autorin-susanne-michaelis - Donnatrium

Einbeck - Between beer and surprises

Tue, 23 Apr 2019 20:11:00 +0000

As already mentioned, hubby and I visited an old Roman-Germanic battlefield a while ago. Since we needed a place to stay, I tried to find a hotel not too far away from the battle site and we finally ended up with a place in Einbeck, in the south of Lower Saxony.

Not knowing the area, we'd only head about Einbeck in connection with a nice beer. And, yes, I had read about this small city having a nice, historical downtown, but boy were we into a great surprise when we finally arrived there. We had expected a few nice houses - and had stumbled over a gem of hospitality and architectural beauty:

In 1252, Einbeck already had town ordinances and privileges, but a place called Einbeck had been there for at least a hundred years longer.

In the middle of the 14th cenrury the first exports of the Einbecker beer are documented. The beer got brewed in more than 700 (!) private homes that got a beer brewing licence (those houses are marked by their large doors for the brewing kettles) and then put onto the market by the town council. In 1368 Einbeck joined the Hansa and now their beer could be found from Antwerp (in the west of Belgium) to Riga (Latvia), from Stockholm (Sweden) to Munich (southern Germany).

To transport the top-fermented beer without it spoiling, they brewed it with an unsually high wort and a resulting higher alcohol percentage than normal beer (somewhere between 6.3 and 7.2 %).

1614, an Einbecker master brewer was hired in Munich to brew the famous Ainpöcksch beer in Munich. Legend says that the Bavarians' dialect turned Ainpöck (or Einbeck) into "Oanpock," which in turn became today's known term "ein Bock" (a billy goat" or a Bockbier (a bock beer). In other words, the Einbecker beer is the mother of all bock beers. And rightly so! When given a mug of Ainpökisch beer in 1521 in Worms, Martin Luther is quoted to have said:

Der beste Trank, den einer kennt, der wird Einbecker Bier genennt

(The best known drink is called Einbecker beer)

Einbeck wasn't just known for its beer but also for its blue-printing. According to Wikipedia.de, the first German blue-printing was done in 1689 or 1690 by Jeremias Neuhofer in Augsburg. And according to their shop webpage, the Einbecker dye factory of Hans Wittram started to use the then modern technic of blue-printing already in 1700. From 1638 til 2005, this dye factory had been without break in the hand of the family Wittram...

... and til today the blue-printing is traditionally done by hand and with the help of a treasure of over 800 models, used for the Reservedruckverfahren (an indirectly dying technique, where with the help of a wooden model a sort of paste is stamped onto the cloth before dying it. Afterwards, when washing off the paste, a white, undyed pattern will emerge). The oldest model being from around 1720/30.

Another, although more modern Einbecker highlight is the PS-Speicher, a transport museum located in a former granary with the world's largest collection of German motorcycles as well as vintage cars! It also houses the oldest vintage car in running and original condition of the world, a Victoria-Benz-Motorkutsche from 1894! It is only allowed to be driven from sunrise to sunset, but it did get this year's Vehicle inspection sticker.

But what makes Einbeck even more fascinating to me is its architecture. 1540 had been a very dry summer - and one of religious-political "gunpowder" as well. Einbeck had joined the pro-Lutheran Schmalkaldic League in 1531 and when a fire started at several different points in Einbeck simultaneously, arson was seen as being the obvious reason. In 1540 a total of 33 German cities burnt and of these fires many were suspected to be the torching of protestant cities. However, Henry V, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg, one of the adversaries of the League, pointed out in his written defense to the emperor that not only protestant cities had burnt.

In any case, being almost completely destroyed by the large fire in 1540, the city had to be rebuild. Thanks to its wealth it was not only rebuilt fast, but also in splendor, like the houses in the Tiedexer street demonstrate.

With many of them showing symbols of their owner's trade...

... or just its owner's sense of beauty, wealth, education and piety (as can be seen by the Latin quote):

As you can see, the letters are Antiqua-Kapitalis letters, which were used from the 16th century on. Before that date, inscriptions on half-timbered houses, starting in the second half of the 15th century, used the Gothic Minuskel, as you can (barely) see to the left and the right of the word "Brodhaus" ("Breadhouse") of this only preserved guild house from originally at least 1333 (although it had to be rebuilt after the fire as well):

However, Latin wasn't mandatory. Some just used good ole German for their inscriptions:

Besides the inscriptions and trade symbols, Taubänder ("hawser bands") were a favorite way to decorate those houses as well as rosettes, which call to mind the classical shell portrayal of the Romans as well as that of sun wheels. Not to mention the treasure of braces...

... and friezes:

Every once in a while a house sports a Neidkopf (Envy Head) of which some say it is supposed to keep off grudgers, while others claim them to be purely ornamental items:

And the Einbecker town hall even has oriels:

However, the Late Renaissance Eickesches Haus (today's tourist information), built around 1612, easily tops them all. Motives deriving from the educational world of the Humanism, Renaissance, Reformation and Classical Antiquity left me gawking like a bumpkin:

Contrary to another fantastic half-timbered house, that made me cringe. Somehow the interaction between old and new didn't convince me...

Not to mention the strange souvenir shop that sells wine, Einbecker mustard and ... weapons?

Besides that, anybody who loves doors will have a field day in Einbeck. There are coloful ones...

...and romantic ones,...

... larger ones...

... and hidden ones...

... and - drunken ones...

All around these narrow streets, ...

.. cute squares...

... the enchanting monastery garden...

... and its St. Josef church...

... all around Einbeck's modern art....

... and the statue of Germany's well-known joker Till Eulenspiegel ...

... not to mention around those beautiful houses (older and more modern)...

... there are still left-overs of the old town wall:

Of the former about 24 towers only few are left. Like the Storchenturm (Stork Tower)...

... or the Bäckerwall Turm (Bakers' Wall Tower)...

... or the Totenturm (Death Tower)...

... and the Dieckturm (Dieck Tower, maybe Fat Tower?)...

... which guarded the town's water supply like the medieval water crossover , where the Mühlenkanal (mill channel) gets guided over the Krumme Wasser (Crooked Water) as a supply for the town's mills:

To turn Einbeck into a tourist attraction, the formerly mostly unpainted houses...

... got painted colorfully...

Which is great for tourists, but really expensive for the owners of these houses, as some of them did not hesitate to communicate to all the world and its uncle:

I'd still highly recommend a trip to Einbeck. And if you are a fan of a nice welcome, a superb breakfast with homemade salads and spreads...

... historical decoration...

and if you aren't allergic to the color pink...

... I'd recommend the hotel "Der Schwan" (the Swan):

No, I don't get any money for praising it. We just liked it there.

And in case you wonder what to do in Einbeck once you've seen its more than 150 late medieval houses and some of the other sights, you can always visit the Harzhorn site - or one of the other 4 towns of the so called Fachwerk5Eck (Half-timber Pentagon): Osterode am Harz, Northeim, Duderstadt and Hann. Münden.

