Eastern Europe Itinerary

On Saturday, we are slipping away for one of our last long trips. Here is our itinerary in a nutshell:
Eastern Europe, 8 nights, 5 cities. Average high: 45 degrees.

OK, here's a bigger nutshell:

1) Fly 700 miles due east to Krakow; our first and probably only time to Poland. Copernicus and John Paul II are both alumni from Krakow's university. We'll have bagels, pierogi, and kosher food in Kazimierz, the Jewish Quarter. Schindler's factory is also there and hosts a new exhibit on life in the ghetto. After much deliberation, we have decided not to visit Auschwitz, which is a reasonable day trip and one of the reasons we wanted to go to Krakow in the first place. However, we know that Daisy is actually noticing her environment now and don't want her to see some of the things that are there. Since it takes about four hours to see Auschwitz-Birkenau, and since we've already seen a concentration camp in Dachau, near Munich, we are going to honor the Jewish circumstance in other ways instead.

2) Take a night train to Prague, Czech Republic. Despite the number of trips we've taken, we've somehow never taken a night train before. I hear that these rails are a little more jolting than other routes, but to me, that makes it all the more Old World. However, we will certainly have a long day ahead of us after we get off that train at 7 AM. My itinerary is pretty packed for the 2.5 days we're here. Since my Granny's side of the family is Bohemian, I'm excited to learn about the local heroes and food. We've heard about Prague's beauty but also about its scams and pickpockets. Here's hoping we leave with our wallets.

3) Now midway between Krakow and Dusseldorf, we'll stay in the gloriously rebuilt city of Dresden. It was carpet bombed in WWII and shares a powerful reconciliation story with Coventry, England. Our first night there, I will get a birthday present from Chris and my parents: Chris will watch Daisy while I go to see a production of Händel's opera Giulio Cesare in Dresden's beautiful Semperoper.

4) We'll stop in Leipzig for about five hours to see Bach's church and museum, a Stasi museum, and the Nikolaikirche, which played a role in the peaceful end of communism in East Germany.

5) From there, we'll go to Wittenberg, which is where Luther lived and where he posted his 95 theses to the church door. We are pretending to be ultimate Lutherans by coming specifically for Reformation Day (October 31 - happy halloween and happy birthday, Granny!). There will probably be a ton of people, but I hear that they sell "Here I Stand" socks, so it could be worth it. If I get to sing "Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott" while looking at Luther's grave in church on Sunday morning, my German experience may be considered complete.

Then we're home! Of course, it probably won't all go as planned: we've suffered torrential downpours, taken wrong non-stop two-hour trains, and been grounded because of strikes enough to realize that our itinerary is just a suggestion. We'll let you know how it goes. November promises to be a busy month, so the posts of these upcoming cities will probably trickle in.

A Spin through Dance Class

I brought my camera to Daisy's dance class to document what is probably my favorite hour of the week.

Kathrin runs a ballet school for all ages, and she leads this "Mami & Ich" class with her son in pink ballet shoes, Jonathan. Because this is also a German name, it's pronounced "Yona-tan." Kathrin's expressive mannerisms put to rest any stereotypes about German coldness. Daisy and I both adore her. As a side note, you can see her wedding ring on her right hand, which is the European tradition.

Kathrin and Jonathan

Her studio is in a quiet, wooded neighborhood just up our hill. With all the windows and the white surfaces, it's a really peaceful space. The names of the other kids in her class are: Lucas, Frederike, Henriette (absent this class day), and Mia.

Kathrin plays a delightful soundtrack of ballet and classical themes and uses various props to explore different movements. Because I want to show how fast-paced the hour is, I'm including a million pictures in this post. Also because I like playing with Picnik's effects? Maybe...

"Little Mouse and Big Bear" dance

Daisy coos along with the flute melody in this flowing song

These "ribbon dancer" sticks are always a hit

Feathers

Balancing a star on her head

Star trail

Spontaneous rolling

We get to do a whole song with the kids on our backs;
my favorite

Actually, the tambourine tarantella is
probably my favorite. Who can decide?

Daisy "Carmen" Scarborough

Relaxing song at the end with scented kerchiefs

The huddle for the dancing-clown-music-box
tradition at the end of class

The kids are completely mesmerized

When our class is over, we do some shopping on our walk back home. If we're lucky, there's puddles. It's a great morning!

