peace, freedom, nature, go green, travelling, economy, gold, silver, commodities, investing, corrupt politics, small dirty central banks, activism, anarchocapitalism, fairness, ZEITGEISTMOVIE.com, no NWO, OWS, OccupyWallStreet, OccupyWarStreet, OccupyYourStreet, OccupyTogether, RealDemocracyNow => save the world :o))
what about our nice birthday party in cadolzburg close to nuremberg / nürnberg? well, we met friends and listened to the frankonian (fränkisch) cabaret artist sven bach. unfortunately, there are not many pictures i can show you. why? well, my wife and her hypnosis therapist friend didn't censored their dirndl pictures by now. i fear they will not allow me to post them in the internet as they are prettier as the police allows :-)
happy birthday, dear dimitra ;-)
anyway, at the way back to munich we have visited the historic and 'holy' city of eichstätt with its catholic university, dome, bishop, many many churches, ...
the dome / dom
peace :-)
city center
the walk around and the castle willibaldsburg were the places we liked most
great, there were 320,000 people in the rainy streets in 7 german cities against the planned CETA & TTIP trade agreements between the EU and CANADA + USA. in munich we have been 25,000 activists out there.
yes, we people know this agreements are just made for the big corporations and is not good for us. how could the lowering of standards in quality and working conditions or external corporate courts instead of national parliaments be good for the people? no way!
what if the reigning corrupt european politicians (= mostly puppets of big business) will sign that or similar 'free trade' agreements anyway? well, then we probably only can boycott consume as far as possible and boycott big corporations by buying local products from local farmers and local businesses, will we?
enjoy few pictures:
my protest umbrella ~ people should decide about it, not politicians and corporations ...
some police out there
the protest march through the rainy streets of munich
back at odeonsplatz square ~ hans söllner performing his protest songs
what we really want: system change (systemwechsel)
even more pictures in the combined album about the july 2016 protest and from today: HERE
what to say about our caucasus trip in early september? that's easy: armenia won, georgia lost. probably because our travel guide in armenia, hakob (jacob), was many many times better than his georgian colleague arthur ... and because the armenians we met were somehow more friendly to us than georgians. anyway, my dusty school russian is still well enough for travelling in caucasus.
... damn, what if the georgians do not like russia anymore because of the conflicts with south ossetia & abkhazia and thus do not like to speak russian? hell, what if they like only their new 'friends' americans? there is even a g.w. bush street in tbilisi => OMG, OMG, OMG :-( => IMHO is g.w. bush an ugly mass murder / war monger / war criminal (who attacked iraq & afghanistan which didn't threaten any other country and especially not the usa. even in the 9/11 issue was not a single afghani involved) => btw, can you imagine a hitler street or göhring square in today's germany?
off-topic: who believes in american 'friendship'? the americans murdered about 100 millions native americans; enslaved the black; supported the soviets against germans in WWII when the soviet victory became obvious, but supported the western germans against soviets directly after WWII; they thrown nuclear bombs on the japanese; thrown napalm & agent orange on the vietnamese; shot uranium ammunition on the iraqies and serbs; still support al-nusra, al-qaeda and isis in syria, ... if you asked me, the americans (not the ordinary people, but the dark powers which rules the white house & government) will always follow their own interests and never consider interests of any other nation or the earth itself UNLESS the american people abolish these dark powers and start to rule their country and its foreign policy on principles of respect and equality (liberty, equality, fraternity!) ... or at least according to their own constitution and not on the principles of imperialism as today.
what to say in short? well, georgia (or sakartwelo as the georgians call their country) is a beautiful, green, orthodox catholic, country in the caucasus mountains. economically much better off than its neighbor armenia, mostly probably because after the georgians got rid of shevardnadze (he is now some ministry in the ukraine and would be arrested when in georgia), the new government (saakashvili) fought successfully corruption, e.g. in 2005 they fired the entire traffic police force (around 30,000 people) due to corruption and hired & trained new well paid officers. today are almost all police stations a light glass buildings in order to demonstrate the new transparence. well, without massive corruption and jobs for the boys approach can the georgian economy develop quite freely now. the most important business partner is still russia. tbilisi is a really save place (and much nicer than yerevan) even if there is also much too much traffic noise and thus not easy to find a quiet place to relax / drink coffee / etc....
unlike armenia where the most tourists were probably ethnic armenians from abroad, in georgia have been many tourists from russia and many from pakistan. in the northern mountains there were a different category of tourists: hikers and climbers mostly from eastern europe (czech republic, russia, poland). more coming soon or never ...