I'm planning to!

The Forgotten Battle at the Harzhorn

Mon, 15 Apr 2019 13:40:00 +0000

A short while ago, hubby Wolfram and I went on a weekend trip to visit the second best preserved historic battlefield in whole Europe (the best one being almost around the corner of where we live) - which is barely known outside the circle of experts. Wolfram, of course, had heard about it. I, of course, stumbled across it by accident.

Which was the same way this battlefield got found - by accident. In Germany, the usage of metal detectors for hobby "archaeologists" is illegal. Which, naturally, doesn't faze the more eager ones of them. In 2000, two of them were hunting for the remains of a medieval castle and found several artefacts. However, in 2008, the photo of one artefact, a hippo sandal, which they posted in an internet forum, got identified as something much older than expected. So they confessed to their illegal search and handed over what they had found to the local authorities for archaeology. The hippo sandal turned out to be a Roman artefact and almost 1800 years old. the other artefacts they'd found as well.

Memento mori: hodie mihi, cras tibi

Within a very short time, the experts were up to their noses in Roman and Germanic artefacts of a large military encounter. A military encounter nobody had heard of before. Our tour guide at the site told us that approximately 3000 - 10.000 Romans had fought against 3000 - 6000 Teutons! In the middle of nowhere, much further north and east than people had thought the Roman army to have advanced into Germanic territory en masse! The first assumption that some Teutons fought each other with looted Roman weapons had been corrected soon. The finds show that there had been Roman infantile, archers, heavy cavalry and artillery as well as baggage and auxiliary like African javeliners and Syrian archers. Btw. this shows that ancient Romans had been much more open for intercultural enrichment than today's Italian ruling party...

Traditionally, the Romans had used the Rhine as channel of supply for their army. So along the Rhine, the Romans had been up til Xanten. And they had built their border wall from west to east a bit north of Frankfurt (Main). But the south of Lower Saxony?

The blue dot shows where the battlefield is (more or less). The Rhine, however, passes Koblenz, Bonn and Düsseldorf!

After some research and thanks to some coins they have found, experts nowadays assume that the Germanic battles of the first Roman Barracks Emperor Maximinus Thrax are connected to the combat at the Harzhorn. According to the Historia Augusta, Maximinus Thrax (directly after coming into power in 235 A.D.) and his troups pushed forward trecenta or quadringenta (300 or 400) miles into Germanic territory. Starting from their Mainz camp, this would have put them deep into Germania Libra. But earlier scientists did not think it possible to have launched such an enormous military campaign during the Crisis of the Third Century. So the information of the script got "corrected" to triginta and quadraginta (30 or 40 miles). Only after finding the battlefield at the Harzhorn was it proven that the original information of the Historia Augusta had been correct and no exaggeration and that there had been a thrust into the interior of Germania Libra around 235 A.D. as an answer to the Germanic devastation of Roman territory in 233 A.D..

Our tour guide told us that by now it is believed that the combat happened on the Romans' way back "home", towards Mainz and the Rhine (German winters aren't fun for people from Italy, Arabia or Africa!).

The assumed route of the retreating Roman army after their battle with the Suebi.

(The green line shows the location of the Limes, the Roman border wall that was supposed to protect the conquered, now Roman territory against the Germanic tribes. Btw., the wall didn't really work in the long run. Just saying...)

Several armies might have met to retreat (more or less) together. Furthermore, it was the habit to plunder everything that wasn't nailed down on the way back home, mostly food, livestock - and slaves. Which made a retrieval essential for survival for the Teutons! A winter without wife might be a blessing, but a winter without food and helping hands for the hunt was a death sentence. So this might explain why the Teutons risked their lives by attacking such a huge number of Roman soldiers.

The pictures I took of that battle site aren't really exciting, but I'll try to pass on some of the story behind it. Any mistakes I make are mine and not those of our fantastic guide Mr. Goettig!

So, the retreating army faced a muddy middle of nowhere with enough hills and low mountains to make any soldier unhappy.

The spot I took the photo from is an older road, the road you see in the forground is the federal highway B 248, which got build in more modern time, and the road in the middle of the picture shows he newest connection, the Autobahn A 7 (Hannover - Kassel). It is Germany's north-south connection and with 962,2 km the second longest Autobahn in Europe. As you can see, the more modern the road, the deeper it is in the pass. But, thanks to the Rodenbergbach (the Rodenberg creek), in 235/ 236 A.D. there weren't green fields, there was mostly mudd. It wasn't a fun route to chose for an army.

However, the Teutons somehow blocked the pass and the easier road along the ridge as well, forcing the Roman army (coming from the right) along a steeper way up the hill...

And the Teutons were smart enough to let the vanguard pass unmolestedly. This is known because they found another battlefield about 3 km further along, closer to Kalefeld where there is a strong spring which would be a perfect resting place for an army. It is assumed that some Teutons kept the vanguard busy there, while their main army attacked the baggage struggling uphill over a dirt road through the forest.

Since the whole area is and was too woody, stony and steep to be of agricultural use, the battlefield had been almost completely undisturbed for almost 1800 years, allowing the archaeologists to not just find hundreds of battle artefacts, but also to find them more or less where they had (been) dropped during the battle. In the case of the arrowheads and bolts it could even be seen in which direction they had been shot, this way making it possible to use them as witnesses to Germanic and Roman combat strategies.

It was decided to make the combat more visible by using different colors for different finds. The yellow flags you can see here show where Roman arrowheads lay, the blue flag shows a Germanic find. So in the pictures above we have one spot, where a Teuton stood - with lots of Roman attempts to shoot him dead.

The orange flags show where bolts of Roman torsion siege engines were found.

As you can see, shooting uphill is a bitch! That they still tried so hard indicates that they really wanted to hit whoever was on top of that knoll. Maybe the commanders of the Germanic hordes?

The red flags show where found artefacts indicate close combat.

The info point (in the middle) tells the story of a single Roman rider or Germanic auxiliary in Roman service, who got surrounded and probably killed by surrounding Teutons. The little knoll has hardly enough space to swing a cat around, not to mention to have several warriors fight each other! The archaeologists found (among other things) bridle trimmings, a buckle, a terminal decorated with an animal head, a phallic pendant, a knife, two Roman spear tips, relics of a chain mail shirt - and a copper coin minted in Nicaea, Asia Minor.

Another thing they found close by was an almost complete chain mail shirt (which you can see, together with the other finds, at the Braunschweigischen Landesmuseum, the history museum in Braunschweig).

And as you can see, the find was not buried very deep by time. And it is the first time such a well-preserved chain mail shirt could be found on a Roman-Germanic battle field. Only in a few cases, chain mail shirts were found in Germanic graves and normally not whole shirts but just smaller combinations of links. A chain mail shirt was made out of up to 30.000 links and, yes, in this case most of them did not survive their slumber in the ground. Reportedly, however, the links can still easily be distinguished.

So, the Romans and the wagons got forced up the hill, which is pretty steep on both sides.

