Notes of the Traveller
Call me Gabrielle. I am from Russia. The following notes describe the journey I made with my American friend around Europe. We visited Germany, France and Spain. During the travelling the idea to write these notes came to my mind where I would write some peculiarities and some interesting things I saw and this is the fruit of my observations. I would like to share my experience with everybody who is interested to read about it. I hope you’ll enjoy it. The journey began in June 2000.
Germany
So the first country from which my journey began was Germany, the threshold of Western Europe. An interesting country on which recent and not so recent historic events put their seal. The fall of Berlin Wall, the uniting of Western and Eastern parts—everything is still here. My first impression I’ve got right from the plane when we were about to land. The earth seemed to consist of slates of different colours; yellow, green and brown red. Yellow particularly. As I found out later yellow slates were wheat fields, green slates—grass and a few red or brown—probably ploughed earth. This coloured ground is the first thing that impresses you. You’ll never see this in Russia though there are many fields there too. But the nature is similar: the same trees and plants you meet everywhere in Europe. Landscapes are picturesque but a kind of monotonous. The air is fresh and clean.
Frankfurt airport is huge. As soon as we landed we had not even to go out—they put the covered passage right from the plane to the airport building. A good thing since it was sprinkling outside. A long stroll around the corridors, unsmiling custom officers and finally I see Richard, my friend. What a delight! What a joy!
We came to a small café right in the airport. There were no people inside but we were served very quickly. From now on I am a foreigner in this country. A delightful sensation, I would tell you, at least at the beginning. Later you are getting accustomed to it and don’t give you thrill any more. I felt that way in France and Spain. But I’ll tell about it later.
As you have not to go out to pass from the plane to the airport building, you can catch a train right there too. Of course later you should change at usual stations but on this first train they didn’t even check for our tickets. And there were no places to buy them anyway. The trains are very nice in Germany. You can buy ticket from the ticket salesmen in the station or from special automats. You insert paper money and the automate gives you back the ticket and change. You can also buy a ticket right on the train but it costs a little bit more this way because they think you want to slide without paying. On every platform there are clocks and plates with the name of the place. Very convenient. On some stations you can even learn more. Like arriving to Eisenach you immediately learn that it is the birth town of Johan Sebastian Bach. Germans are very proud in their famous people and it really nice to realize. After all the streets and cities in Russia named after numerous politicians here you are pleased with the fact that Germans take proud in this distinguished musicians and people of culture.
When we arrived to Bosserode (a name that is difficult to pronounce—if you don’t pronounce it right you won’t be understood) our friend Adam was already waiting for us there. All of us got into his car and we went to the nice little place Hellers where we lived for about a month.
Visit to Eisenach
The next day we went to Eisenach by train. The ride took only about 20 minutes and was nice. Trains and cars are the main means of transportation there and you can’t do without them. Most of Germans like our friend in Hellers went to the cities by car. We have no car and we enjoy riding train. Our friends took us to the train station from which we caught the train for Eisenach. The station is so small that you cannot even buy a ticket there. In fact Bosserode is not a station but just a stop with a platform. No telephone either. So we’ve bought the ticket from the train collector who uses for this purpose a special hand machine.
Eisenach is the capital of Hesse (one of German districts like counties or states). It is situated in the Eastern part, not very far from the border with the former Western Germany. It is a charming little town, very picturesque. The roads are very narrow compared to Russian roads but the traffic is regulated by stop lights. All the shops except very few are closed on Saturday so we could not buy what we wanted. Yet we found a second hand cloth shop and were surprised at the good choice there. I bought some items of clothes for myself. Then we just strolled around this beautiful town. This city is full of historical reminiscences. Bach lived here for some years and Luther translated the Bible in German in Wartburg castle and thus initiated one of the most famous religious wars that resulted in Protestantism. By the way they still play Bach music in the cathedrals here and they do respect Der Gute Luther. Well, it is known that Germans are the most famous for the two things: music and philosophy. And here in one city they have great representatives of each art. I’m glad for them.
