Paradoxes of proximity and distance

(Introduction)
The Dutch Airborne Museum Hartenstein provides an opportunity for visitors «to see and feel what the war was really like». The museum, based in the former Divisional Headquarters of the Allied Forces in September 1944, houses a large collection of militaria from Operation Market Garden. The brochure proclaims that an Airborne Experience «lets you experience the course of the Battle of Arnhem and brings history very close>>.2 Under the heading «FEELING IT IS KNOWING IT>>, the website urges the public not to miss this experience, <> Since the Airborne Museum also offers an education program one wonders what the learning outcomes for students will be when they walk through a noisy basement along replicas of battered houses, artillery, tanks, life-size puppets of soldiers with original film fragments projected against the walls. What is the significance of coming «close>> to the heavy fighting between Germans and Allied Forces, the hardships and the tremendous fear for- unexpected grenade attacks? The question is also how to avoid that young kids consider the presentation merely as an adventure.
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