“Wherever you go, go with all your heart” Confucius
So, Ive realized the titles are getting longer as the trip progresses, hopefully by the end this won’t mean the title are longer than the post as the post are pretty long themselves. The day was bright and it called us out to adventure! We obliged, and our means of arrival, to ADVENTURE, was a little train car thingy! All Aboard!
And we were off for about five minutes…. yah it wasn’t really far at all. We got off in the “main” part of town, really you could walk from one side to the other in like 45 minutes, this was indeed the smallest town we had been to yet and so didn’t really have a main part? Our guide told us he had lived in this town his whole life, like his father and grandfather before him. He had worked in town his whole life and knew everyone. Literally, he said hello by first name with everyone we passed. He took us about and pointed out, like we had seen in previous towns, the high water marks as well as carvings on the outsides of many buildings that told us what the profession of the person who built it was and the year it was built. So we saw old signs for baker or butcher or general town silly person, that last one we weren’t able to find which soon in a talk down by the river became much clearer as to why, there are no silly billies in Germany.
It’s really amazing the ideals to hold onto the culture and past so much that they keep these old buildings and don’t update them and replace parts, especially as they get flooded every few years, something we wouldn’t bother with in the USA, as even where my parents live in Florida, when it flooded so much everyone now is required to build higher up; crazy old Floridians and their tradition be damned! There is a small problem however with holding onto old ideals. We had another uncomfortable conversation about the past and this towns history. So our guide, whom up to this point was just lovely and a sweet little roundish old man, began taking about how this town didn’t sustain much damage back in the war. Except, he explained a few of the bridges that were destroyed when the Americans were approaching the town by “patriotic germans.” I made a very visible face of discomfort and confusion as I knew he was talking about them there nazis. Hold on now, it picks up the brain hurt pace here pretty quick. He explained how his father was a little boy at the time and the townspeople were hiding in their basements when the American troops came into town and how this was the first time that many of them had ever seen a black man, and the soldier gave out pieces of gum to the people and children. Ah, nice right? Making friends and stuff? Well hold on, next he said how the American troops we nice and Patton wouldn’t let them misbehave and how they were respectful and then he said, “but later the “French” came and they had black soldiers, and no one kept them in line and they raped all our women.” All the while looking right at the only black man in the group, our boat and most likely the surrounding 1,000 sq miles or maybe even further. Judging from facial reactions alone, I would believe that Alex and I with our shipmate were the only people who were in shock over what we were hearing. Not even his friends in his group looked shocked but they were native Spanish speakers and I don’t believe the rest of our group didn’t care, it’s a lot to do with the way these things are said. He talks about it in the context of history, this bridge etc. but then he tangents and talks about other things and is able to leap between them because there is a common thread even though it doesn’t actually have anything to do with the actual thing he was originally telling about. Don’t play those games with me, I’m a bullshit master. Anyway people kinda get swept up into it and he’s saying everything in kind of a nice way with slight remorse for the past but also always trying to turn it to how it was bad for them, in such a way you kinda get taken away with it. Again, this is not everyone, our young guide the other day was as human as they come, a real crystal glass. But some people are little less clear and harder to see through.
So we finished the tour with plenty of time to spare, time to walk up the mountain and see the ruined castle and pop into a glass blowing studio belonging to the gentlemen who would on this very evening would come on board to perform a presentation demonstration galore! Again, anyway, we pressed up the mountain from inclined paths to stairs and winding bits we made our way up to a stair case that connected to the drawbridge. We walked around and looked at the small city below, but they wanted to charge for you to go and walk around in the ruins and had signs that pretty much said good luck you’re on your own and the risk is yours. We, with our legs like jelly from the preceding days decided to head back through town to the boat. On the way down however, Alex found a gate left open down a small path we passed. Like the curious cat we branched up the path and found ourselves in the area from which they were charging entrance fees. Thats right we cheated the system! So still tired and hurting but not pretending to be an equestrian dentist and taking the gift we were given we climbed the tower to see like the great birds see! More accurately we had to squeeze up some stairs that I could best describe as a spiral ship ladder staircase to reach the top. Hitting my head on everything as Alex skipped up the stairs with all the room in an empty sky. Finally, we made it to the top. I stood and took in the wonderful breeze, grateful for the fact that I did not become stuck and die wedged in an old staircase left to become part of the attraction. Alex tiered of the view quicker than I and headed back down from where she was apparently yelling back up so she could take my picture but atop a tower higher than heaven I could hear her not. We walked around a bit more and just as we went to leave we saw a Ford SUV in an multi century old castle in a backwood town in Germany and had a giggle, he then drove through our secret gate and it locked behind him with us inside…… So back up through the castle and back down the mountain, still with no entrance fee paid. We stopped in the glass shop and got a gift for Emma who we would be seeing later in the trip and got a little memento for our trip and honeymoon. We took the train back to the boat for another five min drive and talked about sneakers the whole way with a lady sitting next to us. Then we relaxed in the room! Until the man arrived for the glass blowing demonstration!
A man from the town came aboard on one of the locks and put on a demonstration for us. Himself and going back five generations in his family are all glass blowers. He told us about the profession, making glass for science research projects and special items, making glass eyes and how that is a very small specialized group. He talked about how when the wall was up and he was getting started how hard it was but how glass blowers always had work because it was always needed. He talked about glass blowers back in the war and also how they have to stick together and thats why most of the glass blowing done in the whole country happens in this small town that has nearly 20,000 glass workers in the area! He, much like many of the proud and opinionated people, made some jabs at the French as well but even more at the east germans, which was a first we had heard about this but not the last as we would hear about it another three times. Specifically about a tax imposed after the wall came down to help build back up different industries, so in his case money was coming out of his paycheck to help train east germans to do his profession thus taking work from him. He was actually the first person we heard complaining about taxes, it made me feel good to know they all weren’t crazy. He had two young girls come up and help him make Christmas ornaments that he ended up giving to them. Everyone had good fun, we laughed, we jumped a little as he kept breaking glass and we all learned a little more through awkward conversations in Germany!
Erroll & Alex's European Honeymoon Trip! 