Würzburg

Würzburg's bridge over the River Main -
Franconian vineyards in the distance

Finally, we come to the last stage of the Mother-Daughter travels through Bavaria. I arranged to have five hours in Würzburg en route back home, which ended up being the warmest hours of our trip. We breezed through a walking tour of the city, had lunch at a well-known winery that Chris had been to on his Humboldt tour, and toured a fantastic palace before boarding our final train (of the twelve trains we took in all). It startled me to see the Oktoberfest crew again on the train, coming directly from Munich. They were still dressed up with gingerbread hearts around their necks, snoozing in their seats.

I am currently attending a Musikgarten with Daisy once a week. In that class, I have learned a lovely old German folk song about a bridge over the Main river. As I read that Würzburg's old stone bridge is the 2nd oldest in Germany (dating from 1133), and that it spans the Main, I decided to pack my dancing shoes. Well, actually I didn't, but I couldn't help taking a few inconspicuous skips and spins when I was on the bridge. Here is the first verse followed by my translation:

Es führt über den Main, eine Brücke von Stein,
wer darüber will geh'n, muss im Tanze sich dreh'n.
Fa-la-la-la-la, fa-la-la-la-la

An old bridge of stone, the Main river it spans

Whoe'er wishes to cross, must spin, swirl and dance.

Fa-la-la-la-la, fa-la-la-la-la

It's a shame to include the words without the music, so I've included the track from our at-home CD. It's actually not bad for "kids" music. While I was at it, I added a few pictures. The first image here is a photo I took on that bridge that I've digitally altered to look like a sketch (thanks, Katie Riddle, for addicting me to Picnik). The panorama shots are actually Chris' from his visit last summer when he took the long hike up to Marienburg Fortress, on the other side of the river, where a pre-Christian Celtic fort once stood.

Marienburg Fortress

Daisy and I jumped inside three churches clustered in the old town. The main cathedral, called St. Kilian's, houses the skulls of three sainted Irish monks, martyred in the 7th century. It's the church with the skinny twin spires directly facing the bridge. Once again, I saw works by the Bavarian artist Tilman Riemenschneider (we've been on his trail in Rothenburg and Bamberg, too). Some of his tombstones of Prince-Bishops here are impressive for their late-Gothic realism. The Neumünster basilica is built with a Romanesque interior and looks similar to Salzburg's cathedral. Finally, the striking Marienkapelle has some Riemenschneider's on its exterior: Adam and Eve are flanking a side entrance.

The altar of St. Kilian's Cathedral

The Gothic Marienkapelle

The city itself was not as decorated as Bamberg's; Würzburg was Germany's third most-destroyed city after WWII. That doesn't prevent it from having exciting, modern touches, though:

Unique Würzburg fountain

Daisy fell asleep in her buggy, so I had a solitary lunch at Bürgerspital, a nice Franconian winery that Chris had done a tasting at and toured (seeing the world's oldest bottle of wine). When I asked what kinds of wine I could try by the glass, the server quickly indicated that their Federweisser was from "today." Today? I had seen restaurant chalkboards advertising this mysterious wine all throughout my travels, and was excited to find out what wine from "today" tasted like.

It was white, sweet, and cloudy. They served it in a stemless glass. It was sweet, yet refreshing, like sparkling lemonade. In short, wine from "today" is delicious, and I asked if I could take home a bottle to share with Chris. I was ushered into the kitchen, and told to ask a busy chef. He pulled out a big white bucket of wine, poured some into an old bottle still with its original Silvaner label on it, screwed on a lid, and recommended that it be consumed that day. (Normally, these wines are just sealed with foil, since they produce so much gas; when I got home, the bottle overflowed a whole glass's worth before it stopped fizzing.) Later, I looked up the production process. It's made by adding yeast to grapes that wineries don't think will make good wine. Federweisser is extremely popular with onion cake in harvest season. It has a shelf life of a few days, but the first day is best.

Next, we got to see the prince-bishop's palace. The bishop here became a prince, with secular power over all of Franconia, after he granted Barbarossa, the Holy Roman Emperor, a divorce. It was very common in Germany for religious leaders to govern small states, and this had broad implications: as I understand it, protection from a different powerful prince-bishop is the main reason that Luther survived.

