Cross-Country-Skiing in the Black Forest

Many Freiburgers and people nearby, including French Alsatians and Swiss, love to go skiing in the Black Forest, located practically at their front door.  As aging former downhill ski teacher I watch with some envy as younger generations rush by on downhill skis.  Nowadays Bill and I prefer cross country skiing as it is so much easier on the knees.  Many villages have specially made snow tracks leading up and down gentle slopes.  The length of the ski tours ranges from 8km to 25km to... you decide....

Fortunately, there are good signs to tell you where to go and how far your next destination is:

Ugh! Finally on top of the hill!!

 

The après-ski is also a lot of fun:  there are plenty of Gasthauses or huts where the hungry skier can get good, moderately priced food.  For example, the Gasthaus of the Farmers Wives in St. Maergen which is a cooperative: they run their own "restaurant" that offers locally grown supplies, cheeses, herbs, wines and cook delicious main meals and serve a great coffee and cake (here we are after a beef stew with red wine (Bill) and Weizenbeer (I), eating cheesecake (Bill) and Black Forest Cherry cake (I).   

 

Lunch at the Hoefener Hut

 

 

After a cold and foggy tour to St. Wilhelm Hut: Boy, did the simple food taste great!

 

 

 

 

Carnival in Heitersheim

We are now back in Freiburg / Black Forest / the Upper Rhine Valley where Carnival has been in full swing for the past four days.  While Berlin and Germany's Protestant areas do all kinds of serious things like working and governing, the southern and more Catholic areas have been abandoning themselves in crazy celebrations.   In Freiburg it's called Fasnacht, in the villages around here Fasnet, elsewhere Fasching, and in Cologne, the most famous of Carnival cities, it is called Karneval.  No matter the name, it means the same: four days of plain fun, costume balls with dancing, music, and on Rose Monday parades with colorful floats and lots of music.  Spectators, especially kids, get sweets and popcorn, and they and adults alike are strewn with confetti and faces painted with face paint by parade participants, whether we liked it or not... 

Yesterday my niece Lisa, 11, and I watched the Rose Monday parade in one of the near-by little towns:  Heitersheim, dating back to Roman times and proud home of 6,004 Heitersheimers, showed what even a little place will do to escape reality. 

 
 

 

 

             Many witches come with their families, husbands,
            wives, kids, babies --- all dressed up in witch costumes.

 

                               


                 
                       This witch wanted to "steal" Lisa's roller.   

 

 

Here is Lisa after the parade:  covered by confetti, face "painted", with a bag full of sweets, and cold.....but very happy.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Life without a car


Since July 12 2014 we have not driven a car.  Which is easy in the center of Berlin where many, probably most, people are car-less. Public transportation works 24/7/365, frequently and in all directions.  It takes us to museums, theaters, exhibits, shops in the city, friends and relatives in the suburbs, and large forests, parks, lakes where we love to hike and walk.
However, Bill and I, even nuttier than the Berliners, usually bike everywhere, or have taken our bikes on the fast trains and started riding from a station further out.  Bill, as you know, used to ride his bike to and from work in DC and gradually has persuaded me that biking is fun and not scary.  Like he, I can now say: the more I ride, the more I prefer it over all other forms of transportation.

Here in Berlin we have been simply non-plussed by the number and types of people we see on bikes.  Thin guys dressed in black business suits with bowler hats, upright on upright 19th century-look-alike bikes; gorgeous young women dressed to perfection in high heels riding to work; elegant middle-aged ladies with large shopping bags; handymen with equipment carts attached in the back of the bike; mail carriers with big containers in front and back of the bike; people of all ages, looks and appearances carrying all kinds of objects; young parents with one kid seated at the handle bar and one kid sitting on the back seat, often with a little kid on a tiny bike in tow.  As a matter of fact, we continue to be astonished to see tiny tots following adults on bike lanes, even in bad weather.  (Parents' way to bring them to pre-school, kindergarten, elementary school.)

