Frank Huis

While in Amsterdam, we visited the Anne Frank House. It was an amazing experience!

The museum is so popular and busy that we had to get a reservation and get there an hour before they opened. I took a picture of the line that we didn't have to wait in because we had a group reservation. It stretched around the block!

The Anne Frank House is hard to get a large group reservation for because of its close quarters. They haven't modified any part of the annex apart from guide ropes to keep you on the path. It is also peculiar that you cannot take any pictures while there. This is because it can be an emotional experience for some visitors and they do not want to upset anyone by having everyone taking pictures of everything. They do have approved pictures printed on postcards in the bookshop, and of course, I loved that. I bought a lot of postcards and what I couldn't have pictures of, I keep in my memories.

Being a People to People experience, there was a little extra compared to what the average tourist got to experience. Before entering the museum, we had a lesson on the Frank family and did an activity with the book In Memoriam. This book was written to remember all of the people that lost there lives in the Holocaust. By looking up Anne in the book, I realized just how young Anne was for going through all of the horrors of Auschwitz. she also died soon after her sister, Margot, and only days before the prisoners in Auschwitz were set free.

I already had a small understanding of what awaited people in concentration camps, but after seeing the Annex, I got a true understanding of the lengths people went to to try and keep themselves and their families safe.