You’re reminded of the anti-Semitism still sweeping the world and Anne Frank’s legacy 80 years on when you visit Amsterdam.
There are few young women who have had quite the impact the German-born, Dutch-raised teenager has had on the world.
It is difficult to envision the life Anne lived with her family and their friends in the cramped annexe in Westermarkt.
But visitors to the Anne Frank House can get a physical sense.
When entering through the false door and treading carefully through the attic.
Until they were given up by an informer on this day 80 years ago.
And the occupants were sent to concentration camps where all but her father Otto died.
The voice of Anne Frank
Many are struck by the claustrophobia, by the torn pictures of Hollywood idols of the day and flowers ripped from magazines on the walls.
Today’s visitors can also hear an actress narrate excerpts from Anne’s diary on headphones.
Something not afforded this visitor the first time I went to Anne Frank’s House 34 years ago.
It chronicles her diary, her many thoughts and observations.
Of her cloistered life one spoke right to this journalist’s heart.
‘I finally realised that I must do my schoolwork to keep from being ignorant, to get on in life, to become a journalist, because that’s what I want!’
That Anne would have gone on to become a renowned journalist is undoubtable.
That much is clear from her writings in her diary.
In the footsteps of history’s greats
My peers and I shared that dream at her age.
And we managed to pursue that vocation for 36 years or more.
And it is something I have never taken for granted.
It has also afforded me the opportunity to travel the world.
And retrace the footsteps of the true great figures of history, like Anne.
Anne Frank’s House will, of course, remain a time capsule.
Of a Jewish family’s incarceration in an annexe in World War II.
But it has always served as an outreach programme to warn against the recurring threat of racism.
And visitors are drawn as they exit to boards and literature.
All of which reminds us that anti-semitism and racism is on the rise.
Amsterdam revisited
It was a message I took away from Amsterdam on that first visit in 1990.
Little knowing that come my next trip, on what would have been her 90th birthday, that the situation would have worsened.
As we mark another landmark today it is timely to consider Anne Frank’s legacy 80 years on.
And profer the view that we should all revisit her story, visit her annexe in the biggest city in the Netherlands.
And consider how far we’ve come in the past 80 years from families holed up in annexes because of their faith.
To Muslims hiding in their mosques in today’s Britain.