By the way do you know that the slang name for Germans is krauts? In English this word means “pickled cabbage”, and in German “plant”. So there are krauts and umkrauts (good plants and weeds).
In one of our visits to this city we came to see Eisenach’s historical sightseeing—the castle of Wartburg where Luther translated his Bible. Well… we came there by bus that went by strange loops. When we arrived at the place we climbed up the stairs and a man with playing machine tried to pretended to play something from Bach. We went there but could not get in. The crowd was so enormous that we decided to drop it. The funny fact was however than when we tried to enter one of the other entrances the guard dog didn’t allow us in because we didn’t have tickets. When we returned in 5 minutes with tickets she didn’t let us in because it was not the right entrance. She didn’t tell it us that at once. Now see what a mixture of German nature and Socialistic mind. We honestly tried to stay at the main entrance but the interest evaporated. So we went back and retuned the tickets and they gave us our money back. At least that was a nice surprise. You never know.
Another place to visit in Eisenach is a Bach House. But there you won’t see much. That’s the reason, I think, that a jolly fellow gives you a brief lecture on the musical instruments on which the composer played. He played himself and switched on some records. The exhibits were mostly just photographs. In back of the house there was a little garden (almost the same as in Goethe’s house in Weimar…)
The next day we visited Adam. He happened to be a very nice guy. He loves to talk and he knows lots of thing about history. He entertained me and Richard for more than an hour. With such capacities he could easily write books or speak from the TV. I was very interested in the history of St. Johan’s Order and he told us it briefly. St. Johan’s Order and Maltese Order are originated from the same root.
Adam’s house is a real mansion that was rebuilt from the old tool barn. Now this is a two-story building with a huge hall, large kitchen and even a dining room. In the hall where he received us there were pieces of ancient furniture and a real fire-place. All that this mansion lacks is a butler. Not bad at all for the former barn. Everything is so solemn, once we were invited to the party and they had a dinner in the ceremony dining room with two or three plates (you know, when one is put on the other and is never used by itself) and so on. Dishes on such dinners are usually not very tasty but they are not held for gourmands. They celebrated Adam’s mother-in-law birthday and for this event even Adam’s son Max (Micky) came. He is an architect, still a very young boy. In spite of his young age he’s already visited Italy and Russia. Besides this boy is a talented artist, once he even got commissions from the old friends. He was reluctant to paint the portrait of this man but his relatives implored him so much that he was compelled to agree. But as he confessed he cheated. The cheating was that the main thing on the picture was the interior and there was a little figure of man sitting on the chair. But his friends said that it was just right. That’s how he always looked. Adam paints too and his wife Emma is a psychiatrist.
One interesting detail: the full name of Adam Trout is Adam von Trout zu Seltz. That’s how he signs his documents. But his son Max on the house he lives put simply “Trouts” on the door plate with the list of inhabitants. It’s not in fashion now to have “von” before your name.
These Germans are very religious, they tell a grace before every meal and Max was building a church in the nearby village. We’ve been there: it is very tiny. Every village has a church there, it is even more important than school.
In several days we visited Eisenach again and came to see Max’s wife Friederica. She is a very nice young woman, an architect like her husband. Also we got acquainted with her daughter Helena. I’ve never seen such a beautiful child before. This is a case when she really deserves her name. Helena. What kind of woman will you become, Helena? But to tell the truth both of her parents are very handsome too. When we’ve been there Friederica was expecting the second baby. Will this boy or girl be as beautiful as the first Helenchen?
But we still wanted to see Eisenach. We went to the main pedestrian street where many shops were situated and found a very good book store. Books there were not very expensive. I’ve bought one on Goya. It’s a cheap edition with coloured illustrations, small but of good quality. Later I gave it to Adam as a gift.