This made it difficult for the Romans to use their favorite weapons, the long range weapons. Which makes it puzzling to understand, why some more nimble Teutons ran down the hill to engage the soldiers at the foot of the hill.

So the baggage struggled up the hill while Roman soldiers with long range weapons were still at the northern foot of the ridge. The Teutons were on top of the ridge, trying to steal the wagons. The find of wagon parts hint at a mule that had bolted and overturned the wagon down the ridge. Found Roman hobnails indicate that the Roman soldiers had tried to recover the overturned wagon after the encounter. That they left many things behind to be found hundreds of years later shows that they didn't feel secure enough to linger and pick up all the pieces. An inkwell and a box full of keyes were left behind. Looks as if the tools of administration were not nearly as fascinating to Roman soldiers nor Germanic warriors as food and luxury goods.

But the Teutons had to flee, too! Finds indicate that a large group of Roman soldiers made it back to the battlefield, fighting their way up hill from the south. In addition, the Roman cavalry found a way up further down the road. The Teutons found themselves between a Roman rock and one or two Roman hard places - and took off. The originally about 2,0 x 0,5 Kilometer long battlefield is frayed towards the west. Several finds show people losing loot without taking the time to recover it, probably thanks to being chased.

We left the ridge and doubled back...

...towards the info building.

If you ever plan to visit this battlefield, I highly recommend to not do it in March. It was a bit bleak and cold even though very fascinating!

Wolfram and I found much more to admire during our short trip. I'll show it to you in my next blog. Stay tuned!

The Dechenhöhle (the Dechen Cave)

Mon, 03 Dec 2018 23:14:00 +0000

A few weeks ago, our authors' club held a reading at the Dechenhöhle (the Dechen Cave) in Iserlohn. This reading had been combined with a private tour through the cave. Dr. Stefan Niggemann, the managing director of the Dechen Cave, had been so kind as to allow me to take pictures during our reading and the tour, and to post them here. So here you are:

The Dechen Cave is part of a 20 km long cave system, which still isn't explored completely. New caves belonging to it are still found on a regular basis. However, only 400 m of the Dechen Cave is open to public tours.

In 1868, two railwayman dropped a hammer into a crevice during their procedure of rock consolidation at the railroad between Letmathe and Iserlohn. They let themselves down on a rope into the crevice - and found themselves in a wonderful cave.

The owner of that area, the Bergisch-Märkische Eisenbahngesellschaft (Bergisch-Märkische railroad company), turned the cave into a show cave at once, securing the front entrance with a door, laying ways and installing steps so the public could see 280 m of the cave.

In 1910 a continuation of the cave was found and after laying out paths and stairs there, the cave could be visited for a bit over 400 m from 1921 on.
In 1890, the illumination with first candles and later on oil gas was exchanged for electric light, so the sooting of the dripstone wouldn't continue. At that time, the Dechen Cave had been among the most modern ones when it came to illumination. Til today, light plays a major part when it comes to the tours.

Until the end of 1983, the Dechen Cave belonged to first private, later state railroad companies. Today it belongs to the Mark Sauerland Touristik GmbH, which in turn belongs to Iserlohn and the Märkische district. The cave museum from 1979 got expanded into the German Cave Museum Iserlohn in 2006.

And, no, they haven't so far found any fossiles of human beings or human cultures in the cave. But they found fossiles of cave bears, cave lions, cave hyenas, reindeers and even wooly rhinos. The Dechen Cave itself has existed in its current form for approximately 800,000 years.

Our group trouped into the cave, along some fantastical formations...

... to the Orgelgrotte (Organ Grotto). Our first reading stop.

And yes, that's yours truly. If you're wondering, I'm the one on the left. The gentleman on the right is one of my authors' collegues, Winfried Diener, who was kind enough to help out with the light since blue light turns the scenery into a fairyland but a typed text into a game of memory.

And, yes, this place also has a monster. One just hast to change the light and the perpective to see sunk-in eyes, the knobbly nose and the clawy left hand...

After this first reading part, we moved on to the Kanzelgrotte (Pulpit Grotto) with its Kronleuchter (chandelier):

My colleague Wilfried read here before the whole group marched on. We passed through winding "hallways,"...

... saw Makkaroni Stalaktiten (Macaroni Stalactites aka stalactites which are hollow inside)...

... and lone watchers...

... til we reached the Nixengrotte (Mermaid Grotto):

It was a bit of a challenge to take pictures, to not fall too much behind, nor stumble over some dripstone and fall flat on my face. So, although I might be able to multitask up to a certain point, I still wasn't able to dot down all the names of the places we saw and passed. Some places are obvious, like where they store the Stollen, a traditional fruit loaf for Christmas time, which needs a certain time, coolness and humidity to ripen to perfection. As a fun note, "Stollen" is a fruity loaf - but also a tunnel in a mine...

The other places you just have to enjoy without my babbling:

What fascinated me no end was that I couldn't find some local myth or fairytale of the Dechenhöhle. Not one! I guess the time after 1868 was too modern for myths and magic.

But, there is a story about the dwarf Buntröckchen (colored coat), who helped a poor boy, a cowherd to herd the cows while they chatted and told stories to each other. The village people were impressed by the good care those two took of the cows, so they gave the dwarf a coat in the colors of white, black and green as a small thank you. the dwarf was delighted and the people liked the colors as well, so they painted their own house in the same colors: the walls white, the door-posts black and the shutters green. And since the dwarf didn't have a name so far, they called him Buntröckchen.

One day, the by now grown up boy went away to learn a trade and the dwarf gave him a small golden hammer, asking him to please visit him when he returned. This the young man did and the dwarf was very happy to see him once more, because he was old by now and wanted to return to his fellow dwarves, deep in the mountain. Before he left, he took the young man aside and told him: "There is a fortune within these hills. Take the rock and burn it to lime and you will get very rich!"

The dwarf said his farewell and the young man heeded his advice. He sold the burnt lime and could live a life of comfort.

So, the cave itself may not have a legend attached to it. But they do have a ghost in here [can you see him?], watching over dead-end paths and tunnels, scaring away curious visitors so they won't come to harm:

They also have bats! Not as many as the Carlsbad Caverns have, but we did see one. Probably their amabassador. But it was too fast for my clumsy fingers on the release. In any case, the tour was over much too fast.

If you are curious about the two stories I've read, you can find a podcast of them below. And, yes, it's the English version. Thanks to Alec Hyde, I hope to have not too many errors in them. If I still do, it's my fault not his! He worked at high speed to have the texts ready for me til Christmas 2018 - just to hear that my voice was gone and I would do the whole post later. I'm deeply grateful he didn't terminate our friendship there and then!

If you are curious about Alec's work, you can find it e.g. at Amazon UK or Amazon USA. Trust me, it's worth reading!

As for my two texts:

Marcel took form after a man from our parish first told me that, being a professional foster parent, one of course knew how to guard one's heart because the children never stayed. And then, after this short credo, he took out his smartphone - and showed me about a zillion photos of the last little foster boy they'd had...

