Last Day in Berlin

Wow, it feels as though we have been away from home forever. Nevertheless, we have seen more of Germany than I ever imagined we could see in 10 days. From Munich to Wolfsburg to Berlin – we have seen ancient history, evidence of recent changes in history and modern art and technology. Today, the sun even came out for the first time since we arrived.

Our last day here was a free day for everyone. Many faculty and students spent the day on Museum Island. Museum Island is located in the Spree River, and it is home to five major museums:
1. The Altes Museum (the Old Museum): houses the Prussian Royal family’s art collection.
2. The Neues Museum (the New Museum): the big attraction is the Egyptian collection, which includes a famous bust of Queen Nefertiti.
3. The Alte Nationalgalerie (Old National Gallery): includes collections of Classical, Romantic, Biedermeier (more realistic type paintings), Impressionist, and early Modernist artwork.
4. The Bode Museum: includes sculptures, Byzantine art, coins and medals.
5. The Pergamom Museum: include several reconstructed huge and historically significant buildings such as the Pergamom Altar and the Istar Gate of Babylon. We hate that we missed this visit.

Sarah Veal and Sarah McCary planned to visit a concentration camp today, so we are interested to hear more about their adventures today. We saw them briefly at dinner, but did not sit with them, so we have yet to hear what all they did, but they seemed to have fun. Several other students visited to the Berlin Zoo. We heard from Andrew Phillips that the visit was most interesting, and that they were extremely impressed with the quality of the zoo.

Tony, Sherry Walker and I started our day at the Checkpoint Charlie Museum. Checkpoint Charlie was the name that Allied Powers like the UK, US, France and other allied countries gave to the most famous Berlin Wall crossing point between East Berlin and West Berlin during the Cold War. Even though I had visited this museum 11 years, I am still amazed at how much I had forgotten about the brutality that people endured in their desperate attempts to escape East Germany. What struck me even more during our visit is that most of the students on our trip were not even born when the Berlin Wall came down! Yikes!

After our visit to Checkpoint Charlie and a few photos, we took Sherry with us to Mass at St. Hedwig Cathedral. The Cathedral had an extremely modern design inside for a church located inside such a beautiful old building. After Mass, we brought Sherry back to the hotel and moved onto the afternoon portion of our plans. Our first stop was the Sony Center, which is also home to the Filmmuseum Berlin. This was not our destination, however. Tony was determined to visit the Dunkin Donuts in the Sony Center. He continues to be put out that we only have one Dunkin Donuts in Chattanooga, and we have seen at least three in Berlin. Granted, Berlin is a much bigger city, but he argues that Chattanooga is so much closer to the home of Dunkin Donuts (Quincy, MA) that we should have more. Dunkin Donuts, are you reading this?

After a brief visit to Dunkin Donuts, we moved along to see remaining pieces of the Berlin Wall, then found the Führerbunker (Hitler’s Bunker). Hitler’s Bunker was tricky to find because it is essentially just a parking lot now marked with a simple plaque. The German government has purposely refused to more elaborately mark the bunker because it wanted to try and prevent neo-Nazi groups from making shrine out of the location. The bunker was very large, and the government placed a children’s playground on the area above where Hitler and Eva Braun’s burned bodies were allegedly discovered.

From Führerbunker, we trekked to the Memorial for the Murdered Jews of Europe. In includes 2,711 concrete slabs of different sizes in a grid pattern on a slanted field. Walking amongst these slabs was very moving.

Beyond the Memorial was the United States Embassy and then the Brandenburg Gate. The Brandenburg Gate was built in 1791 and was once one the gates of Prussia. The gate served as the backdrop for many Nazi propaganda films, but it also served as the backdrop when US President Ronald Reagan demanded “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!” We sauntered onto the Pariser Platz, which is a large city square that “celebrates” the German occupation of Paris in 1814. Now it house many banks, restaurants, hotels (included the Hotel Adelon where Michael Jackson infamously held his baby over the balcony), museums (including the Kennedy Museum – Berlin still loves the Kennedys evens 37 years later!) and cheesy photo ops like fake Indians, fake statues, re-enactors, etc.