We stayed with Martha, our hostess in Hellers. She is a kind woman and a magnificent cook. Every day she fixes something interesting for dinner. I cannot say that I am very fond of German food but it was not bad. Most of all I liked the Dutch cheese and wurst. You can buy them both already in slices. She served these things for every breakfast and supper as well as her absolutely delicious jam that she cooks herself from fresh berries that we picked in her little garden.
During the visit Richard painted pictures for her that she liked very much. He even got a commission from Emma and she paid for the floristic still-life he’d made for her. In Martha’s house I saw some of his pictures and they were not bad. Especially the one imitating etching. On the other hand there was a picture there that looked like it was painted by a child.
Blumenstein
We liked to walk in the wood near Hellers. One day we went to a village with a strange name Machtlos that means powerless. There we were lucky to find opened its little café where we tried coffee with cake. The waitress that was serving us happened to be Adam’s relative. It’s a small world we live in indeed. When we asked her about the Trouts’ dog Silva and she said that everybody in Machtlos knew this dog. Silva is a very unusual dog indeed. She can easily run for 50 kilometres and not to get tired. We used to take her a couple of times with us for our walks and she made loops: first run far ahead, then run back, looked at us and run ahead again until finally she found something interesting after which she didn’t return any more. Adam calls her by whistle but she does not always react. In fact it is not a very trained dog, but not wild and likes company.
In the morning Martha left to see her friends and for the first time we had a breakfast without her. Her house is also magnificent, only it’s not so big as the Trout’s house. But there is also a spacious dining room, sitting room, a large kitchen and a little room where we take meals. The first storey is intended for guests like us.
Hellers is such a small community that you cannot even call it a village. Indeed, there are just two houses, one family and another old house where nobody lives. It is surrounded by forest where they actively cut trunks of the trees. The forest is pleasant place to walk in though, there are three or four lakes nearby where as natives say, trout lives. It is forbidden though to catch this trout. Germans like to set rules and observe them So in such a small place where strangers come rarely and usually by accident there are at least ten plates with different warnings: Do not ride this road, It is forbidden to come close to the lake, This path is private and others like that. It is not a joke. This is the essence of German nature. (To learn more about it I recommend you an excellent book by Jerome K. Jerome Three Men on a Bummel where you’ll find a detailed and complete description of German character. We had a chance to assure that at was true. Not much exaggerating.)
But today is the day for Blumenstein. Blumenstein means blooming stone. It used to be a castle but it was so long ago that nobody remembers how it really looked like. All that is left is an old decorative arch that probably was a main portal to the castle. Adam showed us a picture and explained the way but we didn’t understand. Luckily we met the young couple and they showed us these ruins. It happened we nearly missed it and were in ten meters from it and didn’t notice. By the way these people were the only ones we met on the whole way. Such a lucky coincidence.
We decided to take another road to return back and it was a long walk. We passed through the forest and then came to the road that led to Hellers. This is the most boring part of the way and I never liked it. We walked it two or three times, one time Silva accompanied us. Other time the young Trouts took us to see some lake with an island (it was nothing much to see). And we saw a local monument: stone column. There was some story connected with it but I don’t remember. People are still interested in all these objects though, Adam showed us some books and even a dissertation on Blumenstein and other old aristocratic mansions. Treatises on history of these places are still being written. But those who are interested are usually grand children of people who lived in old time and owned those mansions. Actually not really much material left and soon the history of these places probably will be forgotten.
In fact it was our second try to get there, and this time we did it. Three days before we went there but didn’t go far enough. It was getting dark already so we had to go back. Dunkel Wald.
The next day Martha had guests, the old friends of Richard. Annelise and her daughter Renata. They brought two albums with pictures to show us and we had a nice talk. We spent just one evening together but I felt a great sympathy for Renata. She speaks English very well too. They showed us old photographs, I looked at them with interest though usually I don’t like to look at pictures at all, even on my own. They not only showed but also commented what I really like. Renata’s father was Richard’s old friend Siegfried who died years ago. Later this evening Richard found in his archive another photograph where he, his father and Siggie were pretending to beg. So funny.
