administrative capital of the Third Reich. The Ettersburg mountain overlooking the city became the location for the Buchenwald Concentration Camp, which would become one of the largest within Germany.

Controversially, the old 'Gauforum' complex has recently been lovingly restored and is now used as offices by the Thuringian state government and the (never completed) conference hall at its centre has been converted into a shopping centre.

In comparison to the other towns I've visited so far, it's clear that a lot of money has been put into Weimar since Reunification. If anything, it's almost too perfect - as if it was designed by the same people who built Main Street USA in Disneyworld - but it's proving to be a great place to live and I have no worries about being here for a year.