The Reichstag – the seat of German Parliament – was our next stop. A mysterious fire in the building in 1993 (some believe it was started by the Nazis, but it was blamed on the Communists) resulted in increased power for the Nazis and decreased freedoms for the people. Despite many repairs and work on the building since reunification, the building has yet to be fully restored, and you can still see Soviet graffiti inside on the walls. Next door to the Reichstag building is a more modern structure that serves as a meeting place for Parliament as well as a personal residence for current German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

We stopped for a quick lunch at a small German restaurant on our route, and their special today was “fried chicken, cole slaw and chips.” We got a kick out of that. I ordered a baked potato (Germans LOVE potatoes), and Tony ordered a German favorite – currywurst. Currywurst is basically hot pork sausage with curry sauce.

We came back to the hotel to find that at least three more members of our group have come down with a stomach virus that seems to be making the rounds. Tony and I spent the rest of our afternoon buying multiple bottles of ginger ale at the hotel bar and delivering them to student rooms while waiting for the doctor in our group to return from museum visits. He has arranged with our guide to go to an Apotheke (drug store) and some prescription anti-nausea drugs that should help keep everyone hydrated. We are hopeful they will feel better before we leave tomorrow and that no one else will get sick. We are always glad to have an ER doctor with us for moments like this, but he does not think it is anything serious.

We enjoyed one last group dinner tonight, and now everyone is packing and getting ready for our flight out in the morning. Assuming everything runs on schedule, we should be back on campus between 10 and 10:30 tomorrow night, maybe a bit later. We can never tell, but I would predict about that time. Tony and I ready to sleep in our own bed and see our little Ruthie.

Thanks for following our adventure.

Joanie and Tony

Saturday in Berlin

Today has definitely been the dreariest day in Germany. First, it is cold, dark and raining. It is the coldest and wettest day since we have been here. We have honestly enjoyed the trip very much, but we have NOT seen sunshine at all since we have been here. Several people say the cloud cover is good because it is protecting people from the volcanic ash from the Icelandic volcano, but Tony and I are starting to get a little depressed with no sun.

Secondly, we embarked on the morning with a visit to the Jewish Museum of Berlin. This museum features 200 years of Jewish history, and it features one of the first buildings designed after German reunification. It may be of note to some that the director of the museum is W. Michael Blumenthal, who was President Jimmy Carter’s Secretary of the Treasury.

The design of the museum is similar to the Star of David, and it includes many dark, empty places that the architect refers to as “voids” to represent to the many Jews missing from Berlin as a result of persecution and exile. One of the most jarring parts of the museum is the Holocaust Tower. This tower is a 79-foot somewhat angular empty silo made of concrete. It is neither heated nor cooled, and it is very dark. I remember standing in there with Tony when the large door slammed shut, and saying “this is really creepy,” and he responded, “I think that’s the point.” Point taken! We have included the pictures of the exterior view of the Holocaust Tower as well as the corridors of the Garden of Exile, which is another of the exhibits.

The museum not only taught a lot about the history of Jews as a people, but it also taught about the accomplishments of some individual Jews during the past 200 years. I am ashamed to admit that I learned more than I ever imagined I would about some truly accomplished human beings. I think the one who stood out for me during this tour was Nelly Sachs. Ms. Sachs was German poet and playwright. She was educated at home due to health issues, and she led a very sheltered life. As the Nazis took power, she became increasingly frightened – to the power of becoming mute for a period of time. For years, she had pursued a deep friendship (via letters) with Swedish author Selma Lagerlöf, who was the first woman to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. It was this friendship that ultimately saved Nelly’s life and the life of her mother when Lagerlöf pleaded with the Swedish royal family to secure their release from Germany, at which point they fled to Sweden. (Sorry for the really long sentence – I get excited!)

Nelly Sachs’ writings have been described as giving voice to the grief, despair and longings of Jews during and after the Nazi siege. After her mother’s death she suffered a nervous breakdown, but she continued to write. She won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1966.

In the same area where we learned about Nelly Sachs, the museum was showing a film of some of Hitler’s troops marching through Berlin. At the same time we were watching this film, the museum’s fire detector went wonky for about 10 minutes so we kept hearing the fire alarm blaring as we watched this film. Somehow, it felt appropriate to hear alarms blaring while watching Hitler’s troops marching.

All in all, the museum was a moving experience, but as one of our fellow travelers noted at the end of the tour, “It is amazing there are any Jews left when you consider the level of persecution they have had to endure.” Indeed.

The afternoon included several more student-led tours (in the rain).