I’m beginning to understand German. “Gabrielle, you are making progress with it”, Richard said to me. I understand Richard’s speech and it seems I’ve got his method. He does not care a bit about grammar, I suspect he does not even know how to make a future or past forms of verbs. But he picks words and sentences and adapts them in his speech. Certainly by this method you cannot become an expert but combining it with academic or linguistic methods would make the learning of every language much easier. This is an opinion of a linguist scholar. But in fact German seems to me a difficult language. I bought the manual in Moscow just a day before leaving. (When I returned I’ve got two cassettes for this manual but the manual itself by this time was in America. They departed me from my true love again.)
Martha is also impressed. Actually it’s just enough for me to say any German phrase from my textbook and they are much entertained. So I am an object of great fun for these people. With them I feel easy. With the Trouts I cannot even try. Adam does not listening to anybody except himself. Or does it just seem to me so?
Well, it wonderful thing to write a diary during your journey. It helps to remember some things. But some things you don’t want to remember. Is it worth to write about them? I think it is. Because it’s also part of the experience. Reading the diary helps me to remember. And on some things you look differently than when you wrote about them. It’s natural.
Well, the time came when we didn’t want to stay there any more. We liked our aimiable Martha, and were really grateful to Adam and his family for the wonderful time. But the life there was too monotonous, everything is planned here a year an advance. Germans are the nation that does not like surprises. They like order and rules. Concerning this I remember a curious event. We were riding a car with Adam and he drove on the wrong track (he was not a very skillful driver). “Damned, it’s a hellish crime in Germany to drive on the wrong track.” Note that this was said by a German. So after all they are humans too. At least some of them.
Visit to Bad Hersfeld
Bad Hersfeld is the nearest administrative centre to Hellers. That’s where Adam drives to take care of his business. And we went there too a couple of times with him and Martha. Martha wanted to buy something that she could not get in the nearby villages. Some spice. (They say you can buy any ingredient for your cooking in Germany but obviously the rarer the thing you want the farther you have to go). Adam showed her how to use his mobile telephone and indeed when he called later she and Richard who also never used mobile before were excited to hear the call and answer it. While Adam helped me with prolonging my visa Martha and Richard went shopping. After that Adam and I came to computer shop to look what they had. That was one of the best stores I’ve been and it had not only computers but all kinds of electronic devices. A very nice handsome clerk helped us. Have you ever try to make a conversation knowing only numbers? That’s what I did. He was so kind that made copies of technical characteristics of the computers I wanted. A kind of service you can only dream of in Russia.
Bad Hersfeld is a charming little town. It is so small that you can easily walk from one place to another without using a bus. But of course there is public transport there. Not many cars on the roads. Most shops are closed on week-ends. But in the center there are several cafes that are opened on week-ends and even late at night (not too late, though. For Germans 8 o’clock is a dark night). But the main sightseeing of this town is its Opera house. They are very proud of it and they have all the reasons for that. Operas take place in the ruins of the old monastery. There are only walls that left, no roofs and they put a stage in these walls. There is a kind of roof that was constructed for spectators only but actors are singing under the open sky. Certainly these performances take place only in summer time when it is warm but the tickets for operas are sold a year in advance. We wanted to visit but the period began after we would have to depart. We had to leave soon. We didn’t know that it was impossible to buy tickets but Martha told that there was a chance to buy a ticket at the entrance right before the performance. Of course no one can guarantee that you’ll get it. But the truth is that even if you cannot get “inside” you can easily listen to the opera staying out because there is no roof and acoustic is great in that place. It is a brilliant idea, the only disadvantage is that travellers like us cannot visit it. On the other hand no tourists. All this entertainment is wholly for Germans. Martha said that she was at these performances and she was going to come soon for Aida. We head tunes from it when we were passing by. Well, it’s amazing that they found a use for the old monastery.