Biking is definitely one of the accepted ways to get to work.  In the mornings and evenings there are huge flocks of bikers everywhere. In Berlin many streets are wide, with plenty of space for separate lanes for cars, bikes, and pedestrians.  Yes, each - car, pedestrian, and bike - has their own specifically designed lane and traffic lights.  The lights are set so that cars and pedestrians have to wait for the lights of the bike lanes.  The fact that bikers are considered part of traffic and cars have no more rights than bikes makes biking so care-free.  Before turning right Berliners in cars look out for bikers on their right --- bikes always have the right-of-way.  I bet owners of car driving school are getting rich teaching their student drivers to look out for bikes.  Considerate drivers and well-marked, visible bike lanes, provide a feel of safety, even when I ride in the dark, with and without Bill.  My good friend Lydia from Freiburg-Munzingen, not known to be much of a bike rider, on the first day of renting her bike, rode right through the middle of Berlin with me --- on a dark November evening! I really admired her guts!

 I mention this in order to show that biking in Berlin is safe, and that even 65-year old ladies can get the hang of it.       Needless to say Bill and I are by now not only committed, but addicted, or in the lingo of our friends, crazy.

As safe as I feel about cars, I cannot say the same about all fellow bikers. Guess how it feels to get overtaken with just an inch or so between me and the other biker.  I have learned to always be aware of what is going on behind me in order to be ready for "the profis", meaning I try to stay on the right of the bike lane at all times.  The bike lane, often squeezed in between a busy pedestrian path and a busy car lane, tends to be just wide enough for one bike.  That's how I see it.  But for Berlin biking commuters the bike lane is easily wide enough for two bikes, plus comfortable for a bit of racing with each other.  Needless to say, my considerable biking prowess (no exaggeration, honest!) has been insulted by a few comments not suitable for ladies' ears.  Even if getting used to the "Berliner Schnauze"  (Berlin snout, famous for making quick and naughty remarks typical for the inhabitants of this city), I prefer to bike during non-rush hour.  During the day I can ride my own speed while watching the other bikers who are in the more typical bike frolic mood like me; i.e. tourists on rented bikes who proudly ride - yes - on the bike lane -- but O God no! - in the wrong direction (just like I did when I first got here), family outings on bikes; lovers riding on the pedestrian path oblivious to their surroundings; young tattooed hooded men telephoning, reading, writing on their I-phones, and so on.  A typical enjoyable ride.  When suddenly I see WHAT??  Pedestrians with suitcases WALKING IN THE BIKE LANE!!!  What are they?  Tourists, or what??  Boy, where is my Berliner Schnauze when I need it?  (Fortunately, a true Berliner is never far away and will always say what needs saying.... Even more fortunate for the tourists: they won't understand; Berliner Deutsch is not what's taught at Berlitz.)

Please note that Bill meanwhile, bored to tears, is kilometers ahead of me.  Fortunately for both of us, he enjoys stopping by the wayside just like me and the other more sane bikers to look at things. 

I wish I had photos of the most spectacular bikers we have seen, but every time I tried to get their picture they - whoosh - were gone.  I wonder why. 

Here a few photos of the bike trip I took with my friends Barbara and Steffi.  From Rostock per ferry to Denmark, where we got off in a downpour (second photo), rode through Denmark and Sweden to Trellorborg.  You see us going up the ramp of the ferry in Trellorborg on our way back to Rostock, Germany (last photo).

 



Riding through Berlin

 

 

 

 

 

And, last not least, the postmistresses' bike  (Understandably, she did not give permission to be in the photo.)