BERLIN THEATRE: John Moser and Amanda Hand led the Berlin Theatre tour. In the 1920s, Bertolt Brecht changed the world of theatre forever with the introduction of “epic theatre”. His ensemble, the Berliner Ensemble, attempted (and still attempts today) to re-function theatre into a medium for social change. In this way Berlin’s theatre is best known for avant garde and “high art” theatre as opposed to popular, Broadway-style theatre. After World War II, a revival spread through Berlin’s theatres founded significantly in the developments of Brecht and his ensemble. Known today for alternative and non-traditional theatre, Berlin provides a unique historical and creative perspective with a significant amount of influence on today’s international theatre scene. Their tour included visits to Theater des Westens, the Deutsches Theatre, the Berliner Ensemble, Zoologischer Garten, Möckernbrücke, Oranienburger Tor, and Hebbel am Ufer, Hau 1. Rumor has is that this tour began with a song and dance by John Moser himself.

NAZI BERLIN: Christine Currens and Tyler Walker led this tour. The thematic thread that will be explored on this tour will highlight the presence of the Third Reich and the Nazi regime in the city of Berlin. Nazism was a unique variety of fascism that involved biological racism and anti-Semitism, which eventually resulted in the Holocaust. The Nazi party stressed the belief in supremacy of an Aryan master race, and they claimed that the German Nation represented the most racially pure Aryan peoples. Their ideologies were rooted in nationalism, the rejection of democracy, social Darwinism, and the supremacy of the state over the individual. Propaganda and censorship of books, broadcasting, and resistance groups helped them to control the masses of German people. Their influence on Europe during the 1940’s spurred the Allied Forces to enter World War II against the Axes. Still, their direct influence within the city of Berlin can be seen today. This tour will visit some of important landmarks that were left behind following the wake of the Third Reich and will include such places their military air force ministry, Hitler’s personal underground bunker, and a site where one of the first major book burnings took place. Among the places this tour group visited were Gestapo Headquarters, Topography of Terror, Documentation Center (a new exhibition center), Fuhrerbunker (Hitler’s Bunker), Reich Air Ministry Building/New Ministry of Finance Building, and Bebel Platz (where the Nazis held their first official book burning). Word is this tour was very effective but understandably depressing.

GERMAN REUNIFICATIONðBERLIN: Jessica McKinney and Cheryl Toomey led the tour on German Reunification. The German Reunification of 1990 is of huge significance to German history. Since the fall of Nazi Germany, the country had been divided into East and West Germany. This had resulted in not only huge cultural differences, but also economical differences. The East was dominated by Communist rule while the West was under Federal Parliamentary Republic rule. Under the influence of internal and external pressures, negotiations began for reunification between East and West Germany. East Germany had been on the decline due to internal issues such as the Peaceful Revolution and external issues such as the removal of the Hungarian portion of the Iron Curtain. In 1990, Germany was reunified and East Germany merged into West Germany. Western Germany’s government, economic systems, and culture overtook Eastern Germany. The divide is still seen today, but there is continual movement towards internal reunification. This topic is important because it influenced how German politics, culture, and economics are now practiced. It also greatly influenced the lives of the Eastern Germans because they had to adopt the Western German practices. Among the places this tour group had planned to visit were:

1) Brandenburg Gate: This gate is a symbol of the desire for the reunification and freedom of Berlin. The East German prime minister and West German chancellor met after the wall was torn down. Thousands of people came to celebrate the reunification and still come to celebrate its anniversaries such as the 20th anniversary last year. President Reagan gave his famous speech here about tearing down the wall. {Our friend, Tom Griscom, drafted that line “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down that wall!”}

2) Reichstag Building: The ceremony for the reunification of East and West Germany took place here. The next day, they symbolically met as the Parliament of the newly united Germany.

3) Marienfelde Refugee Centre Memorial: This memorial has exhibits on the refugees that came from East Germany to West Germany and documents their flight. The Centre was one of the housing areas for the refugees.

4) DDR Museum: This museum takes people through the daily life of an average Eastern German before the reunification. These exhibits will show how an Eastern German lived and how different their lives were before the reunification.

5) Berlin Wall Memorial: This museum documents the history of the Berlin Wall and discusses the events of the Bernauer Strasse. The exhibits detail international politics that influenced the divide and reunification of Germany as well as local life.

Word on the street, however, was that the entire group did not make to all of these stops because the rain and the cold cut the tour short.

Saturday night was a night for everyone to enjoy one last evening to do whatever they wanted to do because our last evening in Berlin involves a group dinner.