Marcel

Ohin is an autobiographical story. Only the student's name in the title got changed.

Ohin

Last but not least, I'm happy to say that I not only have a new PC but also still all of my earlier photos! As it turned out, my former hard disk has, against all odds, survived the crash. Actually, it was (besides a few cables) the only thing of that old PC that has survived the crash. In any case, the chances of getting new posts to you on a more regular basis are now significant higher thanks to my surviving photos.

Wien - Vienna (Center)

Sun, 07 Oct 2018 13:19:00 +0000

Yes, I know Vienna doesn't belong to Germany. Nowadays. However, Germany has been so closely knitted to and interwoven with Austria that I thought it might interest you to see Austria's capital as well. Besides that, the Vienna pictures are among the few that have survived the hard disk crash of my computer... However, we've mostly been in the First District of Vienna, the center. So this is just a glimpse of this city. It's still a longer blog than the one on Berlin. Don't worry, the next blog will be much shorter! Here we go!

If you compare Berlin and Vienna, you'll find these two cities on different sides of the galaxy! Even if they've shared large parts of history. One large difference can be seen with your eyes, even if Karl Kraus might have put it a tad harshly:

"What distinguishes Berlin from Vienna on first sight is the observation that, there, one achieves a deceptive effect with the most worthless material while, here, only real things are used for the kitsch."

The other difference can be felt! Berlin is always busy, Berliners seem to always walk purposefully, Vienneses ... not so much. Karl Kraus once wrote:

"Every Viennese is a sight, every Berliner a public transportation."

And Gustav Mahler went so far to say:

"If the world ever ends, I'll move to Vienna because there everything happens fifty years later."

But there are also similarities between those two cities. Both, for example, are old, really old!

Vienna was named after its river, the river Wien, the name itself being the modern version of Wenia, which comes from the celtio-romanic Vedunia (forest river). It has no etymological connection to the Roman military camp which preceded Vienna and which was named Vindobona.

According to archeological findings the area of Vienna had been populated since the Old Stone Age. However, the first mentioning was in 881 in some annals about a battle that took place "ad Ueniam" (= ad Weniam). In the first century AD, Romans adapted a Celtic settlement and turned it into a military camp with a connected civilian settlement. The Romans stayed until the 5th century when the Celtic migration put an end to it. But even today, the traces of this old Roman camp can be seen in some places of downtown Vienna.

In 955, the East Franconian Otto I won a battle against the Hungarians and Vienna's (and Austria's) star began to rise. In the 11th century, Vienna was an important trading place and with the ransom paid for the release of Richard the Lionheart, Vienna could finance its first urban expansion.

1278 the Habsburg started to rule Austria and they tried to keep up with the glory of Prague by expanding Vienna. 1438, with Albert the Magnanimous being elected as King of Romans, Vienna became the residence of the Holy Roman Empire.

In 1529, the Ottoman Empire led by Suleiman the Magnificent tried to capture Vienna for the first time. Without success and this failed attempt put an end, so far, to the conquests of the Ottoman Empire in eastern and central Europe. It also was the start of 150 years of military tension at the border between the lands of Habsburg and the Ottoman Empire, which happened to be just 150 km east of Vienna. 1556, Vienna became the official seat of the Emperor. And in 1683, the Battle of Vienna, the second fruitless attempt of the Ottoman Empire to capture Vienna, was the starting shot of the 15-year-long Great Turkish War between the Holy League and the Ottoman Empire.

No matter how devasting these wars had been, they left Vienna with a wonderful Coffee-house culture and great coffee! And maybe it is thanks to the Battle of Vienna that we have the croissants today, too. According to one legend, A Viennese baker rose in the middle of the night to start baking bread and by chance heard Turkish soldiers as they tried to tunnel their way into Vienna. The baker sounded the alarm, the invaders were killed and a crescent-shaped pastry was baked to celebrate the victory over the Turkish and therefore Islamic enemy.

The end of the 18th century saw the Viennese Classical Period with its famous musicians Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, Schubert. And 1804 saw Vienna as the capital city of the Austrian Empire. In 1805 and 1809, Napoleon's armies succeeded where the Ottoman Empire had failed by conquering Vienna, but after Napoleon's defeat, it also was Vienna that saw the struggle to return stability to a war-torn Europe at the Vienna Congress (1814/ 1815).

1858, Vienna dramatically changed its "face." The city fortification got demolished and a large boulevard, the Ringstraße, now circles the inner city. Monumental buildings in the historicist style line it and one should just ignore the fact that this circle street isn't really a circle, but rather a bunch of straight streets, which connect at an angle in such a way that a cannon, placed at the angles can shoot down the street to both sides and cover the whole distance to the next angle (and maybe stationed cannon there) with a cannonball - a nod towards the French Revolution, which had scared the bejeezus out of not only the Austrian monarchs.

WW I didn't so much threaten Vienna itself but rather plunged it into a horrible supply crisis. Hunger ruled the city. In 1918, Charles I, the last Austrian Emporer, resigned. 1938 Hitler sent the Wehrmacht into Vienna and later in this year held his famous annexation speech in front of cheering masses. In November 1938, 92 Jewish synagogues burnt! And at the end of WW II only 5243 Jewish people of former 200.000 were still alive and living in Vienna.

In 1944, air raids destroyed 20% of Vienna and 1/3 of its inner city. And at the end of the war, Vienna suffered a fate close to Berlin: It was occupied and divided into four sectors by the Americans, the French, the British and the Russians. The inner city was ruled and patrolled by all 4 more or less together. Their patrol lovingly was called the "four in a car." And 1955, Vienna and Austria were free again and, thanks to the Marshall plan, thriving.

Today, Vienna counts a population of more than 1.8 million people and is, according to the international Mercer-study, for the ninth time running the number one city when it comes to quality of life.

The Hofburg by night. It is the former principal imperial palace and serves today as the workplace of the Austrian president. Originally built in the 13th century, it was expanded several times. In 1938, Hitler stood on the balcony above the lightened entrance, speaking to the cheering masses. According to a tour guide, it's now forbidden to use this balcony no matter for what purpose.

The yard in front of it, the Heldenplatz, sports two statues. One of Prince Eugene of Savoy in front of the entrance of the Hofburg and...

... the one of Archduke Charles of Austria opposite it.

The Michaelerplatz (St. Michael's square) in front of the Michaelerkirche (St. Michael's Church)...

.... shows the entrance to the Michaelertrakt of the Hofburg.

The strange stones in its middle protect an archeological dig site. There you can see some of Vienna's underground....

... like the foundations of Roman civilian settlement (the lower stones) and parts of the walls of the Renaissance Paradeisgartel (Paradise garden) of the Hofburg (the higher stones).

Because Vienna is built on clay, people tended to grab a shovel whenever they ran out of space. The result is a city standing on a maze resembling a Swiss cheese with cellars up to 5 floors down. It also made Vienna the city of espionage after WW II, because one could easily tunnel to whatever basement the other side used to plot the next moves in.

