Sitting with 90 naked Germans…

…I was struck by the power of ritual and collective memory.

We were packed into a vast hall-like sauna, hot stones arranged on a huge square altar. The gong goes. The door closes. The ritual begins. First, water through sprinkling cup; then scoops of snow; then as if dancing around the flames, a man fans the heat. Thousands of hot pins pierce the skin. Always someone leaves immediately. Then it repeats. Hotter. Strangers turn to each other for comfort. Then a third time, and we sink within our thoughts and bodies. Joined as one, our differences dissolve.

I imagine us all in battle against a Roman Legion.

At dinner in Salzburg the Austrian owner asks my friend about her name. “My father told me I was named after the last Hapsburg Empress, Zita”, she explains. The lady beams. “And where was your father from?” She asks. “Uganda” comes the reply. And then touching her heart the Austrian says, “Ah! I know it very well, such a beautiful place. I was born in Kenya.” We swap stories. Her mother travelled to east Africa from Genoa on a Dutch cargo ship in the 50s, down the Suez Canal, the only woman on the ship. I mention my parents drove a similar route to India in the 60s.

“We must remember these people and what they did, their courage, their resilience” she says.

Later when we leave, she runs out and gives us both a long hug.

My hotel in Bad Reichenhall is a large 19th Century villa. It used to be called Villa Ackermann. This part of Germany has deep war history. The owners are the third generation of the family who bought the property in 1938. It was a hotel then too. In the dining room, guests are greeted by a prominent black and white photograph of the building before renovations, proudly displaying the name Villa Ackermann. A couple pose in the photo. I pause, and look, and remember.

In this way the current owners say, “We remember you, and honour what you started.”

In the large hall by the park a Christmas craft fair takes place. Inside a lady stands quietly by her stall selling bowls and containers carved from wood. I am mesmerised. Eventually she comes over, “Do you work in wood too?”. I pause, lifted from my trance. “No - but my Irish ancestors were carpenters, for generations.” “So, you remember,” she says. “It’s my passion, too”.

I choose a bowl with a space where a knot has come free. “Ah, that’s a special one” she says.

We have choices in how we remember, in how we move from one moment to the next.

Do we take good lessons from the past and move forward with strength?

Or does something of the past need attending to, before we can move on?

If so, with the right attention we can loosen what holds us back, and transform it to a strength that moves us forward.