One wing of the U-shaped Würzburg palace

Certain rooms were only open to participants of guided tours, so in we went for another hour-long test of Daisy's patience. Furthermore, we had to check all bags: no cookies and no cameras. There was a little meltdown in the completely amazing room of intricately painted mirrors, but I was able to fully concentrate on huge ceiling frescos and frosting-like Rococo stucco because I smuggled in a Conni book. I even saw stucco that was modeled to look like draped fabric -it was so convincing. It was all done by a Venetian artist named Giovanni Battista Tiepolo in the mid-1700's. One thing that's hard to explain but stood out to me was the main entrance hall with large, arched doorways. I learned that it was actually for carriages to pull into, letting them ride inside the palace, right next to the grand staircase; a good way to impress guests.

Palace gardens

Princess Daisy

And after all that, we caught our train and rode back home. Besides the Federweisser, I brought Chris home a "tasting tour" of four outstanding beers: a doppelbock from Andechs monastery, Augustiner's Oktoberfest brew, the wheat beer from Bayreuth, and Bamberg's special Rauchbier, or smoked beer. With my assortment of German beverages, it was like I was making a symbolic representation of the Day of German Unity, which was that day celebrating the 20th year since the fall of the Berlin wall.

Bayreuth

Although I was targeting Bayreuth for only a couple of key landmarks, the rest of the city turned out to be a decent travel destination. It's bona fide Bavarian: it has its own wheat beer, the architecture is beautifully intriguing, and it's an educated university town. The sunny fall weather made everything around me seem to glow with happiness; I noticed a few families scampering in the parks, dressed in knitted hats and sweaters, gathering freshly fallen chestnuts.

In the Hofgarten

Ding-ding! For a change of pace, here's a pop quiz to guide the introduction of Bayreuth. Don't worry; there are only 5 questions and I tell you all the answers at the end.

Question #1: For starters, how is Bayreuth pronounced? 
A) Baby Ruth
B) BYE-royt
C) Beirut

Question #2: Here is Richard Wagner's grave in the garden behind his house, Villa Wahnfried. His wife is buried with him. What was her name?

A) Cosima Liszt
B) Fanny Mendelssohn
C) Marie Berlioz
D) Clara Schumann

Question #3: True or False: Wagner was born, lived, and died in Bayreuth.

Question #4: What is the following picture a part of?

A) A sauna
B) A playground
C) A world-famous opera hall
D) Paul Bunyan Amusement Park


Question #5: Which of the following street names in Bayreuth is not like the others?
A)Walkürenstraße
B) Wotanstraße
C) Parsifalstraße
D) Rheingoldstraße

Ding-ding! Congratulations, you're finished. Thanks for playing along. Here are the answers:
Answer #1: B) Standard German pronunciation.
Answer #2: A) Cosima was pianist/composer Franz Liszt's daughter. Her marriage to Wagner was her second, and they had already had three children together.
Answer #3: False. Wagner was born and educated in Leipzig. He lived in Dresden, Würzburg, Magdeburg, Riga (then part of Russia), Paris, Zurich, Munich, and Bayreuth. Towards the end of his life, he was hugely financially supported by his fan and friend, Ludwig II (Neuschwanstein Castle, died in Starnbergersee...). Wagner died in Venice from a heart attack.
Answer #4: C) Wagner's opera hall's interior is almost completely made of wood. Imagine a giant violin...that the audience gets to sit inside of. Resonant! And it kind of makes you feel like you're at summer camp.
Answer #5: B) Sorry, this question was too hard for non-Wagner buffs. All the streets are named after opera titles except for Wotanstraße, which is just the name of one of the characters, Wotan, the king of the gods. 

Bayreuth Festspielhaus
Every August, the Festspielhaus (festival theater) produces a marathon of  Richard Wagner's operas, a tradition that he began here with the premier of his Ring cycle. I would have gone to an actual production instead of just a tour, but the waiting list is 10 years long.