Leading up to the Michaelerplatz is the pedestrian zone Kohlmarkt (Cabbage market), which connects with the Graben (Ditch), one of the most important streets of Vienna when it comes to shopping. It also runs along the former outer wall of the formerly mentioned Roman military camp.

The Graben is a wide pedestrian zone and often an exhibition place for contemporary art.

It also has a public bathroom...

... designed in Jugendstil. Which, you have to admit, has more style than these modern "wee-wee boxes"...

If you follow the Graben, you'll come...

...to the Stephansdom. Formerly (1365) the Domkirche St. Stephan, it became a cathedral in 1479 and since 1723 it is the Metropolitan Church of the archbishop of Vienna. Parts of the church that went before (from 1230) still exist and are part of its western side. The dome is Vienna's landmark and the Viennese call it lovingly the Steffl.

The other landmark of Vienna is the Riesenrad (Ferris wheel) of Vienna. It stands close to the entrance of Vienna's amusement park, the Prater. Built in 1897 for the Golden Jubilee of Franz Josef I, it was not only one of the earliest Ferris wheels ever built, but also, with a hight of almost 65 meters, the world tallest extant one from 1920 til 1985! It is a popular movie-set, as the Third Man and James Bond's The Living Daylights show.

Talking about the Third Man. Besides it being a fantastic movie in my opinion, it also gives an eerily spot-on impression of Vienna after WW II. Shot in 1949 at original places, it shows Vienna as it was after WW II - destroyed, occupied, starved and run by criminals, spies and contrabandists. If you ever make it to Vienna, go on a Third-Man-sightseeing tour. Some show you movie sites above the ground, like the morris column, where Harry Lime supposedly accessed the Vienna underground...

... the entrance to the Wien River...

... or the doorway where Harry Lime shows up for the first time.

But some tours even hand you a helmet and send you underground into the sewers...

I highly recommend both tours. Just rub a bit of eucalyptus oil underneath you nose if you want to see the underground movie sites. We are talking the Vienna sewers in full swing here!

Those who are more into fresh air can enjoy Vienna's beautiful gardens. Some are smaller, like the Volksgarten next to the Hofburg...

... or the Augarten...

... with its Flak Türme (Flak Towers)...

... or larger ones like the Donaupark with its 604.000 m².

Or if you are more into royal gardens and the palaces attached to them, you can visit Schönbrunn...

... with its spacious square in front...

... its wonderful view over the Palace garden towards the Gloriette...

...its Pavillons (Pavilions)...

... its Palmenhaus (Palm House) at the entrance of the Tiergarten (the world oldest zoo still in existance) ...

... its fountains...

... and its fake Roman ruins...

The view down from the Gloriette is truly glorious...

... and from that height one cannot even see that the people at the palace aired their bedclothes late in the afternoon (5.30 pm to be precise ;-) )...

... as can be seen at the window of the top floor, right in the middle. ;-)

Those who like it a bit smaller can take a look at the Belvedere.

Prince Eugen started the project of this summer palace outside of Vienna in 1712 with the Untere Belvedere (Lower Belevedere).

The construction of the Oberes Belvedere (Upper Belvedere) followed as soon as 1717.

With its beautiful gardens...

... and fountains...

... one can easily imagine the peacefulness of the place before...

Vienna crept up and around it.

Another place to enjoy some quiet are the cemeteries. The best known is the Wiener Zentralfriedhof (Vienna Central Cemetery). After Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II's Josephinism demanded, among many other things, that the cemeteries within today's Ringstraße are to be closed down and the dead to be buried outside of Vienna, 5 cemeteries were build to cope with the demand. However, Vienna grew and with its growth came its dead. So another cemetery was planned, one far outside of Vienna, one that was large enough for many years to come.

So, opened in 1874, the Zentralfriedhof is one of the largest cemeteries of whole Europe! With 2.4 km² and over 2 million, who found their last home here, it is a good place to escape the hustle of the city while brushing up one's history knowledge. Many known politicans, authors, actors, philosophers and musicans are buried here. Where else can one find Beethoven...

... and Schubert...

... close to musicans like Falco.

Not quite so "romantic" are the graves of the soldiers...

But as a central cemetery, the Zentralfriedhof has room and a special corner for all nations, for atheists and for all confessions - Buddhist, Protestant, Islamic, Jewish, Orthodox, Mormon and of course Catholic.

However, some graves are more creative than others. Like the one of August Zang, the founder of the Freie Presse (a newspaper of Vienna).

If you don't want to walk til you drop (or take the cemetery bus Nr. 106) to see all graves, you can always chose one of the smaller cemeteries.

My favorite, so far, is the Friedhof St. Marx (St. Marx Cemetery). As one of the 5 cemeteries, built because of the Josephinism, it was used from 1784 til 1874. Joseph II decreed not just that cemeteries had to be outside the city but also that the burials had to be economical, preferable without grave markers or coffins or embalming. That's why there is a marker of Mozart's grave, although his actual grave is unmarked. The myth that Mozart's grave is unmarked because he had been poor is just a myth. In reality, his burial followed the laws of that time.

Until 2005, the cemetery had been mostly neglected. So the whole atmosphere is still calm and slightly enchanted.

Cemeteries aren't your cup of tea? Don't worry, one can spend ages in Vienna's museums!

1891 the Kunsthistorisches Museum (Museum of Art History) opened its doors and houses the collections of the Habsburgs. It had been designed as a museum right from the beginning on. At the moment they show a fantastic exhibition of Brueghel the Elder, pictures of which I cannot show here, thanks to copyright issues, Sorry!

Opposite of it is the Naturhistorisches Museum (Natural History Museum), which got opened in 1891 as well.

Personally, I'm a big fan of their dinosaur room with its animated dinosaur (the first time, it went 'Jurrasic Park' on me, I almost jumped out of my shoes!)

Between those two is the Maria-Theresien-Platz with its monument of the Empress Maria Theresia.

Another fascinating museum is the Heeresgeschichtliches Museum (Museum of Military History). Completed in 1865, it is Vienna's oldest museum that was planned and execuded as such.

Its motto is "Kriege gehören ins Museum" (wars belong into a museum) and it shows not just armor from the 16th century, but also a history-related car, marked by bullets that also hit Archduke Ferdinand and his wife Sophie, and Archduke Ferdinad's bloody uniform. Silent witnesses of the literal starting shot of WW I.

A hidden pearl is the Gartenpalais Liechtenstein (Liechtenstein Garden Palace).

Finished around 1709, the palace had been a private museum until 2011. It had shown pieces of the private collection of the Liechtensteins, which is one of the largest and most important private collections worldwide. Today, however, one can only visit it if one has booked the rooms for some event or at one of the few guided tours. If you should ever be in Vienna, try to get onto one of those tours! Where else can you be surrounded by international art of 5 centuries and furniture that had cost thousands of Euros, in costly decorated rooms that don't look like some museum's room but like some king's private dining room? Spectacular!

