It's just below the surface

 "The need for [pagan] ritual goes deep," Silvia said.  "But it’s also just below the surface," I said.

Scratch the surface of a German and you find a pagan who loves trees, being in the woods and mountains and who loves processions that take place in the dark by torchlight. Hunting has its own rituals associated with honoring the game animals. When a house is built, the first roof support erected is decorated with a branch from an evergreen tree. A German is very close to his pagan roots, as we saw one evening at the “Perchtentreiben.” (roughly pronounced pairk-ten-try-ben) See the Wikipedia article on  Pre-Christian Alpine Traditions.

The Perchtentreiben traditionally takes place between Christmas and the New Year. The Perchten represent devils who are driven out as a way of getting rid of the evils of the old year and of this indeterminate “time between the years.” (see note below)

The roots of the Perchten tradition are not clear, but in recent years, it has become connected with the Krampus, a demonic-looking character who accompanies St. Nicholas as he visits the children, scaring and punishing those who have been bad. The feast of St. Nicholas is celebrated Dec. 6 and is a real tradition here; the children put out their shoes so “der Nikolaus” can fill them with treats.

At a Christmas market in a small town on the first weekend of Advent, we gathered around a roped-off area in the middle of which a fireplace had been set up. A stage occupied one end of the enclosure.

The performance soundtrack started with a passage from the book of Genesis, “The world was without form and the dark was upon the deep, and God said let there be light.” Flames leaped up in the central fire ring. Saint Nicholas, with a long beard and a wise face, wearing his crimson bishop’s robes with mitre and crosier, entered with angels dressed in white, processed around the circle and took their place on the stage.

As the music turned darker, the voice changed to a deep demonic one speaking Latin and saying “Lucifer, great devil,…”. Smoke came from the side of the stage and finally, the lead devil made his entrance. As he stalked around the circle, he carried a staff with a horned animal skull on it (and a sign displaying the name of the group).

 The Perchten, or devils, appeared with impressively fearsome masks with huge horns, wearing ragged robes of furs, and bundles of long hair covering their lower legs so that you could imagine there were actually hooves underneath. 









Some of the figures had red or blue lights in their eyes. All had wild, long hair. Some of them clanked as they entered the circle – they had huge bells tied to the backs of their belts with chains hanging from the belt so that the bells clanked as they moved. The music changed to a heavy-metal soundtrack. They threatened and leered at the onlookers as they entered, pausing to put a clawed hand on top of a pretty girl’s head so that she screamed, or knock a hat off. 

Some of them represented witches, with hooked noses and broomsticks. As the witches surrounded the fire in the middle, they dipped wands in the fire and opened them out to flaming fans. They danced with these, gracefully and slowly, while still moving threateningly. 

A fire breather entered the ring dressed in a dark monk’s robe. More of the devils entered, some with whips made of bundles of horse hair. These they beat on the ground as they mimed fighting with each other. Others moved menacingly around the circle, running toward the onlookers as if to attack and sliding onto their knees at the feet of the spectators. As they stalked around the circle, they reached into the crowd, even into the second and third rows of spectators. Those who thought they were safe were no longer! I was standing behind two other people, but I took off my hat in case they decided to reach in to grab me! The fire breather circled and crossed the area, coming ever closer and breathing his fire just above the heads of the crowd. 

The devils continued circling, clanking, glaring and dancing as one of them used his staff to create a ring of fire on the ground. Some of them gathered around this ring to perform. Then, the church bells started to ring, and St. Nicholas and his angels left the stage to drive the devils off. 

A cage on wheels containing a child-sized devil (or a child?) came from off-stage and into the circle as the devils followed St. Nicholas away. The Ave Maria started to play, the flames went out. Peace was restored, and the spectacle was over. 

The crowd broke up, but a few minutes later, the MC announced that the devils and St. Nicholas would assemble on the stage for pictures. The spell was broken, but it was great fun to be able to see the fantastic masks and costumes up close as St. Nicholas and all the devils assembled. They got a round of applause and, as they made their way out again, paused for pictures with members of the crowd. 

You can see lots of good pictures on the devils' website: Oberpfälzer Schlossteufel

 A highly personal Interpretation

It was a communal rite, watching the forces of darkness with their fearsome faces cavort, fight with each other and leer at the bystanders. Who says that the gods, or forces of nature, aren’t capricious devils? The Old Testament god of the Hebrews was certainly capricious and displayed his might frequently through forces of nature. 

Why do these creatures who represent evil fascinate us so? Because they still have power inside us. Sometimes they are our gods: vanity, lust, pride, irrational and selfish behavior. Silvia said that people need these representations; what are depression and anxiety and panic but our personal demons? On the other hand, they are of the earth, their terrifying faces carved out of trees that grow in the earth, their robes are animal skins, their horns and fangs remind us of predators. We are also of the earth, and not so far removed from the animals biologically. They are eventually driven out by the forces of light to the strains of church bells and the Ave Maria, but we miss them with their fascinating earthiness and passionate behavior. They are also our avatars.

Are they really evil? “For there is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” – Shakespeare, Hamlet. You can’t have the light without the dark.

Another thing I posit is that Christianity, especially in the Middle Ages, was a religion centered on aspirations toward a paradisical heaven and the afterlife. “Rejoice and be glad for your reward is great in heaven.” (Really? Do I have to wait until then?) The pleasures and temptations of the flesh were to be denied and denigrated. But we still need to cherish our connection to the earth that supports us and not deny and ignore it. 

Another thing I have concluded is that, in comparison to polytheistic cultures, which have many stories about the gods, the Christians only have one great mythological story, and that’s not enough. It’s like only being able to see one movie in your whole life and having to base your life on that. We need to acknowledge that other stories can be just as powerful and just as valuable in our lives.

The power of these performances is proved when, every year, various church officials protest against these events and encourage their faithful not to participate, even seeking to have the events banned. 

