Sunday - Tuesday June 1 - 3, 2008 (diary, travel)

Very good news. My daughter in law Lisa in Darwin is pregnant. If everything goes well there will be a brand new Furstner in this world sometime in February next year. I have no idea how it will feel being a grandfather but with a bit of luck I will find out.
Here in St.Peter it is quiet. Cloudy days but with enough blue patches for me to sit in the sun and contemplate. I am a man with only two modes of motion in life, stop and go, and patience has never been a particular friend of mine. But on the emotional front that is what is required right now.
In the evenings I take Wivica sometimes out to dinner. The best local restaurant is the Bürgerstüble, they have a varied menu (including Pangasius) and a great chef.

I am waiting for some definite good weather to come our way before going on my next venture.

1. This will be a trip first to Stetten am kalten Markt to take some pictures of the old army days stamping ground of Marc Villeneuve.
   
   
2. Then onto Füssen at the end of the German Romantische Strasse, located in the so called Köningswinkle near the Austrian border and the famous Schloss Neuschwanstein of King Ludwig II. There are two camping grounds right on the lake which could be quite nice to stay for a couple of days.
   
   
3. From Füssen I will probably proceed to Lienz in Austria, then heading North over the Grossglockner Strasse to Zell am See I heard good reports about.

Wednesday June 4, 2008 (diary, travel, H₂O)

As I wake up in the morning I see the fog outside my window. The upper part of the Black Forest is reaching well into the clouds. It is not cold, only the dampness of millions of tiny water specks descending slowly onto the grass and trees around me as I sit outside under a large umbrella.

The pond of my emotions is stirring, now for days on end, by the restless currents of love, of yearning. Is it a mere coincidence that the Antien great love of my first life and the possible one of my (present and) last were born (although some years apart) on the exact same date of the year ? Or does it reflect a symbolic symmetry in my life which suggests that it should be this way ?
It is a wonderful feature of life that emotions do not fade away with age. In fact they become stronger and ever more precious as on gets older, but therefore harder to deal with too as a consequence. She is in Singapore now (out of IT contact for 10 days) visiting her grandchild. (Women naturally need a much closer hands on contact with their grandchildren than men, who remain more remote. At least that is how I feel at present.)

My visit to the Spanish Mediterranean last week had a special purpose : water.
Water is the only substance that exists on earth quite naturally and simultaneously in its three different forms of entropy (order, molecular symmetry) : gas, liquid and solid. It occurs in the air, on the surface and deep underground, and it is an important component of every living organism on this planet.

Water has also been the great facilitator which enabled the development and eventual worldwide spread of Western civilisation. The prominent Australian historian Geoffrey Blainey points out (in his "Short History of the World") the important role the Mediterranean sea played as means of communication in the interaction, development and spreading of the Greek culture around the Mediterranean shores.
I had previously been to several places along the Mediterranean coast, but never with the above notion in mind. Many areas along its shores (and I must agree with travel author Paul Theroux on this) have become rather depressing places degraded by tasteless tourist developments. But in Cadaqués, with much of its authenticity still intact, I was able to relate back to those important early Centuries and reflect on it with pleasure.

The Roman empire of course consolidated the Greek culture (without adding to it) and enabled its spread inland through its brilliant network of roads. Although during following Centuries Western culture penetrated much of Europe it did not progress much in depth and quality throughout the Dark Ages.
The second great burst of development, again facilitated through the medium of water, started in the 15th Century with the great discoveries by sea which in turn kick started the Renaissance (and further development which continues to this day), and simultaneously spread Western civilisation around the globe.
This last Century we have finally followed water into the air, and overtaken it through our telecommunications and other IT developments spanning our planet and reaching far into outer space. But it was water that got us there.

Thursday June 5, 2008 (diary, travel)

It is still foggy today, so we decide to drive down to Freiburg for lunch and some shopping. I go to Wivica's hair dresser who also does haircuts for men. After some discussion she gives me a 6 mm crew cut, which feels the same as a "Number 1" in Australia. I hate it when my hair starts to curl around the ears and feel much better afterwards.

I also browse a while through the superb bookshop they have here and, much intrigued, buy a German translation of the French novel Suite française by Irène Némirovsky, set in Paris during World War 2. Irène was a Russian Jew (born in Kiev in 1903) who fled to Paris after the October Revolution, where she became an instant celebrity after the publication of her first novel. Tragically she was arrested in 1942 and died in Auschwitz just 4 weeks later.
Her daughter Denise Epstein found only 5 years ago the manuscript for Suite française amongst her belongings and had it published recently for the first time. (Her books are also available in English translation.)
Even after reading the very first page I vividly recall the feelings and mood I felt myself as a young boy during that time.

We have lunch at the Mai-Wok Thai Cafe. It is very good and always busy during lunch time. I can see that Wivica and Doug have at least one thing in common : they both love crispy duck, only about € 7 here for a really substantial portion. I stick by my fried noodles, which are quite good too.
Back home I spend some time in the Zähringer-Eck Cafe reading a paper and enjoying a beer. All the German papers have Barak Obama on their front page, with extensive coverage of his victory and speculation about what Hillary Clinton now will do.   The news for the milk farmers is also positive. It looks like they are getting a 10 euro cents raise (per kg) for their milk.
I check my online statistics (over 24,000 visitors each week now) and see that there are 46 visitors on my web site at that very moment, one is from Singapore I notice. Is it she I wonder ?   I am thinking of her.