 

Remembering Auschwitz in Berlin


This past week has seen the 70th liberation of Auschwitz.  Several memorials were held in Berlin.
Bill and I visited the Jewish Cemetery in Weissensee, the largest Jewish cemetery in Europe, and one of the largest in Berlin.  Most of the graves date back to before 1933, but there are also newer and very recent graves. Many famous men and women are buried here, among them Adolf Janhof, the founder of KaDeWe (Berlin's upscale department store where Senta works), and Stefan Heym, the German-American author-turned-politician (one of our favorite authors).  
Cemetery translates "Friedhof" in German, meaning a place of peace.  There is no way to describe the turmoil the spectator feels in this cemetery.  Upon entering through the beautiful wrought-iron gates the first thing one sees is a simple memorial to the millions of murdered Jews.  A large black stone with an inscription is surrounded by small rectangular stones with the names of concentration camps. I just stood there, overcome with unspeakable emotions, terrible sadness, shame, utter incomprehension, guilt, and so much more. Words fail. The simplicity and bleakness of this memorial say more than a billion words can ever say.

The cemetery itself is a place of peace and quiet.  Here one senses that the dead lived their full lives and upon death received the honors, memorials and burials due to them.  Each deceased has a place that can be visited, and thus the dead person can be remembered. Visiting a cemetery can be sad but also comforting because the bereaved can grieve at the grave where their beloved is buried.  The terrible thing about the six million murdered Jews is that they lost everything, their lives and even a right to get a proper grave site; many or most do not have any relatives or descendants who knew them because they were murdered, too.  The dead cannot speak.  Let us living remember and speak out in their stead.
 
Unfortunately, like so many other cemetaries in Berlin, the Jewish Cemetary in Weissensee is somewhat unkempt, even though a number of city employees are trying to help keep it in fairly good condition. 

Here some good news:  On Tuesday, the Holocaust Memorial Day, a small Jewish congregation opened their doors to their new synagogue in Cottbus, a small town in the State of Brandenburg that surrounds the city of Berlin.  The cultural minister for the State said that the opening is a "special event for Brandenburg" and that he hopes the synagogue "will be filled with much life".  Other German states had seen openings of synagogues, but Brandenburg was lagging behind.  Rabbi Nachum Presman said that this "new chapter for Cottbus"... is a dream" come true.

When the lights went off at the Brandenburg Gate  on January 5, 2015 

                                                                                                                                                    
2015 is still young and yet already horrific tragedies have happened, for example yesterday's terrorist acts in Paris and Yemen. 
I was just about to write a few lines about a positive event on Monday that was about Muslim immigrants and workers in Berlin, and then this...  But I will go ahead anyway.

You may have heard about the right-wing anti-Muslim splinter group Pegida, short for "Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of Europe", the name a contradiction in itself...  They are a bit similar in their fear and hatred of immigrants, in this case Muslims.  They don't like the fact that in the last few years Germany has taken in hundreds of thousands of political refugees, among them many Muslims, most of them refugees from Syria and Iraq.  Many Muslims have lived and worked here for generations; there are Muslim representatives in most political parties, in short, Muslims have been an integral part of this country for years.  So far Pegida has only had demonstrations in Dresden, the capital of Saxony, but Monday they had one right here in Berlin Mitte.

I did not know much about this planned demonstration nor did I want to get close to anything to do with these people, but thought I'd combine a walk to the Brandenburg Gate with a look at the counter-demonstration the Turkish community had planned.   Along the way there were lots of police.  When I asked one of the policemen what all this was about, he asked me if I knew what Pegida was? - Yes. - If I wanted to go to Pegida?  To which I asked in horror:  Do I look like a Pegida supporter???  (I have since read in the papers that the average Pegida supporter is white and 60+)   A small group of anti-Pegida demonstrators stood behind police barriers near the Dom (Cathedral) and told me that they were going to stop the Pegida march to the Gate.  Did I want to join them?  I told them I was happy to support the cause but was getting too old for anything physical.

Instead I kept walking to the Brandenburg Gate where I found plenty of like-minded people.  Speakers from all political parties, including the former secretary of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, rallied against any intolerance towards Muslim immigrants. He and the 7pm turning off the lights of the Brandenburg gate got by far the most applause.  The idea was that, like at the Cologne Cathedral and the Semper Opera in Dresden, no light was going to shine on the Pegida people...  The photos show the Gate before and after the turning off the lights. 
When I left the Turkish demo I did not know that a much larger demonstration was still going on. Thousands surrounded the 300-400 Pegida supporters so that they could not even start their march.
 