Museums are too stuffy? Just walk the streets! Vienna is full of interesting buildings. Some are very visible. Being a fan of "authorities", Vienna's architects had a field day with historicist style, when it came to buildings suited for the Ringstraße. The Rathaus (City Hall) was supposed to resemble authority, so they chose Gothic Revival as a fitting style for it.

For their Parlamentsgebäude (Austrian Parliamnet Building) they nodded towards the cradle of democracy and chose a Greek Revival style.

The University, although originally from 1365, got its place at the Ringstraße in 1884 and the look of the High Renaissance.

However, not everybody was happy with imitating former styles. In 1897 a group of artists departed from the Austrian Artists' Society and their Künstlerhaus to start something new. Built in 1897, the Wiener Secession became the home of their art.

Otto Wagner, too, was an architect unhappy with traditional forms. He left the Neoclassicism and the more modern Art Nouveau of his time to drag Vienna, kicking and screaming, into the age of modern architecture. His buildings, like the Österreichische Postsparkasse (Austrain Postal Savings Bank) ...

... aren't quite as easily found as the chunks along the Ringstraße, but well worth the search!

Some of his other works are more visible, like the underground station at the Karlsplatz.

Which is just around the Karlskirche (from 1739 and not by Otto Wagner! ;-) )

Or go and see the Hundertwasserhaus (1983 - 1985) in the Löwengasse.

That's about as modern as Vienna can get.

If you are less into modern und more into crazy, Vienna is still for you. Where else can you see a fountain sporting not just buck nacked statues, but having them show their butt (according to our tour guide) towards the house of the artist's former mistress?

Or does Vienna just have a different idea of modesty?

Where can you live not just...

... at the Holy Trinity...

... but also have the kingly residence of Ferdinand I, an artist's workshop, hell's kitchen and the headquarters of "Friss oder Stirb" (sink or swim) as your neighbours?

Or some half-modern, half-traditional house next door?

Not to mention that some shops in Vienna seem to have a shop-window decorator, who might have benefitted from counseling...

And, no, we are not talking some very early displayed Halloween decoration here!

This guy, even though slightly crazy as well, has - sadly - not been at this hotel wall anymore in 2018.

But this Federal Ministry still combines National Defence and ... Sports.

Signs of WW II are all over the place. Be it the Mahnmal gegen Krieg und Faschismus (Memorial against War and Fascism)...

... or the memorial in the form of columns at the site of the Leopoldstädter Tempel, which got destroyed by the Nazis...

... or Steine der Erinnerung (Stones Of Memory) that remind of killed, transported or humiliated Jews in Vienna.

One tour guide told us that, no matter how difficult the occupation after WW II had been, the Russian soldiers had been the first to enter Vienna and they played a major part in the survival of the people of Vienna that coming winter! According to our guide, they gave coats and food to the people, mostly to the children. So when Russia asked Vienna to preserve and protect all Russian memorials, the people of Vienna agreed and put this obligation into their treaty of 1955.

A few years ago, when Putin visited Vienna, the people of Vienna did not feel quite as happy with their former saviors anymore. However, they kept their promise. The Heldendenkmal der Roten Armee ( Heroes' Monument of the Red Army) ...

... was polished and ready for the president - they just turned up the water pressure so the fountain concealed the statue of the soldier...

Vienna, city of strange humor!

("Bikemuda-Triangle - Bikes that are parked here can disappear without a trace")

City of strange artists...

... of narrow streets...

... really small vineyards...

... beautiful musical clocks...

... beautiful balconies...

... cute pubs...

... baroque houses...

... romantic stairways...

... romantic houses...

... road sign craziness (close to German style)...

... and really cute traffic lights (not German style!).

And last but not least, city of chocolate...

... Wiener Schnitzel...

... and yummy deserts!

We adored the daily slowfood breakfast buffet at our hotel (Hotel Rathaus, a wine and design hotel).

Not to mention their wine...

And so I'll leave you with some final words (yes, I know, Shakespeare I ain't. Still...)

Vienna's Muses

The muses didn't come today.

So, up and down I walk the street

with eager eyes and tired feet.

I go by train, I go by car,

I travel much, I travel far.

But muses didn't come today.

The muses didn't come today!

Museums call and cafes, too,

designer shops and then the zoo,

the churches, houses and a park,

some guided tours, then sewer's dark.

But muses didn't come today.

The muses didn't come today!

The history beckons. One by one

the wars they've lost, the wars they've won.

The photos show Vienna's fight,

the bombs, the ruins, people's plight.

But muses didn't come today.

The muses didn't come today.

Viennan food is wonderful.

I stuff myself and then I pull

a bottle close of Austrian wine.

The taste is rich and I feel fine.

But muses didn't come today!

The muses didn't come today.

So I give up and stop my doodles,

just poor some wine, reach for the noodles

and let this city spin me 'round,

half here to stay, half homeward bound.

Still, muses didn't come today!

Who cares about them anyway?

Cheers!

Welcome post - Berlin

Sat, 21 Jul 2018 18:15:00 +0000

I've wondered for some time where to start my journey through Germany and decided on Berlin. Why? Not because it's our capital. That's just a nice bonus. But rather because Berlin is about as much typical for Germany as Hawaii is typical for the USA - just a tad more seedy and crazy.

Klaus Wowereit, former Governing Mayor of Berlin, best know for his confession: "I'm gay - and that's good so" said about Berlin:

Berlin is poor but sexy

And to quote the social worker and philanthropist Anneliese Bödecker:

The Berliners are unfriendly and reckless, ruff and bossy. Berlin is odious, noisy, dirty, and gray; roadworks and congested streets wherever you go - but I'm sorry for everyone who does not stay here

Enjoy!

With a population of 3.6 million people, 32.5 % of them with a migration background, Berlin is not just Germany's capital and its largest city, but one of the most colorful ones as well. It's name is supposed to have the origin in the Slavonian word berlo (plus the Slavonian suffix for towns -in) which means "swamp"or "quagmire". Go figure!

First mentioned in a document in 1244, it had been a capital of one region or another since 1486.

The Thirty Years' War had been a catastrophy for Berlin. One third of all house were destroyed, the population was cut in half. Frederick William (Elector of Brandenburg) took over the reign in 1640 and started a policy of immigration and religious tolerance. 1671 he invited 50 Yewish families to stay in Berlin, 1685 he offered the French Huguenots a home in the capital. By 1700 20 % of the Berliner population had been French. However, it did not result in all Berliner to switch their language to French nor did they turn into Huguenots... Just saying.

With the German Empire (founded 1871), Germany became a global player and Berlin, as its capital, became a cosmopolitan city, jumping the million-inhabitants'-mark in 1877, the two-million-inhabitants'-mark in 1905.

In WWII, the NS-regime destroyed the Jewish population of around 160,000. Later, the Battle of Berlin lasted for two weeks and left Berlin in ruins - more than 170,000 dead, over 500,000 wounded (and that's just counting the soldiers), half the buildings destroyed and Berlin divided into four quarters.