Christians have been brought up to look upon the rites of non-Christian peoples as quaint and meaningless at best: the Hopi Kachina dances, or the Chinese New Year festivals, or the Tibetan festivals with the various demons and gods represented by people in costume. But the Perchtentreiben showed me that even we (nominal) Christians still need to be thrilled by a ritual representing the conflict of the forces of light and darkness. Christians, especially in Germany, are only Christians on the surface. You only need to scratch the surface to find the pagan thirsty for the old rites.

Historical Context (again, highly subjective and personal)

We European descendants in America have no pagan roots in the New World. The Christianity handed down to us by our New World ancestors is relatively pure, relatively free of local pagan influences. The heathen origin of such festivals as Christmas and Easter are legends to us Americans. Because I grew up in such a context, it was easy to believe it when we were taught that Christianity was something new and superior to all else in the world, unaffected by what came before it; that it sprang directly from the teachings of Jesus. (With some accounting for the Jewish civilization in which context Christianity developed 2000 years ago.) There was no locally influenced inflection of Christianity. In other words, for the descendants of Europeans in the Americas, Christianity was not overlaid on any local pagan tradition.

The point I want to make is about the contrast between the Christianity handed down in the New World and Christianity as a veneer over the surface of the pagan traditions here in Germany. The Germanic tribes converted to Christianity between 600 and 800 AD, relatively recently in comparison with the countries occupied by Rome. There was almost no Roman influence north of the Danube and east of the Rhine. Before the Germanic tribes overran the Empire in the 5^th century AD, the Romans had resigned themselves to allowing the German tribes to be German. In the Scandinavian countries (also with Germanic roots) and Slavic countries, the conversion came even later and more slowly. In all these countries, the early churches are decorated with artwork exhibiting a very pagan influence . In Germany, a visit to an early Romanesque-style church reveals such symbols as “Green men” and various devils depicted in the stone work. The stonemasons were still referencing images that the newly converted could understand.

For more on converting the Germans to Christianity and other pagan traditions that are maintained here in Germany, see Richard’s blog Life in Germany.

Summary

The traditions of pagan Germany are still alive in some form in spite of Christianity because the Germanic tribes and their Celtic predecessors have been living  continuously in central Europe for millennia. In many cases, old traditions, including the Perchtentreiben, have been revived, some relatively recently. With the steep decline in church attendance in this country, the old rites and sacred places, however altered, are experiencing a revival of importance.

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Note: It is a very common pagan belief that the ambiguity and uncertainty of the time between the years thins the barriers between worlds and allows the evil spirits to come out – Halloween is based on this very thing. In the Celtic calendar, the new year began on November 1, and the evening before, evil spirits were thought to walk the earth.

St. Gallen

Kathy planned a great birthday trip for me to St. Gallen in Switzerland. The origin of the town has to do with an Irish hermit by the name of Gallus. According to legend, he built a hermitage on the site of the current city, and he had the help of a bear to build it.  In return, Gallus gave the bear a loaf of bread.  Today, the icon of the city is a bear.
Sometime around the year 720, an Alemannian (Germanic) priest by the name of Othmar built an abbey on the site. Since the Frankish king, Charles the Hammer, made Othmar the custodian of the relics of Gallus, the abbey became a pilgrimage site, and the abbey grew rich. An important library was established where monks from England and Ireland came to copy manuscripts.

The Frankish king, Pippin the Short, imposed Benedictine rule on the monastery. When Pippin's grandson, Ludwig the Pious, became king, he held two synods in Aachen in 816 and 817 for establishing monasteries, and one result was an plan for an ideal monastery. This plan still exists in the library at St. Gallen, and it is the oldest existing architectural plan of the Middle Ages. (It has become known as the "Plan of St. Gall".) 


The highlight for me was the World Heritage Site made up of the abbey church and library. The last reconstruction occurred between 1755 and 1768,  when both were rebuilt in the baroque style. It was completed just before the Napoleonic wars resulted in the secularization of church property in 1798, when the monks were driven out.  In 1846 the church and some of the monastery were made into a cathedral for the bishop of St. Gallen, but attempts to restore the monastery where abandoned in 1823 by Pope Pious VII.
Although the abbey was not entirely built on the Plan of St. Gall, there are enough similarities that UNESCO added it to its list of World Heritage Sites because it is "a perfect example of a great Carolingian monastery". Today, a monastery built exactly to the Plan of St. Gall is being constructed in  Meßkirch using the tools and techniques of the middle-ages. (Volunteers are welcome, and I'm sorely tempted to help.)




 

I will always associate St. Gallen with beautiful woodwork. This view, taken from Wikipedia, is the view as you come into the library, where the beautiful woodwork was the first thing to catch my eye. The details are hard to make out from this photo, but there are wonderful carvings and sculptures in the woodwork. The second thing I noticed was that it is a working library, and the shelves are full of old books. In fact, the library contains many famous and important books and documents. The oldest Vulgate (all Latin) bible in the world is on display there.  The oldest text in the Germanic dialect of Alemannic is preserved in a translation of the bible used to instruct the novices. Also, manuscript B of the Nibelungenlied is kept here.
Then I noticed the frescoes on the ceiling of the four great councils: The Council of Nicea in 325 (when it was agreed that Jesus was divine), the Council of Constantinople in 381 (when it was agreed that the Holy Spirit was divine), the Council of Ephesus in 431 (when it was agreed that Mary was the mother of God), and the Council of Chalcedon in 451 (when it was agreed that Jesus was truly human and not only divine).

The beautiful woodwork was also used in the church. This photo is an example of the craftsmanship in the monks' seats in the choir of the church. Each of the figures carved in the arms of the seats is unique.










The great woodwork was on display outdoors as well. There are many beautiful bay windows in the old part of town, and this picture is an example. The detail in the next picture is from another window.


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There were other great memories, such as the brewery and its restaurant, where we had a great meal. The textile industry played a very important role in the history of the city, and there is an impressive museum that we visited. It was a very relaxing way to spend my birthday.