As Tony and I retired for the evening, I discovered that Tony has developed a morbid fascination with this creepy guy on German television here named Daniel Kreibich. He is a psychic/artist/life coach. He has callers (99% women) who call in, and he cheers for them in a really high-pitched voice and gives them prophesies and calls them “super” and tells them he loves them. He is so bizarre, but Tony just cannot look away – like a train wreck, I suppose. I have included a picture of him just because he is funny to me.

As always, thanks for keeping up with us.

Joanie and Tony

First Two days in Berlin

Okay, we have a break before dinner tonight, so back to the blog. We left Wolfsburg yesterday morning and took a coach (thank goodness, no more trains!) to Berlin. Once in Berlin we enjoyed a guided tour of the city. This tour included the Brandenburg Gate, which is the former city gate and one of the main symbols of both Berlin and Germany. The Gate was commissioned by King Frederick William II of Prussia. On the north side of the gate is the Room of Silence, which was inspired by the mediation room in the United Nations building in New York City. The Room of Silence was conceived after appeals from the East Berlin peace movement, and people from a wide range of religious and cultural backgrounds have passed through the Room to honor the peace movement since 1994.

The tour also took us past the Markisches Museum, which is Berlin’s city museum. This museum houses displays that dedicated to much of Berlin’s cultural history. Then we saw the Berliner Dom, which is a Baroque building with Italian Renaissance influences, and it is unusually ornate for a protestant church. The church has a reconstructed pipe organ that has more than 7,000 pipes.

After this, we took a one-hour cruise on the Spree River. Following the city tour, we had a group dinner.

Today, we began the day with the most amazing breakfast yet. We are staying the Hotel Berlin, and it has a bit of 70s Berlin theme, but the food is incredible. The breakfast buffet is the first we have seen that has so many meats, cheeses, breads, etc. Even sheep’s milk cheese! Yummmy!

Then we hoofed it over to Schloss Charlottenburg, which is the largest resident of the royal house of Hohenzollem in Germany’s capital city of Berlin. This Baroque palace is probably the first palace we have seen that we could possibly imagine living in. The palace was commissioned by Sophie Charlotte, wife of Friedrich III in the 17th century, and it was originally named Lietzenburg. When Friedrich III became KING Friedrich I of Prussia in 1701, the palace needed to be expanded. Consequently, Sophie Charlotte commissioned an architect to begin plans for an expansion of the palace, but she died four years later in 1705, and did not see the completion of the expansion. King Friedrich renamed the palace Charlottenburg in her honor, and one can see her monogram (SC) in the gilding in many rooms throughout the palace.
This afternoon, there were four student-led tours.

JEWISH BERLIN: Sarah McCary and Sarah Veal led the Jewish Berlin tour. According to the Sarahs, the Jews first arrived in Berlin in the thirteenth century, though many concede that the present Jewish community did not establish itself until 1671. During the years in between 1295 and 1671, they were often expelled from Berlin for various reasons but were always allowed to return after a period of a few decades. Finally, however, they were able to establish themselves as prosperous merchants and bankers, and though prejudice continued to exist, the Jewish people grew as a community. At the beginning of the twentieth century, there were 110,000 Jews living in Berlin, and many of them were among the social and economic elite. This changed with the rise of the Nazi party, and there are many memorials throughout the city dedicated to the victims, more than 55,000 of whom were Berliners. Much like the city, the Jewish community has strived to rebuild, and this tour demonstrated much of what was before the Holocaust and what came after.