Berlin stayed a capital - but just of East Germany. West Germany transfered its capital further away from the eastern border to Bonn. After Germany's Reunifaction in 1990, Berlin, once again, became the capital of total Germany.

The Brandenburger Tor is an 18th-century neoclassical monument and was commissioned by Frederick William II of Prussia to represent peace.However, it did not take long for it being abused for military propaganda. Napoleon was the first, but not the last, to use the Brandenburger Gate for a triumphal procession. When the Nazis ascended to power, they used the gate as a party symbol.

Badly damaged with holes from bullets and explosions, the gate survived WWII. It got patched by the governments of East and West Berlin after the war. And until the Berlin Wall was built, traffic could travel through it from one part of Germany to the other. In 1961, the Brandenburger Tor border crossing was closed. Until 22. December 1989, when it was reopened again and Helmut Kohl (chancellor of West Germany) walked through the gate to be greeted by Hans Modrow (East Germany's prime minister). In 1990, the Wall was torn down.

It is really hard to explain to non-Germans the emotional importance of the Brandenburger Tor. It saw demonstrations against the separation of Germany. And it saw the opening of the border and finally the tumbling of the Wall. If you want to get an impression of that time, check YouTube. For example "Westernhagen - Freiheit Livekonzert 1989," which had been the hymn of Germany at that time:

Freedom (M. M. Westernhagen)

The treaties are made

And there had been a lot of laughter

And someting sweet for dessert

Freedom, freedom

The band rumtata

And the pope was already there, too

And my neighbour right in front

Freedom, freedom - is the only one missing!

Unfortunately, man isn't naive

Unfortunately, man is primitive

Freedom, freedom - has been canceled again!

All who are dreaming of freedom

Shall not neglect to party

Shall be dancing even on graves

Freedom, freedom - is the only thing that counts!

The Reichstag was opened in 1894 and housed the Diet until 1933, when it was badly damaged by a fire. This Reichtagsbrand was taken as an excuse by the Nazis to demolish the basic rights granted by the Weimarer Constitution on the very next morning. The statement that the fire had been started by a single communist was seen controversially even at that time.

After WW II, the building fell into disuse being physically within West Berlin but only a few meters from the border of East Berlin

The large glass dome at the very top of the Reichstag looks small from below. It isn't! And it is worth a visit! It not only has a 360-degree view of the surrounding Berlin cityscape but also one down, inside the dome, at the debating chamber of the parliament below. Thanks to a mirrored funnel in the middle of the dome, natural light from above radiates down to the parliament floor, while warm, used air escapes upwards, through the open center of the funnel. A large sun shield tracks the movement of the sun electronically and blocks direct sunlight which would make the chamber too hot and bright.

Construction work at the Reichstag was finished in 1999 and the seat of parliament was transferred to the Bundestag in April of that year.

The dome is open to visitors by prior registration.

The Bundeskanzleramt (Federal Chancellery) is the official seat and residence of the Chancellor of Germany as well as their executive office, the German Chancellery. It was build as part of the new government district in Berlin and was finished in 2001.

Thanks to its slightly bombastic and very disputed architecture, it is, "lovingly" called the "Elefant's Loo", the "Washing mashine" or, since Helmut Kohl had not just been the chancellor during the Reunifaction, but also a ... ehm... pretty portly man, the "Kohllosseum"...

Just "around the corner" of the Bundeskanzleramt is the Carillon. It is located in a freestanding 42m-tall tower in the northeastern part of Berlin's central Tiergarten park. It is a large, manually played concert instrument, comprising 68 bells. Every Sunday at 2 p.m., from May until September, the Berlin Carillonneur plays concerts on it.

Right next to it, in the park, there had been an exhibition of art, fitted into its park surroundings. If the sky had been blue, it would have been perfect!

Another place to visit when being in Berlin is the Museumsinsel (the Museum Island). There you cannot just find the Dome...

... which "old-fashioned" neo High-Renaissance/ Baroque style of 1905 presents a charming-strange contrast to the "real" modern buildings like the Fernsehturm at the "Alex" (Alexanderplatz), ...

... but also five very interesting museums. There is the Bode-Museum, originally called Kaiser-Friedrich-Museum, which hosts a fantastic collection of sculptures from the Late Antiquity until the beginning of the 19th century, wonderful Byzantine art from before 1453 and an interesting collection of ancient and more modern coins.

Then we have there the Pergamonmuseum, known for its collection of antique art, Islamic art and its Southwest Asian art. One of its highlights, the Pergamon Altar, cannot be visited until 2020.

The Neues Museum sports, among other displays, the Nefertiti Bust as part of its Egyptian Museum.

The Altes Museum houses the antiquities collection of the Berlin State Museum.

Last but not least, you can find there the Alte Nationalgalerie:

Combining the stairway of a palace, the apsis of a church and the gable and columns of a temple the building was supposed to resemble architecturally the union of nation, art and history.

Inside you can find works of the Neoclassical and of the Romantic movement, of the Biedermeier, French Impressionism and early Modernism. It houses one of the largest collections of 19th-century sculptures and paintings in Germany.

The guy outside, the one on the horse, is Friedrich Wilhelm IV, with the figures of Religion, Art, History and Philiosophy surrounding him. One probably should add Architecture to the mix...

The building crane Friedrich Wilhelm IV frowns upon belongs to the project of reconstructing the Stadtschloss (Berlin Palace). This palace of 1445 got damaged in WW II and then demolished by the East German party SED (the one and only party of East Germany) to make way for a large square for demonstrations, called Marx-Engels'-Square or Palace Square and the Palace of the Republic. Which, for its part, got pulled down 2009 because of asbestos contamination. Since 2013 they are working on a reconstruction of the Berlin palace, using parts of the original building that got saved.

It's a long way to Tipperary...

If you pass through the Brandenburger Tor, your feet will hit the boulevard Unter den Linden, the main east-west-street through Berlin, which happens to link the Museumsinsel to the Brandenburger Tor. As important Berlin street, it houses the Hungarian and the Russian Embassy, the Russian Embassy sporting the nicer entrance of those two:

Several other embassies (like the US and the French one) can be found just one or two streets away. Furthermore, you can find the equestrian statue of Friedrich dem Großen (Frederick the Great) here:

Unveiled in 1851, it marks the transition to a realistical representation in sculpting. It got moved to several different positions during the separation of Berlin and almost melted down. 1980 it was restored to its original place Well, almost its original place: 6 m to the east of it. The pedestal shows 74 coevals of Frederick the Great (aka the "Alte Fritz"), 21 of them as life-sized sculptures in the round:

And then there is the St.-Hedwigs-Kathedrale from 1773, even if it got badly damged in WW II and had to be restored 1963:

And the Neue Wache, opened in 1818 as a guardhouse and later used as a memorial for differing causes, which, after the Reunification, was once again rededicated in 1993. This time as the "Central Memorial of the Federal Republic of Germany for the Victims of War and Dictatorship." It houses a statue by Käthe Kollwitz called "Mother With Her Dead Son." Although "houses" is relative: The statue is placed in the middle of the room, directly under the opening in the ceiling and thus not protected from the elements...