Wolfram's Eschenbach and Abenberg

By Richard

Back on the second weekend in August I went with some friends on a day-trip to the little towns south-west of Nuremberg.  We visited several beautiful little towns with their medieval walls still intact and lots of half-timbered houses. A couple of the towns have connections to my favorite medieval troubadour, Wolfram von Eschenbach, who wrote the Arthurian romance "Parzival" sometime between the year 1200 and 1210. One town, called Abenberg, has a statue of him that I had to have a picture of.


 That's me with Wolfram, who is playing his lute while reciting the 25,000 rhyming couplets that make up "Parzival". The story is of a
boy, Parzival, who is secluded in a forest dwelling by his mother in order to prevent him from learning the ways of knighthood and to keep him entirely ignorant of chivalry and the ways of men. His seclusion is shattered by three knights passing who tell him of King Arthur's court at Camelot. His inner nature drives him to go join Arthur's court. His mother is heartbroken at the news of his decision but allows him to depart, dressing him in fool's garments in the hopes that the knights will refuse to take him in. Soon after his departure she dies, utterly heart-broken.
At court, Parzival fights and kills Ither, the Red Knight. Putting on the knight's red armor, he rides away from the court and meets Gurnemanz, who teaches him the duties of  knighthood, especially self-control and moderation and to avoid asking unnecessary questions.
Parzival rides out to seek adventure, and he eventually arrives at the castle of the Holy Grail. His host, Anfortas, the Fisher King, is terribly wounded, but Parzival remembers Gurnemanz's training and does not ask about the mysterious wound. His failure to show compassion results in his failure to obtain the Grail and relieve the Fisher King's misery. The Grail and the Fisher King and everyone in the castle disappear.  The rest of the story is about Parzival's struggle to find the castle again so that he can ask the important question.


We went to the town of Wolframs-Eschenbach. There is no direct evidence that this is the birthplace of Wolfram, because there are no historical documents which mention him. But his works provide evidence for the town's claim, such as the dialect of his works (which is East Franconian) and a number of geographical references.

We came into town through the western city gate, and were met by the view in the photo. A lot of the half-timbered buildings are almost as old as Wolfram, but only a few date back to Wolfram's day. Still, the layout of the town and the atmosphere must be close to what Wolfram knew.  There is a nice little museum at the very center of town, across from the central fountain. The museum has information on Wolfram's poetry, especially the symbols in Parzival and his other Arthurian romances such as Titurel and Willehalm, and on aspects of the Medieval Ages such as the roles of men and women and the life of knights.







After we left Wolframs-Eschenbach, we visited a couple more little towns. The last town that we visited was Abenberg. The town is mentioned in the Parzival story in connection with a jousting tournament. The tournament field is still there just outside of the walls of Abenberg Castle, and a bit of it can be seen in the extreme lower-right corner of the photo. Inside the castle is the House of Frankish History, which has a permanent collection called "Travel through Time in Frankonia" which describes life in a medieval castle, explains why Frankonia territories were split up the way they are, and how the Reformation, the Farmer's War, and the 30-Year War affected Frankonia and its people.

Also in the castle is the School of Bobbin Lace. (Here is a picture from Wikipedia of bobbin lace being made) When we were in Brugge, Belgium, we visited the school there, and we saw some beautiful lace. Afterwards I wondered where you could learn the craft in Germany. I never guessed it would be so close.  But then again, I never guessed that the hometown of my favorite medieval poet would be so close either.

Bergpark Wilhelmshöhe

Just outside of Kassel is the Bergpark (mountain park) Wilhelmshöhe. The main attractions are the huge statue of Hercules at the very top of the mountain and the waterworks down the side of the mountain. It was started in 1689, which I find incredible because this was only 41 years after the end of the 30-years war (a European war that devastated Germany even more than the world wars).

Hercules: According to the UNESCO World Heritage organization, the Hercules statue "is both technically and artistically the most sophisticated and colossal statue of the Early Modern era."  It was inspired by a large (3.17-meters or 10.4-feet tall) Roman statue from the third century A.D. called the Farnese Hercules, which was recovered in 1546 and is now in Naples. The lions pelt draped over a club and the three apples held in his right hand behind his back are the tell-tale signs of Hercules. (Slaying the Nemean lion and stealing the golden apples from the garden of the Hesperides were two of the 12 Labors of Hercules).
The giant statue in Bergpark Wilhelmshöhe was made from copper by Johann Jacob Anthoni, a goldsmith from Augsburg, and was completed in 1717. The Hercules statue is 8.25 meters (27.1 ft) tall, and stands on a Pyramid that is 29.6 metres (97 ft) high, which is on an Octagon that is 32.65 meters (107.1 ft) high (so the entire monument has a total height of 70.5 meters or 231 ft). The entire monument is also called "the Herkules" by the Germans. We were able to visit the inside of the Octagon and Pyramid in spite of the renovations in progress.  The view from the top of the Pyramid is beautiful.

The Kaskaden (Cascades) at the base of the Herkules were first operated in 1714, a couple of years before the Herkules was complete.  The top of the cascades is called the "Artischokenbecken" (artichoke bowl). The water flows to a fountain that shoots water 12-meter (39-feet) high (you can barely make it out as a white column in this photo).  The fountain is called the Riesenkopfbecken (giant's-head pool), which has statues of a Centaur and a Faun to the right and left of it.  The statues play loud and annoying horns powered by the water pressure.
The cascades themselves are 210-meter (689-feet) long and 12-meter (39-feet) wide. At the bottom of the 535 steps along the sides of the cascades is the Neptunbassin (Neptune's basin). 

We followed the water down the hill as it reached the various drops of the cascades. In some places it sprayed over the sides. It was a cloudy day with rain threatening, so we were prepared with our raincoats. Then we had to walk further along the path to the next attraction.