Another thing that is certainly worthy of you attention and that you should visit if you are there is the museum that is situated in the same monastery in the other side of the building. This other part is restored and now there are 4 floors of wonderful exhibits. This museum is dedicated to the history of the monastery, which was founded according to the history by St. Bonifacius. On the ground floor you can see big reproductions with the scenes from all the plays that have been performed there and a room with ancient devices such as linotype machine, grinds and carriages. But the historical exposition itself begins on the first floor with “ancient” stone arrow heads and knives, old statues. The second floor shows the early history of the cloister, the period of its prosperity with very interesting samples like furniture and metal coins, huge keys, statures, symbolic attributes, the list of all the abbots on the wall and the portrait of the founder (I forgot his name but it wasn’t St. Bonifacuis). The third floor’s exposition shows how the monastery looked in XVII-XIX centuries: more pieces of furniture that I think some people still have (at least we saw a similar trunk in Martha’s house), keys, pictures and models of how the monastery looked in its old days of fame. The last floor describes the latest period, in other words, when the cloister was turned into the theatre. Naturally there are more exhibits about the theatre, many costumes and books. I don’t remember what is in those books, probably texts of the plays and lists of actors. One more thing: this museum is all free, there are no attendants glaring at you from every corner. Maybe that’s why this museum left a very pleasant impression but I admit that exposition is very interesting too: just enough history not to be boring mixed with lots of different stuff from everyday life. The monastery was part of the wall that surrounded the city in Medieval Ages and it is amazing what can be done from the ruins of not a very famous town. If Italians restored Coliseum and gave ancient Greek and Roman tragedies there, they could make tremendous money from this project. Or Greek tragedies and Roman comedies since the lattes were better at that genre. Tourists would flow without ceasing.
But all this happened later, when we lived in Bad Hersfeld for about a week. All we had time to do during the first time there is to go to the café and try the famous Coffee und Kuchen. Apple cake is delicious and coffee is served in little china pot that includes two cups. Cream is served cold but it’s thick and you don’t pour much in the cup. Highly recommended. The interior was nice; you can sit either in the back where it is dark or near the window where it is light.
Dinner in the Trouts’ house. I don’t enjoy them any more. They speak German and I feel stiff. But in the end Max came and entertained us a little with his talk. After all the Trouts’ style is an indigestive combination of aristocratic pretensions, religious hypocrisy, bourgeois habits, real work and… put something you like here. Adam mows the lawns in front of his house by himself driving his tractor. He seems to enjoy himself. And don’t forget the aristocratic mansion rebuilt from the barn, boring dinners, grace before meal and servants. Yes, they really keep one servant (or rather a kind of servant). They don’t know that butler would add much more dignity to their house. Frau Berenbaum drives her own Mercedes, works on the computer and cooks diner. Emma embraces her while singing the song before a solemn dinner but she is not among those who are sitting at the table. At the end of the meal it was Max who was serving meal around and Adam poured wine into the goblets. Such a combination of modern style and old fashioned rituals. But I can’t get rid of the impression that it is all done just to show off. And not as much before Richard and me but more before themselves.
One evening Martha had guests and this time it was unusual evening. Martha’s relatives came to visit her. A young elegant woman Hannelore (I like the name) and her cousin Crystal. We had an interesting talk. First she had unusual glance, very attractive. Richard translated for me. It seems this Crystal is very interested in Yoga and Eastern philosophy. She talked about transportation of souls and the origins of illnesses. Curious. I cannot say that I agree with her in everything but she talked interesting things. She is in non-traditional medicine. I didn’t ask her about her method. My German was not that good but I'd like to talk on such theme, especially now when I read more about these subjects that interest me too.
So we had a dinner and after that a long talk. Martha showed us a detailed map of Germany. We drank her excellent white wine. Crystal stayed for a night and was late for breakfast. She is magnificent; I wish I could talk to her. I’m sure we would understand each other. She was very different from the other people here. I appreciated how she shook my hand. I was upset at that moment and I liked this gesture so much.