Yes, Berlin has many interesting spots. The Gendarmenmarkt, being called one of the most beautiful ones in Berlin, among them. In its center you'll find the Konzerthaus Berlin...

... which had been opened in 1821 as Schauspielhaus Berlin and renamed as Konzerthaus (but still called Schauspielhaus by the most) in 1994. It, too, had been badly damaged in WW II. In front of it is a monument of the German poet Schiller,...

... which got unveiled in 1871 and had been removed from 1936 to 1984, because of severe damage. Nope, not by WW II, but thanks to the brilliant Nazi idea to turn the Gendarmenmarkt into a parade ground. They wanted to move the monument to the Schillerpark - and dropped it!

The statues at the pedestral are the Allegory of Lyric Poetry (facing you), with the Allegory of Philosophy to its left and the Allegory of Tragedy to its right. The Allegory of History being invisible from this point of view.

Flanking the Konzerthaus are two domes, that were constructed to look very similar, the Französische Dom and the Deutsche Dom:

Trust me, you don't want to see my picture of the Franzöische Dom...

The original dome was errected in 1701 - 1708, which got replaced in 1882 by this neobaroque church, because the original threatened to collapse. In 1943 it burnt down during the air raids and it took 13 years, until 1996, to rebuild it once more.

Yes, Berlin has many churches, like the Heilig-Kreuz-Kirche (in Berlin - Kreuzberg)...

... which impressed me mostly by its parish's commitment to help the foreigners, the refugees, the poor and the homeless! But one of the best known churches, however, is the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gedächtniskirche:

The original church of 1890 got very badly damaged during WW II. The present building was built 1959 - 1963 and combines the damaged spire of the old church with a new church and belfry (here all in orange as a reference to the then celebrated Luther Year 2017). The damaged spire, being responsible for the church's nickname "der Hohle Zahn" (the hollow tooth), has its ground floor made into a memorial hall. By the way, the newer parts are nicknamed Lippenstift und Puderdose" (lipstick and powder box)...

Two things that I'd like to mention here are that one of the former British pilots, who had flown in the air raids in WW II, heard about the need for the Gedächniskirche to be rescued from decay and helped to raise the costs for the repair. And that in December 2016, an Islamic terrorist drove an 18-wheeler into the crowd visiting the Christmas market, killing 11 people plus the Polish truck driver and injuring 55.

This spot on the stairs got turned into a new memorial a few months after I took this photo. The steps now carry the names of the killed people, a "golden" fissure running across the square and up the stairs symbolizes the wound this attack left behind, also the crack through society it created - but also the chance of healing

As you might have figured out by now, the Berliner aren't faint of heart - or polite of mouth. So one Berliner published a wonderful podcast at YouTube, addressed at those who had planned this terror attack. His main point being that it was a really stupid idea to attack a Christmas market at the foot of the Gedächniskirche, because this way the image of the Gedächniskirche, which stands for peace, the hope of healing and the Berliner strength to survive a war that left Berlin's streets literally covered in body parts and blood, was broadcasted all across the world, a symbol of peace straight in the heart of the reporting of a terror attack. If a peace dove could flip a bird, it would be the Hollow Tooth! Kudos to him!

Which leads me to one more church: The Kapelle der Versöhnung (the chapel of reconciliation),...

... a church in the Bernauer Straße that got built 2000 at the site of the original Versöhnungskirche (errected in 1892 and demolished by orders of the DDR government in 1985, when the death strip got, once again, enlarged) and is part of the Gedenkstätte Berliner Mauer (memorial of the Berlin Wall).

The Gedenkstätte Berliner Mauer was created in 1998 and shows several aspects of the reality of life in a divided Berlin. The watchtower and the death strip were reconstructed.

For better understanding I'll add the information given at the platform overlooking this part of the memorial:

1: Border area, as of 1989, heavily-monitored and only accessable with special permit

2: Inner wall, in some parts reinforced with barbed wire and signal wire

3: Signal fence. Touching it triggered a hidden alarm at the next watch tower

4: Border lights, illuminating the border strip as bright as day

5: Watchtower, where the stationed soldiers kept surveillance on their rear area, the border strip - and on West Berlin

6: Patrol road

7: Security strip, which was raked so that any refugee would leave tracks that were analysed

8: The 3.6m high concreate border wall

9: The strip at the foot of the Wall, which also belonged to the DDR

But the parts of the Berliner Mauer are original ones, at their original place.

Doesn't look that high, does it?

Oh, well, maybe on the other hand ...

Going through it wasn't really an option ...

Passing over it isn't easy either if there are guys with guns on top of watchtowers waiting for you ...

Tunneling under it was often tried. To make this more complicated, those entrances to the underground, through which the West could have been reached, were closed off, too, the place of the blockade marked here.

Erected in 1961 to keep further East Germans from leaving (until then 3.5 million East Germans had quietly left East Germany by crossing the street and therefore the border in Berlin), the Berliner Mauer became more and more "sophisticated" as the years went on, dividing the city more and more efficiently.

Part of the Gedenkstätte Berliner Mauer doesn't use the original Wall, but iron rods showing its course ...

... with lines in the grass showing where former buildings stood ...

... that first had their west-facing windows and doors bricked up, before they, like the Versöhnungskirche, got torn down to make room for the death strip.

Can you imagine, watching your realtives in the West - so near but unreachable?

Or your relatives in the East, "protected" from you by an "Anti-Fascist Protection Rampart?"

Of estimated 5.000 escapees, about 239 died while trying to cross the Berliner Mauer. Exact numbers are hard to come by, because official numbers vary, depending on their origins (West or East Germany). Furthermore, some deaths were caused by the Wall, but happened not directly during the escape attempt but later. There had been some non-escape-related deaths as well, as is wont to happen if you have a bunch of guys, sworn to high alertness, armed to their teeth and often insecure, sometimes self-righteous or trigger-happy.

So, besides some now left over parts of the Wall ...

... there just isn't enough beer for me ...

... to successfully put on beer googles when it comes to this part of German history, even if it is dressed up Disney-style like today's tourist attraction Checkpoint Charlie:

So what is Berlin like? Well, I'd say mostly a tad crazy ...

It's Kaiserschmarrn (no matter that this is supposed to be a typical Austrian dish), ...

... everyday artsy, ...

... with unexpected specialty shops, ...

... unusual shop advertisements, ...

...(yes, that's a typewriter on top), book exchange "trees," ...

... every once in a while some Trabbis ( aka Trabants, the car brand of the DDR), ...

... lots of green for such a large city, ...

... hidden floral beauties, ...

... hidden stories, ...

... really rough edges, ...

... a disturbing sense of humor when it comes to construction sites, ...

... and probably an astronomical electricity bill ...

I love it!