The Steinhöfer Wasserfall (Steinhöfer Waterfall) is along a path that leads from the Neptunbassin down the mountain. It is named after Karl Steinhöfer, who designed it. It was completed in 1793, and it portrays a quarry that has been taken back by nature.

Most often we reached the attractions before the water started to flow, so the first impression was an unimpressive trickle over the rocks. When the total flow of the water reached the rocks, however, it was impressive and made us "ooh" and "aah" over the beautiful display of a natural force.

 



Downstream of the Steinhöfer Wasserfall the water flows through some beautiful rapids.

















Heinrich Christoph Jussow built the Teufelsbrücke (Devil's Bridge) in 1793.  The water flows under the bridge and falls 10 meters (33 feet) into the Höllenteich (hell's pond).  They are so-called due to the nearby Plutogrotte (gotto of Pluto, who was the Roman god of the underworld).  Don't ask me where the grotto got its name.

Kathy thinks that the devil's bridge got its name from the jagged "teeth" under the bridge. This one also started as barely a trickle among the rocks and impressed us as the full flow started.













The Aquädukt (Aqueduct) is just downstream of the Teufelsbrücke, but it was built by Jussow before he built the Teufelsbrücke. The Aquädukt is a reproduction of Roman aqueduct that has broken apart downstream of the 14th arch. The water falls 30 meters (98 feet) into the debris of the roman ruin. This depiction of a roman ruin was a modern idea at the time. It was usual for the time to associate an ancient aqueduct with the advanced technology of the Roman Empire. Once again, Jussow has shown the passage of time and the effects of nature.

The water thundered down from the height into the pool below, creating a roar. It was beautiful to see the water falling into the pool that was surrounded by green grass and wild flowers.









The Fontänenteich (Fountain Pond) is the basin for the last of the waterworks. Water flows in two streams around a temple into the Fontänenteich.

This is a very picturesque area, with the trees behind the temple carefully chosen for their variety of color and foliage. It looks very bucolic. However, it all changed when the fountain described below shot up to a great height.






In the Fontänenteich is the große Fontäne (great Fountain), which shoots water like a geyser 52-meters high. In order to produce the desired effect, the water is supplied from a reservoir 80 meters uphill.  This water is the same water that started at Kaskaden at the top of the mountain, and 750 m³ (about 200,000 gallons) of water was used. 

The fountain sprayed so high that the breeze drove the droplets across to us where we were standing on the other side of the pond! People retreated before the "rain".

From the Fontänenteich there is a beautiful view back up the mountain to the Herkules.







Schloss Wilhelmshöhe is a little farther downhill from the Fontänenteich. Construction was started by Landgraf (Earl) Wilhelm IX in 1786, and construction continued in stages.  The middle part was completely destroyed in WW II, and was reconstructed from 1968 until 1974. Today, it houses the museums of the Antikensammlung (Antique Collection), die Gemäldegalerie Alte Meister (Picture Gallery of Old Masters), die Graphische Sammlung (the Graphics Collection) and a Bibliothek (Library). The Picture Gallery has a large collection of paintings by Rembrandt and Rubens.

We admired the graceful proportions of the ancient Greek vases and Roman copies of Greek sculptures. There was also a very unique statue of an Etruscan maiden, made of terra cotta. The figure itself was very lean and tall. Although she was wearing a Greek-style garment, her proportions were not the standard Greek ideal. Her fine head rested on a thin neck and her hair was drawn into a top knot just above her forehead. We've never seen anything similar.






The Großes Gewächshaus (Great Greenhouse) is next to the Schloss, and it has some beautiful plants in front. They were normal hanging plants (fuchsia, for example) that had been trained into a "standard" or tree form. This is a very hard thing to do! The one you see in the left of the picture had flowers like marigolds. They gave off a sweet fragrance.




A friend insisted that we had to see this display of the cascades, so we made sure to visit it after our September trip to the States and before it closed for the year. We're glad we saw it. Having watched the water for the first cascade originate from the top near the Hercules monument, Kathy thinks that the next time we see it, she wants to watch the cascades from the bottom.

In Training for a German Driver's License

by Kathy

March 18:
I am taking driving lessons here. Everyone has to go to driving school to get a German license, unless you somehow exchange a US State license for a German one in the first 6 months you're here (how easy it is depends on the State). So I have waited so long that my NYS license is not valid over here anymore, and I have to start from scratch. And it's a good thing, too! Driving over here is very complicated! Everybody else has the right of way - bikes, pedestrians... Don't get me started! So many regulations and signs to pay attention to, you can't imagine it if you've never been here. Started classroom instruction:14 hour-and-half classes required.

Being in a classroom with a bunch of German kids was an experience. The people taking the driving instruction are all around 18 years old. Some few are adults, but most are kids. The kids come in, slouch into a chair and take out a smart phone and start playing with it, or they stare into space. The instructor starts class by holding his cell phone up and saying, "The only phone that should be turned on is mine!" Then instruction starts, with all the kids sitting silently and looking blank. I am the only one with a notebook, writing things down! Wonder how all those kids think that they're going to pass the written test if they don't make a point of learning the stuff. A CD comes with the course; on it are all the questions that can be on the test, separated by topics and available in several languages. I made a point of taking the tests on the CD every day, but I still needed to have things explained, so I asked questions in class (If the car has a certain weight, and can pull a certain weight, what is the allowable weight of the trailer?). These kids sat there like lumps even when the instructor asked questions to get some participation out of them. Sometimes he succeeded. Sometimes there were people in the classes with other types of licenses (car) who wanted to add another type (motorcycle) to their list. They usually provided answers. It was sometimes hard for me to express myself succinctly in German (they have a different word for everything!), but I tried.