This tour included the following stops: Lunch at a Jewish Restaurant; Neue Synagogue [Built by the architect Eduard Knoblauch and consecrated in 1866, the Neue Synagogue was the largest in Europe at the time of its construction. Today, it serves as a museum with exhibits dedicated to the Synagogue and its congregants. ]; Jewish Community Center [The Community Centre of the Jewish Community of Berlin houses the Jewish “Volkshochschule”, an institution dedicated to adult education, and the Library of the Jewish Community. In the courtyard, a memorial has been erected in honor of the more than 58,000 Jewish Berliners who were deported during the Holocaust]; Grosse Hamburger Strasse [Prior to World War II, Grosse Hambuger Strasse was one of the main streets in the Jewish quarter and included the city’s oldest Jewish cemetery. After Hitler’s rise to power, however, it became a collection point for the Jews]; Museum Blindenwerkstatt Otto Weidt [Factory owner Otto Weidt employed many Jews in his workshop and endeavored to protect his employees, most of whom were deaf or blind, from deportation. This museum is dedicated to this heroic citizen, and it is also the location of the Anne Frank Center and the Silent Heroes Memorial Center]; Museum Ephraim-Palais – In 1850, Prussia updated its constitution to give Jews full citizenship. To celebrate, Veitel Heine Ephraim, a Jewish banker, constructed this building. Today, the museum contains prints from the Stadt Museum collection and houses special temporary exhibitions on Berlin's artistic, cultural, and political history]; “Fabrikaktion” Memorial on Rosenstrasse [This memorial is dedicated to a 1943 factory raid in which 11,000 Jews were rounded up and deported. However, several men who had into non-Jewish families were released from the deportation center after their wives protested in front of the building for days]; The Empty Library on Bebelplatz [Bebelplatz is a square best known as the venue for the Nazi’s first official book burning bonfire in May of 1933. Over 20,000 books were burned in order to destroy “the Jewish mind and the whole rotten liberalist tendency.”]; and Holocaust Denkmal [this is the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, and it is Berlin’s primary place of remembrance to those who died in the Holocaust. The memorial consists of about 2,700 concrete slabs arranged in a grid pattern that covers 19,000 square meters. Below ground, there is an information centre and Holocaust exhibit.]

EAST/WEST ARCHITECHTURE: Reid Bolus and Lauren Milleville led a tour on Berlin Architecture: East and West. Berlin was divided into East and West Berlin from 1949 to 1990. The city was split with the erection of the Berlin wall in 1961, and remained so until 1989. The German Democratic Republic (the Soviets) occupied East Berlin, while West Berlin was inhabited by the Federal Republic of Germany and controlled by the Western Allies: America, Great Britain, and France. The architecture during this time (1949-1990) reflects the great degree of segregated thought, ideals, and political partisanship existing between East and West Berlin. East Berlin’s architecture is characterized by large, blocky, clean-cut buildings. There is a great lack of artistic flare, preferring to keep things simple yet bold, showcasing elements of Stalinist and Nazi grandiosity. West Berlin’s architecture, in striking contrast, developed a freer form. The buildings have a modern appeal, with lines of chic curvature and amorphous silhouettes.

Their tour included the following stops: The East Side Gallery [At 0.62 miles, the East Side Gallery is the longest preserved piece of the Berlin Wall. This section of the wall has been turned into a visual spectacle with 106 politically-charged airbrush paintings by 118 artists from 21 different countries. The works are an expression of hope for a better and different future following the deconstruction of the wall, highlighting the true significance of this once 96 mile slab of concrete that separated West and East Germany]; Karl-Marx-Allee [Karl-Marx-Allee was popularly dubbed the first Socialist street of Berlin, and therefore initially regarded with a great deal of contempt by the Western Allies. It was built in the 1950’s and originally named Stalinallee, until 1961 when it was renamed Karl-Marx Allee. It was the showcase for the grand designs of Socialist Realism and provided the backdrops for soviet tanks, marching soldiers, and the annual May Day Parade. Today it is recognized for its unique architecture as it relates to the style of the German Democratic Republic (signature style of East Berlin)]; and Alexanderplatz [After WWII this square became the heart of East Berlin and was used as a display of Socialistic architecture. One building of interest in the Fernsehturm (Berlin TV Tower) which was built by the GDR government to demonstrate the strength and efficiency of the socialist party system and is Europe’s second tallest structure at 368 meters!

ART & CULTURE IN WEIMAR BERLIN: Chandler Lawson and Raquel Barlow led a tour on Art & Culture in Weimar Berlin. Following World War I, a new form of democratic government, known as the Weimar Republic, was officially enacted in 1919 and lasted until the rise of the Third Reich in 1933. The Weimar Republic saw both economic struggle with hyper-inflation and unemployment, as well as advancement in the realm of arts and culture. Berlin’s population exploded to 3.8 million people, and the city transformed into the cultural and artistic hub of Germany. Art, music, architecture, theater, radio, and film became highly influential to the people during the “Golden Era” of the Weimar Republic, particularly those of the low and middle-classes. The tour primarily highlighted the ambiance of this era’s culture through exploring the medium of film. Expressionism was the primary idea seen throughout cinematography in the 1920s and mirrored an overwhelming public desire for change rather than resistance and the importance of the individual over political machine. Film was popularized and served an important purpose to German culture because it gave fulfillment to Germans who sought escape from reality in the form of a fantastical and mystical world. Arts and culture in Weimar Berlin freed individuals from frustration, oppression, and class conflict and introduced them to a flourishing, fast-paced culture of progressive and intellectual thinking.

