The Augustiner Museum was closed for renovations last year, so it wasn't until this past Saturday that we were finally able to pay it a visit. Small but beautifully arranged, the museum includes some impressively tall statues and gargoyles from the Muenster--centuries-old originals that were replaced to prevent decay--respectively depicting the twelve apostles and the seven deadly sins. And thanks to the backside of a c. 1500 altar cabinet painted by Martin Schaffner et al., we learned that 15th-century sinners got what was coming to them for playing backgammon naked.
Monday, August 2, 2010
Augustiner Museum
The Augustiner Museum was closed for renovations last year, so it wasn't until this past Saturday that we were finally able to pay it a visit. Small but beautifully arranged, the museum includes some impressively tall statues and gargoyles from the Muenster--centuries-old originals that were replaced to prevent decay--respectively depicting the twelve apostles and the seven deadly sins. And thanks to the backside of a c. 1500 altar cabinet painted by Martin Schaffner et al., we learned that 15th-century sinners got what was coming to them for playing backgammon naked.
Back in Freiburg
Thanks to an odd twist of fate, as of this afternoon we're back in our old apartment in Freiburg for the next few weeks. We spent the past three nights staying with friends Wolfgang, Christina, and Terisa on the building's third floor (which would be the fourth floor in the U.S.--I want full credit for all those stairs) while the tenants who replaced us in December moved out. That was more than sufficient time for Terisa, age 3.5, to fall madly in love with Elias (actually, he was targeted before we even arrived). Elias in turn demonstrated he's a remarkably gracious and good-humored 9-year-old.
Elias is spending this week at a summer camp at the Weiherhof school, practically in our backyard. He attended the same camp last year, and we thought it would be a good way for him to meet up with kids again and hone his German. The teachers were delighted to see him this morning, and Elias was delighted to reconnect with three of his best school friends. After camp, Elias went across the street to trade soccer cards with his faithful pen-pal and fellow camper Johannes.
Elias is spending this week at a summer camp at the Weiherhof school, practically in our backyard. He attended the same camp last year, and we thought it would be a good way for him to meet up with kids again and hone his German. The teachers were delighted to see him this morning, and Elias was delighted to reconnect with three of his best school friends. After camp, Elias went across the street to trade soccer cards with his faithful pen-pal and fellow camper Johannes.
Nothing is sacred
I'm sure German can be a poetic language when it wants to be, yet it is a language of unexpectedly limited vocabulary. This is ironic, given that German allows speakers to invent new words by smashing multiple old ones together; but German ran out of phonetic Ur-combinations some time ago. Thus it has to use the same word, die Dichtung, to mean both poetry (hail Goethe, hail Schiller, hail Heine) and gasket (hail exhaust manifold, hail intake air duct).
Granted, English does the same thing. Take the noun key, for example, which can be both something to unlock a door (der Schlüssel) and something to affect sound production in a musical instrument (die Taste).
Still, you'd think concepts like poetry are sacred enough that the Volk would have found a different word/concept to share with gasket--say, das Radieschen (radish) or der Elch (elk). Maybe gaskets were invented before verse.
If poetry is not sacred enough, what is? We merely need turn to the word for mother--die Mutter--to learn that nothing is. Die Mutter means both mother and screw nut. The crass English double meanings of screw and nut perhaps highlight that I shouldn't be too critical of German. Still, mother and nut?
German reserves der Vater solely for male progenitors, so maybe we can simply blame all of this on The Patriarchy.
Granted, English does the same thing. Take the noun key, for example, which can be both something to unlock a door (der Schlüssel) and something to affect sound production in a musical instrument (die Taste).
Still, you'd think concepts like poetry are sacred enough that the Volk would have found a different word/concept to share with gasket--say, das Radieschen (radish) or der Elch (elk). Maybe gaskets were invented before verse.
If poetry is not sacred enough, what is? We merely need turn to the word for mother--die Mutter--to learn that nothing is. Die Mutter means both mother and screw nut. The crass English double meanings of screw and nut perhaps highlight that I shouldn't be too critical of German. Still, mother and nut?
German reserves der Vater solely for male progenitors, so maybe we can simply blame all of this on The Patriarchy.
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Koenigstuhl
We are visiting our friends Hans-Walter and MaryBeth in Heidelberg, Germany for a few days before heading down to Freiburg, which means we are enjoying good company and eating well.Today, Elias, Stefan, and I hiked up the Koenigstuhl (the local mountain or hill, depending on your standards) to the Max Planck Institut fuer Astronomie to meet Hans-Walter for lunch. We arrived an hour late because we got caught in a thunderstorm and had to hunker down in a shelter for about 30 minutes before continuing on in the rain. The sun emerged just as we reached our destination, but by then, Hans-Walter was late for a meeting, so we didn't get to see much of the Institute. We did enjoy seeing this lovely, late 19th-c. gate to the Sternwarte (observatory). I photographed it at an imposing angle, as the gate looked somewhat less elegant with the big recycling bin in the background.
Frankfurt to Heidelberg
A train! A train! A train! A train! Could you, would you, on a train?...Would you, could you, in the rain?I would not, could not, in the rain. Not in the dark. Not on a train...
Friday, January 1, 2010
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