June 11:
Started actual driving lessons (in German). The driving school uses 4-door BMW 1's, which are powerful and easy to speed in, but have a horrible turning radius. I realized that the last car we bought was a VW Jetta in 1997 - that's 16 years ago! The modern German car has more lights than you can shake a stick at! Headlights: high beams and low beams; hazard lights; signal lights for turning; parking lights (new to me); daytime running lights - so far all the usual, but there is a special light called the rear fog light. You turn this one on only in foggy conditions where the visibility is 50 m or less. It's only on the rear of the car and is so bright that it can hypnotize the driver behind you and therefore its use is restricted. Once when I saw the driving school car backing up, I noticed that one backup light was out. I told the instructor this and he said, "It only has one back up light, the other is the rear fog light." As we say in Germany, "Again what learned!"

Tuesday, July 16:
Today I took the written part of the driving test and passed with no mistakes! Didn't even make a careless mistake! And I was lucky that there weren't any stupid trailer questions.

One step closer to endangering the bicyclists on the street on my own!

Thursday, August 1:

Today, at around 4 pm, the driving test ended when, after 40 minutes' driving, I parked in an industrial area in a town nearby Erlangen. My driving teacher was in the front passenger seat and the driver's license examiner sat in the back seat. He said, " You get a driver's license from me, but first I have to take you to task for three things."  (The Germans have a saying - if you haven't been reprimanded, that's praise enough). So I said politely, "Please, I would like to hear it." The three things were:

1. I exceeded the speed limit by driving 60 kph (36mph) in a 50 kph (30 mph) zone....

2. I did not drive in the extreme right hand lane when I should have, although free choice of lane is allowed inside city limits, so it was not wrong...

and

3. I made a move to the left in a street (where there were no lane markings and I did not cross into the oncoming lane) without  first looking and signaling. "Both your driving instructor and I gasped at the same time, that could have been very dangerous. You're lucky it was a time of the day when the traffic is calm."

Otherwise, he said, I have a calm driving style and did some things characteristic of an experienced driver. Did I have a driver's license in the US?

Then he had to go on to a motorcycle license test near where we stopped.

So, the story from my point of view: Very early in the test we went into a side street where I had to parallel park behind a car. That was successful, thanks to much practice with the driving teacher. Very proud of myself! I managed not to drive into any pedestrians or bike-riders, who always have the right of way if they're going straight and I'm turning. As for item 1, above, stuff happens! It is hard to sense the speed in the driving-school BMWs because they are so smooth and have a lot of power in 3rd gear. So I was trying to keep to the speed limit, but at the slightest incline, it's easy to exceed the exact speed limit. I recognized the problem and corrected it! So sue me!  Otherwise, exceeding the speed limit by 10kph during the driving test would be an automatic fail.

The emergency braking went well. That's where, from 18mph, you suddenly put the brakes on as hard as you can. I actually heard the tires skid  - a good sign. I also managed to remember to align myself to the appropriate side when turning out of a one-way street.

As for no. 2, OK, it's something to keep in mind in general; I'm still learning all the rules, and though I have been taught this one before, I can't remember everything all the time!

As for no. 3, OK, I could have done better. But there were no lane markings on the street, and at the time it did not seem like I was making a large move. I was trying not to drive into the bus lane on the extreme right side of the street. The examiner had also just previously said suddenly, " No, let's turn right instead," which meant that I had not been looking ahead into the street we ended up turning into. So, OK. Something to learn from.

On the way back to town, before the driving teacher dropped me off, he congratulated me and said that if he weren't going on vacation at the end of the week, it would have been good to have had another week or two of practice. He also said that any time after getting my license I could call the driving school and ask for a couple of hours practice where I thought I needed it.

So all in all I got lucky and didn't make any life-threatening mistakes. However, in general, it was not a good day for driving tests. While I was waiting for my test, I saw at least 3 potential young drivers get out of the test car in tears because they hadn't passed. The fourth one, a young man (probably 18), got out of the car with a white piece of paper, which I assumed meant he passed. My teacher's two test candidates of the morning hours both failed, which did not surprise him. One was a 40-year-old woman on her fifth attempt at the test. The candidate before me, who also had my teacher, came back within 15 minutes because he had failed to stop at a red light before turning left. (My instructor, "It's a good thing there are no guns in Germany!")

When I got back to my neighborhood, the neighbor, Susanne, was outside. I told her that I had passed and she gave me a hug, went into the house, and came out with a bunch of sunflowers! She figured that either congratulations would be in order, or consolation. She is so thoughtful and generous!

It is a big relief to have that over with! I would celebrate by going out to dinner with Richard, but my last yoga class of the summer is tonight and I don't want to miss it. I missed the one last week because of driving practice. I will have to buy the beers tomorrow if the usual Friday afternoon club of Richard's coworkers meets at the beer garden. We will celebrate with a Japanese dinner on Saturday.

Not a Cheap Proposition

My costs       €1332 for the driving school (Instruction, CD, driving hours and fees)

                       €106 in test fees (to the DMV equivalent)

                       €  22 for first aid course and vision test

                       €  43 in fees to City Hall

----------------------------------------------------

  Total          €1503 = $ 1954

The driving school costs are usually higher for first-time drivers who have to do a lot of hours of practice.

Total number of driving "hours" (1 "hour" is 45 minutes long):

14 hours normal practice (quantity can vary according to the learner)
5 hours in the countryside (all required)
4 hours on the Autobahn (all required)
3 hours of night driving (all required)

My license is subject to a trial period of 2 years. If I screw up in that time, I could lose it and be required to take remedial courses. In cases of extreme misbehavior (drugs, repeated traffic violations) medical and psychological test can be required before you get your license back.

Traffic violations can earn you "points in Flensburg", where the central registry of traffic violations is located. Certain types of violations are "rewarded" by a certain number of points that go on your permanent record there. If you accumulate 8 points, you're done - your license is taken away.

I like to take the cards out of my wallet one at a time, saying: with the department store card I can earn points, the pharmacy card earns me points, and I can get points on my driver's license, too!