Their tour included the following stops: Filmmuseum Berlin [Located in the Sony Center this museum boasts several exhibitions of German film and television. The tour will highlight exhibitions of the films “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari” (1920) and “Metropolis” (1927), as well as film in the Weimar Republic and a tribute to the famous actress of the roaring 20s, Marlene Dietrich. The museum has permanent as well as temporary exhibits of artifacts, images, personal letters and papers of film greats, art designs, sets and costumes, and a collection of scripts from Germany’s most famous filmmakers]; Theater am Potsdamer Platz [After visiting the Sony Center film museum, we will walk to the theater square dedicated to Marlene Dietrich. Berlin’s largest musical stage can be seen here, as well as the theater complex which serves as the main forum for the Berlinale. The Berlinale is a world renowned film festival and Berlin’s largest and most exciting cultural event held every February. This film festival has strengthened the international appeal of Berlin and its culture since the 1920s]; and Café Cinema [A unique aspect of this café is the decorations from past films influential to German culture making the atmosphere enjoyable and relevant.]

MUSICAL BERLIN: Tony and I went on the Musical Berlin tour led by Taylor Perkins and Kimberly McDonald. The German speaking world is well known for the high quality of its music. On this tour, we were able to visit the stomping grounds of some of the finest ensembles in the world. Berliners hold their music in such high regard that it is home to no less than three opera houses and seven symphony orchestras. Over time, Berlin has become the music capital of northern Germany. The musical tastes and attitudes of this part of Germany have set it apart from other musical centers such as Vienna farther south. When asked why he preferred conducting the Berlin Philharmonic to the Vienna Philharmonic, Herbert von Karajan (who directed the Berlin Philharmonic for 35 years) retorted, "If I tell the Berliners to step forward, they do it. If I tell the Viennese to step forward, they do it. But then they ask why." A central theme of this tour will be the public apathy toward the music of J.S. Bach during the years after his death in 1750 and the revival of his music that was begun by Felix Mendelssohn in 1829.
We were able to admire the magnificently eccentric structure of the Philharmonie, home of Karajan’s beloved Berliner Philharmoniker, an ensemble that is repeatedly in the top tier of numerous best orchestra lists. The Philharmonie, which was built between 1960 and 1963, pioneered a new concept for concert hall design and is known for its architecture and excellent acoustics. Next door is the Musikinstrumenten-Museum which houses violins of the Cremonesi masters Amati, Guarneri, and Stradivarius, numerous pianos, clavichords, organs, fortepianos, guitars and harpsichords. One item of special significance to our theme is a harpsichord that was likely owned by the Bach family. Concrete proof of the ownership is no longer extant but the harpsichord itself is a symbol of J.S. Bach’s baroque musical style that went out of fashion at the time of his death. His music lay neglected for nearly eighty years until a revival performance of his St.Matthew Passion by a young Felix Mendelssohn at the Berlin Singakademie (housed in a building now dubbed the Maxim Gorki Theater). This performance had the effect of reestablishing Bach’s work as one of the high points of Western music. We will get a chance to admire this Neo-Classical Schinkel design (also Berlin’s oldest concert hall) after a walk from the Musikinstrumenten-Museum. Violinist Niccoló Paganini and pianist Franz Liszt have also performed here. Down the street we will see another Schinkel design, considered one of his greatest, in the Konzerthaus Berlin. We were able to go inside and tour this concert hall (home of the Konzerhausorchester Berlin) where Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony had its Berlin premiere and Wagner conducted his opera The Flying Dutchman. Kimberly (despite having lost her voice) navigated this tour exceptionally well, and Taylor demonstrated his outstanding knowledge of music history. We could not have been prouder of these two students and the fine job they did leading this tour of musical Berlin. After the tour, we made a stop at the Fassbender & Rausch Chocolatiers. This shop includes a chocolate volcano, a large chocolate Titanic, and a large chocolate Brandenburg Gate. If you know me well, you know I left with chocolate. Mmmmm!