We still have plans to move somewhere else to our own residence. But eventually we found out that it was not easy thing to do. The fact is that Germans don’t like to move often, usually the year is a minimum period you can rent an apartment for. Quite different from America and Russia. Another aspect is that it’s almost impossible to find a furnished apartment here. The scheme is that they look for an empty flat and than move in there with their own furniture. That’s what Max Trout and Friederica did. And they said they have been looking for the flat they are living in now for a year. It is not bad, but not really cosy. The walls are decorated with pictures painted by Max and Friederica themselves. They are both talented young people and little Helena will be a great actress. Or rather a great beauty.
Whatever you think I tell you that it is much more fun to write a diary some time later. I see many things differently now and I like it. And I can say that then you analyse the events and understand many things. Of course many things didn’t change but filtered through the prism of today’s experience you enjoy writing them more. It’s boring just to describe the fact and I’m writing this not to be bored.
In Bad Hersfeld we found an excellent shop with all kinds of painting supplies. Richard paints and I try a little too. My pictures are so pathetic but Richard is an experienced artist. In periods of his life he earned for living by this. Anyway he painted several pictures for Martha and two making a commission for Trouts.
On our return we’ve found guests in Martha’s house. Gundula and Werner came to see her, a daughter and her husband of Richard’s old friend Beatrix. Werner seemed to be older than Gundula, very serious guy. We didn’t talk much. Richard spoke to her about her mother—she looks very much like her, he says. To honour such guests Martha for the first and only time treated us with coffee and cake right in the yard of her house. It was exciting. The enjoyment would be complete if we at least one time had a dinner on the terrace. But we didn’t.
In the evening we visited a ceremony commemorating Adam’s uncle who with some other men framed a plot against Hitler. They spoke several speeches, Richard and I made several pictures. There were mostly old people there, and some of them actually knew Adam (our host was named after him and I was surprised that he missed the ceremony, he’s so good at speeches). There was even an orchestra—a band of musicians. Very dignified but also a kind of domestic atmosphere. It was obvious that all these people knew each other and probably visited this ceremony every year.
On the next day our guests disappeared as suddenly as they appeared. When they were with us we had dinner in the dining room and not in our small one as usual.
The next day Max came and took us to Eisenach in his car. It was a long ride, almost for an hour. Must be very boring to drive this distance every day. We saw Friederica and little Helena. It was there when we decided to visit Weimar. It happened that our friend have been living there for two years and then moved to Eisenach because “there were more than a thousand architecture agencies there.” As you understand when there are so many around you cannot do much and your talent will be rotten there. They showed us a couple of albums with reproductions. So we set for the journey the next day. Seems like our choice of residence between Weimar and Eisenach was resolved in the benefits of the latter. Weimar, it would be a wonderful place to live, we thought. It was a capital of European culture (Oh, I can’t endure this any more…)
We visited Weimar
The trip by train took about an hour. But the strange thing: as soon as we crossed the border the landscape changed and began to remind me of landscapes that are so familiar to people who lived in Socialistic epoch. There appeared again ugly communistic apartment blocks, old shabby barns, repeating gloomy fields. And the farther we went the worse it became. After all it was Eastern Germany and it still didn’t recover from the illness known as Socialism. At least ten years are not enough. But we still were full of expectations. After all Weimar was a capital of German culture, the town of Goether and Schiller. And here we are! The train station is on the outskirts but Weimar is not a big town.
We had an address of a pension where we took a room for a night, dropped our things and went to wander the town. For the first five minutes it was ok but then we suddenly realized there were no people in the streets. And it’s a weird feeling like walking around a ghost town. Then more. Cars engines smoked. There was trash scattered in the streets. Filthy backyard where we went to check for other pensions and there hand a warning there that the air was poisoned in this yard. All these produced rather depressing impression. We certainly didn’t expect this.
