Friday, June 30, 2006

Watiting to tour Weimar


This is me with my classmate, Lara, from Jordan. She loves Bon Jovi and America and speaks more English in class than German. It is pretty funny! She's very energetic and always smiling. She is going to be doing a PhD at the University here in Goettingen.

Trying Thueringen's famous Rostbratwurst!

One of the more happening centers in Weimar

Home of Lucas Cranach, painter and friend of Luther

Pretty streets in Weimar

Famous Goethe-Shiller Statue

This space marks off where there was a young persons block of barracks.

By the time the camp was liberated something like 90% of the inmates where under the age of 23 and the overwhelming majority where from countries other than Germany.

One of the remaining watch towers surrounding the prisoners camp

Road leading to the path taken on the death marches

View into the Crematorium Courtyard. The pathological facility is just to the left

Buchenwald Crematorium


Survivors have remarked that it is not the chimmey that they most recall but the horrible smell that was always coming up from out of the chimmey.

View of the Gate Building (Bunker) from the Prisoners Camp

Experiencing Buchenwald Concentration Camp. I will not forget!!

The picture looks out across where the muster ground was to the depot (big building) and the disinfection station to the right of it.

"It was Sunday, yes, a beautiful Sunday in March. One life later, many lives and many deaths later, I stood there again in the dramatic empty space fo teh muster ground of Buchenwald. The birds had returned, the same wind blew over the Ettersberg. As I contemplated the landscape, I felt my whole life spreading out before me in memory, becoming transparent with its dangers, its misconceptions, the blindness of its ideological illusions, its stubborn striving for knowledge and clarity."
Jorge Semprun, speech held on the occasion of his receipt of the Peace Prize of the German Book Trade in 1994. He was an inmate of Buchenwald from 1943-1945 and went on to be a politician and writer.

Monday, June 26, 2006

Luther pix in a church

Sometimes, at first, you aren't 100% sure whether a church is Catholic or Lutheran. Then, all of the sudden, all becomes clear!

Duder-doggie!

That's for you, Dad! There were many cute dogs in Duderstadt but it was hard to get the camera out and set in time before they went past or I freaked the owner out!

Some countryside from the bus window

Discussing literature and life with "the boys"!

A "little" afternoon snack? I think not! Pure pleasure!

Pretty House (Goethe himself lived there for 2 whole days!)

Here I am!

Occasionally I find it good to give this "solid" evidence of my presence in Germany! So here I am in front of the pond in the park in Duderstadt! Yes!!!!

The proverbial, long dusty road, perhaps?

View of the city from behind, in the city park

Side view of the church in the city center.

Old Fachwerkhaus next to the church.

Apparently this is where the priest used to live.
I think the colors and line designs are pretty.
There is a dog inside barking at us! (that's for you, Dad!)

Of course, the old church in the center of town!

"Get me out of Deutschland NOW!"

When we toured the old Rathaus we saw the dungeon and many of the old torture devices! I'm working towards an Academy Award here in this pix, don't you think?

Duderstadt's old Rathaus

Duderstadt


Duderstadt is surrounded by an old wall and this is looking at the main entrance. I love how it is "spiral-like" up top!

Friday, June 23, 2006

Think on this...

"Were it possible for us to see futher than our knowledge reaches, and yet a
little way beyond the outworks of our diving, perhaps we would endure our
sadnesses with greater confidence than our joys. For they are the moments
when something new has entered into us, something unknown; our feelings
grow mute in shy perpexity, everything in us withdraws, a stillness comes,
and the new, which no one knows, stands in the midst of it and is silent."

"And this is why it is so important to be lonely and attentive when one is
sad: because the apparently uneventful and stark moment at which our future
sets foot in us is so much closer to life than that other noisy and
fortuitous point of time at which it happens to us as if from outside."

Rainer Maria Rilke

Specializing in Tee AND Wein--not half bad!

Proof of more tea shops in Goettingen!

Monday, June 19, 2006

Now this house is cool!

This is the old, old German writing on it and it shows the symbols for the various artisans that would have worked inside the building.

On the street where you live

Okay, so perhaps I don't really live here (Goettingen is pretty but it is no Goslar). These Goslar houses are called Fackwerkhauser because they are 16th century half-timber houses with ornate carvings on them.

Commemorating those trying to get out of East Germany

Hi-ho, hi-ho! It's off to work we go???

I love this picture of Justin, Sloane and I (Right to Left). Here the different facial expressions typify the various personalities! We've got the hard hats on as we await are tour of the mine in Rammelsberg

Here's the Kaiserpfalz (palace of the Kaiser)

Quite big--I couldn't fit it all in the pix and I'm really far back from it! Of course it is 19th century replication of a 11th century building but you can't win them all!

Oh so pretty!

In case you were wondering if I really have been in Germany, HERE I AM!

Note the "Grumpy Monkey" t-shirt from Small World Coffee! Oh yes, I'm going to get my free drink in September! Planner that I am...

Partial view of the Marktplazt in the Altstadt (old city)

All that is missing is the tea!

Show me the streets in America with tables like this set up!

I couldn't help this one!

So it really means jewelry but you know...

They come big over here!

All I could think of was Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Augustus Gluep (sp?)

Very old church in Goslar

A beautiful view of countryside from the train

Lots of bikers in Goettingen!! Mom and Dad you'd fit in!

Thursday, June 15, 2006

Such a good little doggie!

Too cute to not take a photo of, don't you think?

This would be on the side of the Catholic church!

Discovering fun side streets

I think all the flags are up because of the World Cup.

Fleischfest, vielleicht???

Anyone hungry for some meat/pork/sausage, etc? We've got the hook up here in Goettingen!
That's "Tea Paradise" for all of you non-German readers! :-)