Tonight Tony and I are having dinner with Nikki Wooten and Taylor Perkins. Some of the other students have made reservations at a restaurant for a group dinner. It probably will involve sausage and beer. My trainer is going to KILL me when we get home. Seriously. But we are having a great time. Again, thanks for following us!

Joanie and Tony

Full Day in Wolfsburg

We will begin by admitting that we were not thrilled by the idea of adding a tour of the Volkswagen plant to our trip. After all, it is a car factory, right? Well, even after hearing that the Volkswagen philosophy combines great technology with fine art, we still were not convinced. Well, seeing is believing. This place is fantastic. When you enter the Autostadt, you see this huge aluminum globe, which is designed to symbolize the idea that Volkswagen is world-wide. Below the glass floor are several hundred small globes that each show various world statistics. Truly astounding. The Autostadt is marketing center where visitors can purchase a Volkswagen and come to pick up the vehicle and even enjoy a sort of pick-up ceremony.

The Autostadt includes a small track for visitors to test drive their vehicles under a variety of conditions, and the cost to do this is in the range of about $35. They also have a smaller track where they can teach children to drive in miniature Beetles, and the kids get little driver’s licenses with their pictures on them. There are two glass silos that about 200 feet tall, where they store newly purchased Volkswagens. It is here they keep the cars for buyers after they have been washed and polished so they can be kept clean and free from the outdoor elements until the buyer pick-up ceremony. We got to watch the robots lift cars up and move cars down in these silos. Our tour guide said that having the tall silos was more cost efficient than using all the land that would be required to park cars in parking lots. Makes sense. The Pavilions at the Autostadt include the product lines that under the Volkswagen umbrella. These include: Bentley, Skoda, Audi, and SEAT.

We then toured the actual factory. Wolfsburg is a small town that was founded in 1938 primarily to house the workers at Volkswagen. The plant and related facilities employ 48,000 people, which is about 8,000 more than the population of Cleveland, Tennessee. Wow. Much of the work in the factory is done by robots that have to be calibrated multiple times a day. When you think about the precision involved in making sure that each robot is perfectly calibrated and timed to coordinate with the other robots, it is stunning to think about the delicate balance of art and technology that are involved in this process, too. We cannot wait to see what the plant in Chattanooga will look like. Several people guiding our tour were excited to see Tony’s “Chattanooga Lookouts” shirt, and they would say, “You know we are coming to Chattanooga!” We would explain that was why we were here, and they were thrilled to know Chattanooga was excited to have them. One VW rep even asked, “Do you think we will start selling more cars in the US now?” We had to answer YES, because after our tour, we all wanted to buy Volkswagens. No kidding.

Anyway, we still need to tell you all more about our first day in Berlin yesterday and what we have done today, but we wanted to get something posted to keep you all up to date. Again, everyone is well even though it is very cold. Some colds are going around, but nothing serious, and we do have a doctor on the trip, so that is nice.

Will post again tonight.

Joanie and Tony

Germany Update

We have had some Internet issues here in Berlin which is why there has been a delay in posting. We are off to breakfast and tour right right now, but as soon as we get back we ill update you on the past two days. Again, everyone is well and we are having fun. The students are asking, "Has my mom or dad made a comment?" They are enjoying knowing that you all are reading the blog, too!

Joanie and Tony

Munich Top Lists

Top 5 things we will miss about Munich:
1. The Hofbraühaus
2. Our beloved tour guide, Michael Borio, the best tour guide ever. Seriously.
3. The Bavarian clothing that so many people wore.
4. The beer – best beer ever!
5. The sausage – again, best ever!

Top 5 things we will NOT miss about Munich:
1. The half-shower in our hotel bathroom
2. The sex shops on every street – Sexy Land, Erotic World, etc. They were dark and sad-looking places.
3. The even sadder looking casinos – small, dark, smoky and depressing. They were the least inviting places we have ever seen.
4. The lack of diversity. Other than some Asians and Arabs in the part of town where we stayed, we really saw very few people of other ethnicities. We were probably there almost 48 hours before we saw any black people. It was weird.
5. That lack of sunshine. It was overcast every day, but right now this may be good to protect from the volcanic ash, but it gets depressing after a while.