I have dreamed of this theater ever since I first heard about it in my Opera Literature class in college. Despite this - or because of it? - it was not exactly what I expected. The concept is exciting. Wagner's ideal was gesamtkunstwerk: a total art experience. With his operas, he was already blending a powerful mythological story, the intense visual stage, and otherworldly music. It's a five-hour immersion experience. With his personalized theater, he aimed to create the perfect viewing environment for the audience.

The Festspielhaus rests at the top of a steep, wooded hill. Paths wind through the forests on either side of the main road, leading to fountains and fantastical statues. When I finally caught my first glimpse of the theater, I was a little disappointed, since I had the grand halls of Vienna and Munich fresh in my mind's eye. Then, in a flash, I understood. And I was in love. It reminded me of a primitive pagan temple, so fitting for the romantic folklore of the operas.

Once inside, I had the vague sensation that I was in line for a ride at Disneyland:

Here's the intimate theater. Fewer than 2,000 people fit. Seats are arranged in unbroken rows, forward-facing only. The same spherical light bulbs shine inside the theater, outside the theater, and at his home on the other side of the city. You've already seen the plain wooden seats and chairs (ug...5 hours).

Most of the detail in the room was on the ceiling; here's a close up of the most intricate, near the front. It's fresh and subtle compared to other opera venues.

With all this intimacy and simplicity, how did Wagner expect to transport his audience to a different world? He used two tricks to create what he called a "mystic gulf" between the audience and the performers. One was a double proscenium around the curtain, an illusion which made the stage seem far away.

 

The other trick was an orchestra pit that sunk way back under the stage. The musicians are not even visible when they play, and it gets hot down there, so they can wear flip flops and shorts. Even the conductor can barely see the singers, so his movements are video-fed to the stage for cues. Wagner wanted the sounds from individual instruments to mix together under the stage and emerge like a monster from its pit. I think that our tour guide said (it was in German, it was an hour, and I had a tired Daisy on my hands) that the floor and chairs resonate dramatically in the audience. This multi-sensory experience even involves touch!

Bayreuth's orchestra pit

Seeing this building changed the way I see Wagner. From what I had imagined, the theater was painted with murals and draped in purple velvet. That was the only way I could imagine tying in the plot with the theater. Now that I've seen the Festspielhaus, I see the operas that he wrote on a much more human scale: we are a people, sitting around a campfire in the middle of a forest, recounting our folklore as it comes to life before our eyes. It's the mix of natural and supernatural. I dig it, Richard.

Bamberg

Tom Cruise, in Operation Valkyrie, often speaks of his character's wife and children hiding out in Bamberg. In reality, Stauffenberg and his wife were actually married there. While much of the movie was historically accurate, Tom's pronunciation of this city was not (it should be more like BAHM-behrg). Chris had been here during his Humboldt tour last August, overnighting (German verb - a good one) in a converted palace and watching the night crowned by fireworks. Daisy and I spent two nights in Bamberg upon his recommendation, mainly since it was equidistant between two other cities that I had interest in, Bayreuth and Würzburg.

Some trivia: Bamberg lies on the canal between the Danube and the Main rivers. There are some other waterways in the city, too - I crossed 3 rivers heading away from the train station. It is a fast moving current, making a fantastic whooshing sound under all the bridges one needs to cross to get from one side of town to the other.

You might notice the authentic gondola with gondolier in this picture. Bamberg is one of the many cities which either claim to have a "Little Venice" or title themselves "Venice of the ___." Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Bruges, Colmar, Bamberg...Sure, they have canals, but they are all far cries from Venice.

Bamberg boasts highly decorated buildings in its old Altstadt. Here's just a snippet of what was around every corner:

 

St. Cunigunde

Old Town Hall

Bamberg has an impressive, old cathedral, dating from 1004 but not completed until the 13 century. In the mood for some more trivia? All past popes are either buried in Italy or France...except Pope Clement II (1005-1047), buried in Bamberg's cathedral. St. Cunigunde is also buried here, in a tomb carved by local master Tilman Riemenschneider. Also, a famous statue, until recently an "unknown horseman" with a long history of fabricated identities, has been identified by interpreting colors used in the remnants of paint: the 11th century Hungarian Christian king, Stephen I. We saw monuments to him in Budapest last year. I'm so impressed with the tools our modern society has at its disposal: finding paint on this?