Random Thoughts

Having a German driver's license in Europe is like having a New York State license in the States. I can drive all over Europe with it. They are trying to come up with an EU license, which will probably complicate things a lot. The EU regulations have already complicated the required topics in each country for the different license classes. The German regulations for pulling a small trailer with a car have already been affected by EU regulations.

Up until this year, your German license was yours for life! No renewals necessary - no new pictures, no vision tests. Our friends have the licenses they got when they were 18 and it's pretty funny to see when they had hair, and the hairstyles from the 80's immortalized on their licenses. But as of 2033, everybody has to have their license renewed. Another consequence of EU regulations. It's not yet been decided what will be required for renewal. As a new license, mine is good for 15 years, until 2028.

They Make It So Complicated!

Here in Germany there are a lot of rules on the Autobahn, including absolutely NO passing on the right! That means if you're in the right lane and the lane to the left of you slows down, you have to slow down as well so as not to pass them. It is very important that the people to your left can always get back into the lane to their right. It is a requirement to drive in the right-most lane except when passing. In some places on the Autobahn there are no speed limits (recommended speed = 78mph!), so that there must always be an opportunity to change to the right lane if somebody comes up behind you doing 100mph or more! And they do.

In the US, there are far fewer traffic signs compared to Germany's 643 distinct signs (honest! see this link: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bildtafel_der_Verkehrszeichen_in_Deutschland), but even so, in the US, the speed you should drive on the exit ramp coming off the Interstate is marked so it can be seen when you enter the exit lane. Here, you're just supposed to "know" that when you're at a cloverleaf intersection that the first exit is the gradual quarter-circle ramp on which you only slow down to 50 mph (80kph), but there are NO signs indicating this until you get around the bend. In my case, I once slowed to around 35 mph, because I didn't know what was coming, and created a dangerous situation, because everybody else exiting behind me "knew" that this was an 80kph exit!

There are a LOT of things that you're just supposed to "know". When you enter a town and see the sign with the town's name on it, that means that before the sign, you must already be doing 50kph (30 mph), and continue to until you see a sign with a different speed limit on it, or until you turn into a residential area and see that it's a 30 kph (18mph) zone (look carefully for the speed limit signs at the same time you are looking out for pedestrians and bike riders crossing your path). Then, look out for the side streets on your right! Unless the intersection is otherwise marked, people coming out of these streets  have the right of way! It doesn't matter that you're driving straight on a relatively wide street, and that they have to turn on to the street you're on, they have the right of way. Very scary! Sometimes it is not possible to see these streets if a big truck is parked in front of the intersection, or foliage obstructs your view of the signs.

When you exit a town, the sign saying "Leaving Podunk" will most likely be on the left side of the road, behind the sign saying that you are entering the town's boundaries (saving on traffic signs, you see...). When you leave the town limits, the 30mph speed limit is lifted, and depending on the road, you can drive 60 mph. Until the next town, which is usually within 3 km (2miles) and then you have to slow down again.

Very Well Regulated System 

My driving instructor said that the young first-time drivers are trying to do everything at once and so do not have a calm driving style :-). 18-year-olds can get a license and drive on their own, and it's also possible for 17-year-olds to get a license that requires that, for the first year, they be accompanied by licensed driver who is over a certain age and has had a clean license for a certain number of years. It has been found that these kids end up driving more safely. There is no just hopping in the car with mom or dad and driving around. There is no learner's permit. To get a license you have to go through a driving school.

Again what learned! (Wieder was gelernt!)

Now you know more than you ever wanted to about the German license! It has been quite an education for me, and I still don't feel comfortable driving around on my own! Even though I have at least 20 years' experience driving in the States!

And no, we are not planning on getting our own car.

Happy driving!

Under the Tuscan sun, wind and rain. The Italian Blog

A partial report by Kathy

Yes, Tuscany really does look like that. We were there for a week in May, driving around from famous city to famous village, from Etruscan to Gothic to Renaissance, from vineyard to olive grove, and what we saw was what you see in the movies.

We broke up the itinerary so that we wouldn't have to spend more than 2 hours in the car each day. We started in Pisa, where Richard was attending a conference, proceeded east to Siena, then south to Saturnia, northwest to Massa Marittima, and north to San Gimignano before returning to Pisa to catch our train home to Erlangen. Rather than describe each day's happenings in sequence, we hope it will be more interesting to read about the categories of experiences we had.

Our itinerary:
16 May - Kathy travels by train to meet Richard in Pisa, explore Pisa: leaning tower, baptistery, cathedral
17 May - pick up rental car outskirts of Pisa, drive to Siena
18 May - tour Siena: the cathedral, the baptistery, crypts, oratorio, cathedral museum
19 May - drive to Saturnia, check out natural sulfur springs, overnight in Saturnia Tuscany Hotel - with wellness facilities!
20 May - reluctantly leave Saturnia, drive on to small villages on the sites of Etruscan settlements, view Etruscan tomb city carved out of the soft volcanic rock. Drive to Massa Marittima
21 May - drive to San Gimignano
22 May - explore San G., soak up the ambiance
23 May - drive back to Pisa to catch our train back to Germany
           

There is so much to tell about cathedrals, churches, baptisteries and bell towers; picturesque towns, including public squares and hotels and places we stayed; and, of course, food!

Food!
 It's said it's hard to get bad food in Italy. We found this to be true. An Italian menu is divided into Antipasti, which includes bruschetta and crostini, carpaccio and other small dishes; Primi Piatti - pasta with sauce; Secondi Piatti - the meat or cheese dishes; and Contorni - the vegetable side dishes, which often include grilled or baked vegetables and potato dishes. Some meals stand out in our memories both for the setting and the quality of the food.

The second picture above was taken from the restaurant where we ate on our last night in San Gimignano. La Vecchia Mura (the old wall) was perched at the top of a slope on the edge of town; one of the old town walls formed the boundary of the outside eating area. Richard ordered a boar dish, for the last time this trip, along with grilled vegetables and Kathy had pork cutlets in a saffron sauce with grilled artichokes and sage. It had finished raining for the day and the outside seats were pleasant with the layers we had on. We got there around 7, though the restaurant opened at 6, and we got there just in time without a reservation, because so many other people who came after us without reservations wound up waiting or being turned away.