Munich to Wolfsburg

Ah, Tuesday. Usually, I do not think of Tuesday as a particularly rushed day of the week. On a typical Tuesday, I work out, I go to work, I actually get some work, grade some papers, get home at a reasonable hour, usually have dinner with Tony, maybe watch some television, get some work done at home and go to bed. Today, was anything by typical in Germany. I could not sleep, so I got up early and went to breakfast. I was the first there, and after being around so many people every day, it was nice to have some hot tea and read a bit before the chaos of the day. Having packed and checked out, we soon planned to head to the main train station in Munich – Hauptbaunhauf München – to get on a train as a part of our trip to Wolfsburg. As we said out goodbyes to our guide in Munich, Michael, we got some photos with him. Of all the tour guides I have had on all the trips I have taken over the course of my life, none of them matches Michael. He is truly one in a million. Each of the students even gave him a small tip, and he was so touched he blushed and blurted out, “My face is lighting up like a street lamp!” What a hoot!

So the train pulls into the station, and we have about 5 minutes to haul ourselves and all of our luggage onto the right train cars, find our seats and start stowing the (heavy) bags overhead. What an ordeal! If it had not been for some of the students like Albert Vaughn, Taylor Perkins, Tyler Walker, and Marko Bajic, I am not sure what we would have done. So, we rode in relative peace for about three and a half hours until we arrived at our next stop. We had about 90 seconds to unload ourselves and our tightly stowed luggage jump off the train, and them within a few short minutes our next train pulled up. Of course, by the time this train stopped, most of us were back by car 18, and most of us had seats in car number 5. Again, with only about 60 seconds to get ourselves and our luggage onto the train, we started to run towards car 5 until it became evident many of us would never make it as we were hauled substantial loads of luggage. Consequently, many students followed my lead and just jumped onto the nearest train car they could reach – luggage and all. I will not even describe the hell we then endured as we dragged our big old bags through crowded train car after crowded train with scowling passengers sometimes hissing at us – only to get to our car and discover that four of the seats that we had been assigned did not exist!

About 90 minutes later, we did FINALLY arrive in Wolfsburg. We had a “guide” who stood near a tall cage that was meant to haul our luggage to the bus for us – if we so desired. Since most of us had been hauling luggage all day, we chose to continue hauling, but about 10 people allowed the “guide” with the cage to haul the luggage. So, we get to the bus, and Tony helps the bus driver load the luggage we hauled ourselves. Next thing we know, the bus driver takes off, and kids are screaming in the back of the bus that there is still luggage on the sidewalk, and that the man with the cage of bags is standing there watching the bus drive away. The bus drives makes a U-turn in the middle of this tiny road and goes back to the get the backs. Less than a mile a later, the same driver hit a curve, and left us all wondering what in the world we had gotten ourselves into.

We have checked into a lovely 4-star hotel, Hotel an der Wasserberg. After a quick dumping of bags into rooms, we headed back to the bus and checked out some Wolfsburg history. We visiting the Wolfsburg Castle, but honestly, after seeing Neuschwantein Castle yesterday, Wolfsburg Castle hardly compared. Then we went to the Kunstmuseum of modern art where we experienced a current exhibit by James Turrell who is a light and space artist. As modern art goes, I suppose his work is interesting (I am not a fan of most modern and contemporary art, which I am sure, appalls Dr. Townsend), but this might have been interesting if I had ANY depth perception at all. Combined with the fact that I have epilepsy, and I have been dealing with vertigo most of the trip, I just felt a strong compulsion to get the hell out of there! The students found it very cool, though, so that is fantastic.

At this point, it had been 11 hours since most of us had eaten, so eagerly boarded our coach back to the hotel for a lovely 15-minute “freshening up” period before we re-boarded the coach to head out to a group dinner. Candidly, I still do not know where we ate. I can tell you that we were all so hungry by the time they served our food we would have eaten just about the anything. The first course was some sort of soup in a beef stock with an onion flavor. It included matzo balls, onions, tofu and something else that I did not recognize. Nevertheless, I ate it all. Next course was a salad that was fairly standard followed by a third course of huge steaks with mushrooms, garlic butter, some sort of tomato, and baked potato. The final course was the sweet part – a chocolate covered pear with ice cream and wafers. One of the students at our table mistook the pear for a potato and got lots of teasing for thinking the restaurant would serve a chocolate-covered potato. In any case, a good time was had by all, but we got back to hotel really late, and after such a hectic day, we all had to get some much-needed sleep. Now we are heading to breakfast and then a tour of the enormous Volkswagen plant here in Wolfsburg.

Thanks again for following us. We have loved hearing from you!

Joanie and Tony and the rest of UHON