A full-scale replica of the secret annex where Anne Frank wrote in her famous diary opened in New York City on Monday as the world marked International Holocaust Remembrance Day. The exhibit at the Center for Jewish History in Manhattan represents the first time the annex has been completely re-created outside Amsterdam, where the space is a central part of the Anne Frank House museum. But while the original annex has been intentionally left empty, the New York reconstruction shows the five rooms as they would have looked while the Frank family and others lived in hiding, the AP reports.
Education is the focus of this exhibition, said Ronald Leopold, director of the Anne Frank House, at Monday's opening. "And education starts with empathy—empathy with what happened here, what happened in Amsterdam during those years, what was done to Anne Frank." Hannah-Milena Elias, the granddaughter of Anne Frank's cousin, Buddy Elias, said she found it emotional walking through the exhibit rooms. "It is quite overwhelming and quite touching to see to see what a tiny space the families had to stay in and live for more than two years," said the 29-year-old, who lives in Switzerland. Her sibling, Leyb-Anouk Elias, hoped the exhibit would encourage visitors to reflect on what it means to face discrimination or be a minority today.
"History, unfortunately, is repeating itself in different ways," the 27-year-old Berlin resident said. "We have to be very, very careful how to act and to do stuff against it, to not ever make this happen again." The New York exhibit, which runs through April 30, spans more than 7,500 square feet and includes more than 100 photos and other artifacts—many never before displayed publicly, according to officials. Henry Byrne, a junior at Xavier, a Catholic high school in Manhattan, said learning about the family's saga helped him grasp the enormity of the Holocaust. "It taught me a lot about how just because you see one story, walk into these rooms and all the beds and the tables, that's just one person's life," the 16-year-old said. "And there were millions that were lost."
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