Osteria del Carcere, San Gimignano, the second to last night: The list of dishes outside the door with their regional names, on a long rectangle surrounded by tile motifs with no English whatsoever, drew Kathy in. A bit of the exotic... We had a choice of sitting downstairs (4 tables total) or upstairs, and we chose downstairs, because that's where the kitchen was as well as a long counter (or bar) with all the different wines behind it. On the bar, in refrigerated cases, were some of that night's dishes. The woman who greeted us, a well-filled-out middle-aged woman with wiry black and grey hair was one of those gently authoritative types who seem to know what you want (or should want) before you do. She offered us English menus, which was helpful, but aside from that, the place didn't scream "we're here for the tourists". We tried a sampler of terrines for the Appetizer: Rinascimento con prugne (spinach with prunes), lamb, Chianti beef, and Cinghiale (wild boar, a recurring theme this trip). First terrines we ever had - same principle as a paté, but with bigger chunks. Wonderful! Turns out, the bar was mainly used for plating the food in the cases (our terrine slices) before it was brought to the table. The wines were a San Gimignano white Vernaccia, an oft-ordered favorite of the trip, and "Il Templare", a mix of the Vernaccia grape (70%) with Trebbiano (20%) and another one whose name escapes me. Il Templare was light and crisp without unpleasant acidity and easy to drink. Our main dishes were Faraona alle Castagne for Kathy and Tonno di Toscana for Richard. Faraona alle Castagne was Guinea fowl with chestnuts, accompanied by a chestnut puree. It came as a thick slice of stuffed, boneless bird, surrounded by the skin with a strip of fat under the skin. It did not taste like chicken. It was hearty, but at the same time sweet, due to the chestnuts that it was stuffed with and the pureed chestnut that accompanied it. Richard wanted to have the same dish, but the owner talked him into the "Tonno Toscana" (Tuscan tuna) which consisted of very tender, white pulled pork surrounded by white boiled beans, in a Sauce made with the crushed beans. He found it very rewarding. His after-dinner caffe "mokka" was poured from a stovetop espresso maker and came with delicate biscotti. We liked the meal and the atmosphere so much, we asked if we could make a reservation for the following night. "No," she said, right away. "We're closed. We need one day." A disappointment, but we understood.


Our Hotel Cisterna in San Gimignano: While exploring the old fortress in San Gimignano with great views of the countryside from its old bastions, we came upon the Vernaccia wine museum. Admission was free, and we heard the sounds of a presentation playing inside. So we read a little bit about our new favorite white wine and stepped into the room with the video. It was a collection of clips from every movie that included scenes from the charming little town. One of them had a number of British actresses: Judi Dench, Maggie Smith, and Joan Plowright, hurrying among the walls of San G. We resolved to find that movie. Turns out it's "Tea with Mussolini" (1999), by Franco Zeffirelli, a semi-autobiographical story of the English and American women who helped raise him and who were living in Florence as WWII broke out. They were brought to San G. for internment because they refused to leave Italy. On youtube, you can see a clip of how, through somebody's influence (money) they were allowed to stay in a nice hotel in town, which happens to be the "Albergo Cisterna". Sure enough, there is footage of the well (cisterna) in the square and the ladies entering the hotel, with the name above the ground floor as it is today. The well also features in the end scenes when the allied troops march in. We plan to buy the movie as a souvenir of our trip to Italy. (www.hotelcisterna.it)

We showed up at the hotel in the late afternoon, and luckily the restaurant was operating. Hoping for something simple, yet hearty, Kathy ordered the "egg with truffle", expecting an omelet with some sort of truffle-like seasoning. What came was literally what it said on the menu: one fried egg sprinkled with shaved truffle! It was delicious, but not filling. She was able to order a second appetizer of beef carpaccio to keep us going until dinner.

The two pictures below were taken in San G. Yep, those are the Disney dwarfs perched on that wall.

First night in Siena: dinner at Il Gallo Nero (the black rooster): This medieval-themed restaurant was recommended at our hotel by a coupon for a small discount. For the cheese course, we tried the local pecorino cheese in four stages of ripeness, from creamy and mild to hard and tangy on the tongue. The walls of this restaurant were decorated with reproductions of Tarot card characters that were reputedly inlaid into the floor of the Siena cathedral. The waiter said that he also found it odd that such pagan themes were depicted in a cathedral. We could not find them in the cathedral at all. Further research (on Wikipedia) suggests that they represent a bunch of engravings known as the Mantegna Tarocchi  and were used for educational purposes, but not for telling the future.

Below is a picture of the marble inlaid figure of the wheel of fortune, which we did see in the Cathedral (The picture was taken from the top of the wheel, where the king is. That's why the perspective is strange):

Pleasant people
The Italians were in general pleasant. No one snapped at us unpleasantly (as I recall happening sometimes in German-speaking countries, not to mention France). They could be firm, though, when they were tired of dealing with the same tourist question.  Before the ticket office for the Siena cathedral officially opened, Kathy noticed that the doors to the office had been opened. So she went by the doors and looked in, in case they were ready to sell the tickets, "We open at ten o'clock," came the immediate call in Italian from behind the counter. (They probably go through this every day.) We joked to ourselves, "and not until we're good and ready at exactly around 10 after!" because nothing in Italy is exactly on time. But there was no time pressure for us; we were on vacation.