Anyway, I think this is all to the best.  It shows a nation maturing, with discontent made public by this disturbing Dresden movement.  Fortunately 85% of all German disagree with it.   
 
Bill was recuperating from a light flu, but by today almost back to normal.  He said he envied me that I could I be present at some of the Monday action. 
 

 

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL OF YOU!!!


Berlin on New Year's Eve (or Sylvester as the Germans say) is an experience all in itself.  One million tourists come here specifically to celebrate (make it 1,000,002 persons if you count you know who).  The entire week restaurants, bars, Gasthauses, all kinds of entertainment, including the symphony orchestras have been booked by crazy revelers.  Don't even try to get decent food on New Years' eve if you haven't booked a table well in advance.  The Brandenburg Gate with live concerts and light shows usually gets a million visitors just by itself, a bit overwhelming we thought.  Fortunately, we just knew the best place to be:  the apartment where we're staying.  Some years back I was lucky enough to watch the big show from these very windows.  Some of the fireworks then were so close to the building that the balcony door and the windows had to be kept closed for fear of flying sparks. Within minutes the air was filled with so much smoke that I could only see colors and hear the bangs... My account of that event must have been impressive as Bill has had the urge to see it ever since.   
Last night Senta and Stefan came over for dinner (lentil-turkey soup, spinach quiche, 10-layer salad, baked salmon, olives; and "Berlin pancakes" (filled with pudding or raspberries), avocado dip with sesame crackers and pretzels), chats and games. We watched Angela Merkel's excellent speech on TV admonishing the Germans to fully accept all political refugees and foreign workers and resist the indifference and hatred of the Pegida followers towards immigrants.  Pegida is a splinter movement in Dresden - in my opinion completely overrated by the media as more Germans are pro-actively supporting the  thousands of immigrants who are moving into Germany every year (After the US Germany is taking in the second-highest number of immigrants).  Merkel also warned about Putin's lack of respect for Ukraine's democratic self-determination which is in direct contrast to everything Europe stands for.      We helped Angie's serious contemplation along by drinking more red wine and later on almost died laughing about our own fireworks:  tiny crackers which went "pop" when thrown on the balcony floor .... pip squeaks compared to the "real" thing which started at midnight.  Fireworks in all directions for 2.5 hours at which time Bill and I put plugs in our ears and went to bed.  I'm happy to report that there were no fireworks immediately in front of our building, meaning we could open the balcony door and really enjoy the sight (and sounds). The blasting still went on when we woke up... and then on and off thru the day today.     

Note how the TV Tower at Alexander-Platz and the Radisson Park Inn fade in and out... The evening started out foggy and at times we could barely see anything.   In the first photo the TV Tower is completely invisible and the sign of the hotel barely visible (see it at the top left?).  

 

 

 

 

While there was much activity straight ahead equally much was happening to the left near the  Mercedes Benz Bank building:

 

Today the sun came out and yes, you guessed right, Bill and Ingrid hopped on their bikes and rode for about three hours through some northern suburbs of Berlin by lots of commercial businesses and shops - some abandoned -, the usual construction sites, thru formerly separate villages, along fields, lakes and by churches. In Buch we chanced upon one of the largest and most important hospitals of the former German Republic.  In Blankenburg we stopped at this little church, built in the 13th century (there are many such churches in the countryside outside Berlin).  When we got cold we stopped at a Turkish kiosk and had doener (gyros to you) and hot tea.  On our way back the bike paths were still littered with tons of fireworks debris, Champagne and beer bottles...

 

 

 

 And this is what the view from our apartment looked like when we returned from our bike tour... no fog, no smog, the TV Tower and the Radisson Park Inn fully visible:

Wishing You and Yours a Healthy, Happy and Peaceful 2015!