Bamberger Reiter

A little tired of German food, I opted for a chic Italian place that squeezed me in between reservations. I think that servers in Europe (at Italian restaurants) actually speak Italian to their customers way more than they do in the US - it was fun to practice the five words I actually know. Daisy had her orange juice and liked dipping bread in the (delicious) tomato soup. All in all, dining here with Daisy was one of those memorable surprises that you can't plan on ahead of time. 

Munich, Close-Up

When we first moved here, I didn't really get it: I figured that everyone else back home already knew what I was learning for the first time; I thought that taking pictures in public was just plain embarrassing; I naively imagined that I would always remember the little details of our time in Europe. My first blog posts seem like hastily scribbled postcards: "Here we are in Salzburg, it was fun - you should have tasted this cake!" I've grown in my appreciation of blogging since then, but the fact remains that Munich has never had a proper treatment on Over the Ocean. Perhaps this, my third visit, will provide the opportunity?

Marienplatz, the main square of Munich

Honestly, it seems too overwhelming, and not quite sincere, since documenting history was not even where my mind was this time around. It would be like me visiting Madison, Wisconsin next week and then spending a blog post discussing the city's developers and founders instead of the fun time I had revisiting a city that I had already spent years in. Ridiculous.

Instead, I present to you a smattering of images from my visit last weekend. It's kind of like the blind man touching just the ear of an elephant, but it's a nice ear.

After our five hour train ride to Munich, Daisy and I made a beeline to one of my favorite places in the city, the Viktualienmarkt. It sits on the same location as the old medieval market did for the salt traders traveling west from Salzburg. I spent a memorable morning here on Fat Tuesday last year, when I joined costumed spectators watching "The Dance of the Market Women." (There was lots of beer, whooping, and the lifting of skirts.) On normal days, it's a sprawling outdoor market offering top notch produce, specialties like cheese, honey, and spices, and handicrafts. The market women behave themselves, but it's still a lively place to be. The famous Soup Kitchen was our first stop; it's always impossible to decide on what to get when faced with the long list of homemade creations. Then, I just let Daisy walk around while I successfully stifled the urge to hide my camera and took some pictures.

Pumpkin-Chicken Stew at Münchner Suppenküche

This woman makes colorful, seasonal wreaths that would
sorely tempt me if I lived here

Why not decorate your home with hops? Apparently, they are calming and insect-repelling.
I saw these garlands strewn over restaurant windows a couple of times.

The market is permanently attended by numerous figures on fountains.
I love it when citizens quietly "dress up" city statues!

...but maybe not when the Oktoberfest crowd decides to dress up city statues...

While meandering through the city with Amberly and her family, we had a series of nice moments:

1) A sprightly elderly lady began talking with us (because she liked Daisy and because Susan is a conversation-starter), and she basically demanded that we follow her into a private-looking entrance behind some shops. It turned out to be a former palace, which we wouldn't have known about without her local know-how. As we thanked her and waved goodbye, she gave Daisy a chocolate bar.

Preysing Palais

2) Daisy needed to use a coffee shop's bathroom, and when we came out, the girls behind the counter offered her a free "kid's cappuccino," which is steamed milk with her choice of syrup (chocolate). It's just one more example of how she rakes in those goodies.

3) We had a nice lunch at the Hirschgarten (Deer Garden), the largest biergarten in Bavaria, where we could ironically both eat and feed deer.

Amberly with her liter

During the rest of our visit, Daisy and I went to the Deutsches Museum, which is a science and industry collection similar to the Smithsonian. It would have been way more fun with Chris...

We loved the hands-on, recreated mines. 

Wright brothers' Type A (1909)

I also brought Daisy back to the Frauenkirche, the twin Gothic onion domes of which you can see in the picture at the top. The tall domes were about the only part of the church that survived WWII. It's also where the current pope served as archbishop from 1977-1982.

Testing out the legendary "Devil's Footprint" in the Frauenkirche

And that's it! That was the first stage of our Bavarian adventure. Here's just one more picture to throw in that doesn't fit any category:

With Daisy, if something happens once it becomes a fact of life. The new rule is that whenever we go in a restaurant, she needs orange juice with a straw. Luckily, Germans are crazy about juice, so it's pretty much guaranteed to be on the menu. Whew.