The owner of the hotel in Saturnia was cruising the dining room when we were enjoying our dinner there. He came over and, on request, regaled us at length with the story of how he had the hotel designed and built just a few years ago by one of Italy's most famous architects. (www.saturniatuscanyhotel.com)

A necessary evil: driving
Driving in Italy was what you'd expect, although it wasn't as bad as the worst stories Kathy had read. We never had to reverse down a steep mountain road to make way for oncoming traffic, and no one ever came round a tight curve in our lane. A lot of the roads we were on led up and down the hills through the country side, so they were taken at low gear and involved a lot of hair pin curves. On the flat areas, Italian drivers would pass on the solid line (i.e., a double yellow line) whenever they could. Once, in the hills, a deer bounded across the road in front of us in broad daylight.

Parking was also a hassle, and sometimes a costly one, especially for the walled towns. There were parking lots surrounding the towns and shuttle busses to bring you into town, but we didn't find the right parking lot, because the navigator system gave us directions to drive through the center of town, which wasn't allowed without a permit, and ended up in the parking lot farthest from our hotel in Siena. At the hotel, the woman at the counter tried to sketch how we should have been able to drive to the cheaper lot near the hotel, but part of the drawing was off the map, and it wasn't obvious how to accomplish this safely or easily. So we reasoned that the parking garage we were in (we thought) only charged for parking from 8am to 8pm and that it wouldn't cost that much to leave the car there. Wrong, of course! When Richard finally paid for parking, it was 60 € for the approximately 48 hours the car was there. Turns out the 8am to 8pm was for the surface lot only.

Driving into Massa Marittima and finding a parking lot was not easy, either. Kathy had to get out and ask around to find a local who spoke English and was nice enough to leave his bar and show us where we were on the town map, which was located on a sign at the other end of town from where we needed to be. Getting to the lot in this case was not so torturous.

For the next town (San Gimignano) we learned to program the navi to find a particular parking lot.  Of course, it still expected us to drive through town to get to it, and when we got close it told us we were already there and stopped giving directions ("when possible, make a U-turn"). The paper map had a schematic that did not help at all. After a lot of driving around in circles and wrong turns, somehow Richard worked it out by coming across the sign for our lot accidentally.  Nerve-wracking!

Letting it all hang out

As you might have known, the Italians are not known for their reserve when it comes to emotions. Or laundry, either, it turns out. Kathy is continually amused at how the Italians are not shy about displaying their laundry. The Germans, having somewhat different weather than in Italy, are often restricted to hanging their laundry in the furnace room to dry. The Italians, on the other hand, know that even if it rains, the sun will come out again soon. Below is a picture of fluffy pink puppy pajamas hanging outside the second floor of a house on a corner. Kathy couldn't resist!

The ruins of the basilica of St. Sola.

We went to the small town of Solnhofen today.  It has the ruins of the basilica that contained the grave of St. Sola, who died in 794.  He went to Fulda in 744, where he became a monk and was made a priest by St. Boniface (the patron saint of Germany).  Sometime between 745 and 750 he was sent to Husen, which is called Solnhofen today in his honor.  He was visited by Charles the Great (Charlemagne) in 793 who was making his way from Regensburg to Weissenburg.

Foundations of earlier churches

The basilica was built on the foundations of earlier churches. The first two churches were probably built in the sixth century, before the time of St. Sola. The first church was of an early type with two or three apses and served as a base for missionaries from the south. The second church was built in approximately 700.  It was a larger church because evidence of two separate rooms was found.  The second church was an aisleless church with a single nave without pillars or columns. It was destroyed between 725 and 728 in the war of Charles the Hammer (then king of  the Franks) against the Bavarians  A third church was probably built as a meeting house for St. Sola with the support of Willibald (the first bishop of Eichstätt) and Wunibald (founder of the Abbey in Heidenheim). The fourth church built sometime after 795 (shortly after Sola's dealth) was probably the first to be a Benedictine cloister. 

Columns with Carolingian capitals

The fifth and final church was the Basilica of St. Sola, which was built some time in the first half of the ninth century, although this date is not certain.  The construction was directed by Rabanus Maurus, the Abbot of the cloister at Fulda, and sponsored by Ludwig the Pious. The three-nave basilica was christened in 819 by Bishop Agan von Eichstätt.  At about the same time, the church complex was elevated by the Royal Chaplain of Ludwig the Pious to a Provost. In 833, Sola was made a saint, and his remains were laid in a new tomb made of the local sandstone. An early Romanesque bell tower was constructed on the south wall in the eleventh century, although nothing remains of it today. In 1720 an altar with a depiction of the Wonder of St. Sola was installed, but it was removed during a renovation in 1734.  The building was partly torn down in 1782 and 1783, and a protestant church, St. Veit Church, was built partly on the foundations and consecrated in 1785. The tomb of St. Sola was opened on September 14, 1828, but no corpse was found. Excavation was carried out by the University of Heidelberg from 1961 until 1966 and again from 1974 until 1979.  The round columns were taken in 1977 to the Archaeological Museum in Munich, where the Sola Medallion, a round relief with the figure of a torch bearer, was found. The basilica was renovated from 1991 until 1996.  The broken east wing of the cloister is marked in 1997 with a outline in the ground.

Gothic tomb behind the columns

Due to the destruction in 1782 and 1783, only the western part of the north nave remains.  A gallery crypt two meters deep houses the empty tomb of St. Sola.  The nave is 28.28 meters long and 13.3 meters wide. The three-part choir was elevated, but only the approach can be seen.  The location of the middle nave is marked by arcades.  Of the twelve remaining columns, six have been replaced. The three remaining capitals are among the best Carolingian carvings in Germany.  

After visiting the ruins, we had lunch at Hotel Adler.  We had some great Frankish food.  Kathy had smoked trout and Richard had a pork tenderloin with a spicy curry sauce on the side.  They were served on wooden boards, which was fun. The beer and wine were excellent, too.
A retired pastor sat at the table next to ours. He really wanted to practise his English, so he talked to us about anything and everything.  When our food arrived and I commented on how unusual the presentation was, he explained that the presentation was culture.  There is a bigger difference in Germany than in America between culture and civilization, he said.  In Germany, a subway is civilization, but the traditional Frankish food we were eating was culture.