The Medical Student's Rockstar

Sunday was our scheduled field trip to the Plastinarium.  This is where a lot of the bodies used in the "Body Worlds" exhibit are plastinated and then dissected.  My mom and I went to the Body Worlds in Phoenix and thought it was amazingly informative.  If you haven't been, you must go. 

The plastinarium is located in Guben, about 2 hours east of Berlin by train.  When we got there, I was very excited.  This plastination process has completely revolutionized the study of anatomy.  As Dr. Gunther von Hagens, the mastermind of it all, says....plastination captures the body in between death and decay. 

When our tour guides welcomed us into the plastinarium, they mentioned that there was a "little surprise" for us.  Dr. von Hagens (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunther_Von_Hagens) was in Guben and was going to speak to us! You can imagine all of our excitement-no one expected this to happen.  (I thought the surprise was he was going to plastinate all of us, haha)

After we wandered through the museum and the actual Body Worlds exhibit, they took us up on the roof of the building.  From there you could see down into a large tank most likely filled with acetone (step 1 of the plastination process).  There was a giraffe along with a baby giraffe, some reptiles and what seemed to be a deer.  It should be fascinating to see a plastinated giraffe-although I was sad to see my favorite animal dead. 

From that vantage point, if you looked to the east you could see a small river.  We were informed that this constituted the border between Germany and Poland.  (Later on, Lauren, Kirsten and I walked to Poland and were unable to use Euros at a grocery store two seconds from the border.) 

Then we got to meet the one and only Gunther.  He was wearing his trademark black fedora and some non-descript clothing.  I'm pretty sure this guy is a millionaire but he didn't look the part!  His heavily accented English was slightly hard to follow, but it was obviously better than my German.  Students from our group asked him questions and we got to learn a lot about his life. 

Gunther grew up in East Germany and spent two years in jail for trying to escape to the west.  He went to medical school and taught at a university for some time.  It was during this part of his life he developed the plastination process.  One day he was looking at a specimen surrounded by some sort of preservative in a clear block.  It occurred to him that the specimen would be better preserved with the preservative INSIDE it rather than outside.  Voila...the concept of plastination was born. 

My burning question was whether he wanted to plastinate his body.  Unfortunately I didn't get the chance to ask him.  Another person in our group got his answer through a different question.  As I suspected, he plans on being plastinated. 

The next section of the experience was a tour of the grounds with Dr. von Hagens as our guide.  I was in complete & utter awe of how once in a lifetime this day was.  He took us through areas that most do not get to see, including: the area where they keep frozen bodies, where they were dissecting new bodies for exhibits and the shed where they are keeping the elephant that is in the process of being plastinated. Cool, cool, COOL!!

We ended the tour with a group photo in the front of the building.  What a wonderful field trip!