We decided to go the central part and of course there were people there. Most of them were tourists. The most famous sightseeing in Weimar is Goether’s house and we visited it. Not bad but not very impressive either. Another entertainment made for tourists there is riding a carriage with horses. There are many boutiques scattered in the central part of the town where you can buy Goether’s bust, or his head. There was also a tiny sculpture of Aphrodite de Milo (there was the same in Martha’s place).
The streets are curvy but actually this town does not look like Medieval. The only feature of Middle Ages are pebbled pavements—all the central square are paved with uneven stone which is terribly inconvenient for walking. There are some pretty buildings but they are mixed with ugly modern edifices that don’t go well with the ancient ones.
And nothing left here from the culture of the previous century. But I’ll point an interesting detail: almost all the names on the shops and boutiques begin with the word “Weimar”. Weimar Souvenirs. Weimar hair dresser. Weimar Barber’s and so on. That’s how they try to impress people who arrives there or what is more probable try to remind themselves about the glory that passed long ago…
By the way in all the touristic prospects on Weimar there is a phrase: Weimar began to develop as a cultural center with the ruling of a Herzogine Anna Amalia”. One should add “and stopped with her death”. It is obviously the case when the town owed to most part of its fame to one person.
We visited Goether’s house—the interior looked much better on the photographs than in reality. We also looked at the Bauhause Weimar University and it was a bunch of pathetic shabby buildings. So we can say that we were disappointed and decided not to stay there. East and West still exist in Germany and it might be propaganda about cultural value of this town. It is strange though that nobody told us how it really feels. One person did though. Just hinted so we neglected this remark and remembered it only later. It was our unforgettable Adam who understood more than you might think.
Eisenach produced much better impression and it saved more of the ancient city’s charm. It seems smaller than Weimar but I’m not quite sure. The historic reason of it is that Eisenach is very close to the border with the former Western Germany. But in fact this city does not develop much either. We didn’t want to stay there. Enough of the East!
But we didn’t regret that we visited Weimar. It added experience and showed us that you should not trust any touristic, cultural or historical propaganda and stereotypes. “Always expect the worst and you never be disappointed”.
The fact is that we’d been bamboozled with all the cultural associations with Weimar. And forgetting the recent historical context expected something that just could not exist any more. But we’ll never fall into that trap again. Still, it would be interesting to find the cultural capital of Europe or even of the world. But does it exist?
We visited Weimar. I don’t think we’ll come back.
We visited Eisenach and Bad Hersfeld again. We visited a small village of Obersuhl where Annelise lives. She invited us one time to see her. Obersuhl is situated right on the former border with the Easten part of Germany and the natives say it was hell of the time. Soldiers shot everybody who tried to cross the border. There was a fence with electric wire on it. Germany was divided in two absolutely different worlds. People who lived in Obersuhl had all the benefits from the state so they would not leave the place. And they didn’t. They all still live here. Now it is a united country and they take pride in it. People from the West tried us to encourage visiting Weimar and they all said nice things about it. Now you can move freely around the country and live wherever you wish. But there live more people in Western part right now than in the Eastern. Half of the apartments in Eisenach are vacant. Weimar is a pathetic little town. Bad Hersfeld is a typical Western German little town.
One peculiar detail: public bathrooms in the former Eastern Germany are pay and in the Western part they are free…
The very small village we came once where there was not even a single café. When things are like that I don’t like the place. It happened that in this village Max was building his church.
We realized that it was time to leave Germany. There was no more what we could do there and surrounding circumstances forced us to do it too. I don’t like to live in a village more than a month. But we’ve never been in big German cities like Frankfurt or Munich. So we have them for our next journey. We set out mind to go to Spain where it is warm and sunny. We didn’t decide yet what city. In Madrid there are all governmental offices but on the coast city you can swim in the sea. But before this we decided to stop in Paris. At least for a three days. Maybe more.
To be in Paris, to speak French, to wander famous streets of Paris, to see its marvellous museums…—that was my dream. But no more bright expectations.
People see different things in their travelling. Pay attention to different things. And their impressions of the same places are quite different. We see on the things from different points of view.
November 2000
Back to Main Page