few words about our travel guide: he couldn't find hotels, restaurants where we were supposed to go; didn't tell in advance which clothes we need (swimsuit for water reservoir or warm clothes for 2,000m high stepanzminda); couldn't tell exactly what time we should meet after visiting a site or even changed the appointed time after we left the group, couldn't tell much about history / politics / countryside / famous georgians (infamous known former soviet dictator stalin) and thus read with a deadly monotonous voice wikipedia & travel guide book articles; forgot few people from our group in the hotel when we went to a group dinner, couldn't organize the drinks / booked services in restaurants, on our both trips outside of tbilisi we went there and back the same roads and thus saw the same countryside twice; he was not able to organize a break where we could see something interesting even not a single view point / photo stop on the road, he led us to the cable car in tbilisi at time when the cable car was closed and we had to wait 45 minutes in front of a closed gate ==> a catastrophe, if you asked me :-)
at least his recommendation of the traditional restaurant 'pur pur' in tbilisi and the proposal to go by metro were good ideas.
few most interesting pictures:
ananuri (church and fortress) at the zhinvali water reservoir where i swum later on :-)
the church jvari with the remains of former defense walls above the city of mzcheta (mtskheta)
mzcheta (mtskheta)
the wall of soviet friendship (or s.th. similar to that name => 1793 - 1983 = 200 years of russian-georgian friendship) ... and yes, behind the mountain is south ossetia, a territory where the ossetian nation suffered war (genocide?) and assimilation politics from georgians. for example, the ossetians were forced to use georgian alphabet instead of cyrillic. of course would south ossetia like to join russia, especially its north ossetia region. for the moment (because of western pressure?) russia does not respond to this wish accordingly to south ossetian dream but at least russia supports south ossetia economically and protects also its borders from georgia military. russia is also one of very few countries (5-7?) which recognize south ossetia as a sovereign country ...please read more on wikipedia about this issue and the similar conflict between georgia and abkhazia / abchasien (capital sukhumi)
mother russia holds (its) boy georgia
coming closer to the gergeti church (2170m) in village stepanzminda below the 3rd highest mountain in georgia, kazbegi (5047 meters above sea level)
for me somehow turkish looking city of signati (sighnaghi) in the wine making area kakheti (kachetien)
the turkish / muslim part of tbilisi (tiflis)
this restaurant in former hammam (turkish steam bath) is proud because g.w. bush visited it (in 2006?). if i knew that earlier we would go to eat somewhere else, but i have seen the bush picture when i went to the toilet ... ughhhh (old town, sulfur baths area of tbilisi)
many, many more pictures which capture my memories (together 200+ mostly commented pictures) arehere, sowatch just the overview first and zoom in only for the most interesting ones, otherwise it will be boring for you, i guess :-)
a sound example from georgia. but watch out, that talented russian speaking guy is an ukrainian :-)
what to say about our caucasus trip in early september? that's easy: armenia won, georgia lost :-). probably because our travel guide in armenia, hakob (jacob), was many many times better than his georgian colleague arthur ... and because the armenians we met were somehow more friendly to us than most of the georgians. anyway, my dusty school russian is still well enough for travelling in caucasus.
*** the folowing paragraph makes more sense for georgia than for armenia, so just ignore it here :-)
... damn, what if the georgians do not like russia anymore because of the conflicts with south ossetia & abkhazia and thus do not like to speak russian? hell, what if they like only their new 'friends' americans. there is even a g.w. bush street in tbilisi => OMG, OMG, OMG :-( => IMHO is g.w. bush an ugly mass murder / war monger / war criminal (who attacked iraq & afghanistan which didn't threaten any other country and especially not usa. even in the 9/11 issue was not a single afghani involved)=> btw, can you imagine a hitler street or göhring square in today's germany?
off-topic: who believes in american 'friendship'? the americans murdered about 100 millions native americans; enslaved the black; supported the soviets against germans in WWII when the soviet victory became obvious, but supported the western germans against soviets directly after WWII; they thrown nuclear bombs on the japanese; thrown napalm & agent orange on the vietnamese; shot uranium ammunition on the iraqies and serbs; still support al-nusra, al-qaeda and isis in syria, ... if you asked me, the americans (not the ordinary people, but the dark powers which rules the white house & government) will always follow their own interests and never consider interests of any other nation or the earth itself UNLESS the american people abolish these dark powers and start to rule their country and its foreign policy on principles of respect and equality (liberty, equality, fraternity!) .. or at least according to their own constitution and not on the principles of imperialism as today.
what to say in short? well, armenia is a very nice and interesting country with friendly people and especially beautiful women (there are hundreds of kim kardashians walking in the streets of yerevan). there are many, many mostly dry and bleak mountains and there is almost everywhere still present the genocide and diaspora armenians suffered that badly ... so sad ... well, the turks and partially also the kurds murdered around 1,000,000 armenians in the ottoman empire in the early 20th century (most of them 1915-1922) and many other flown the country, so out of 10 million ethnic armenians there are 7 millions living abroad. the last million left armenia in the nineties after the breakdown of soviet union because of serius economic difficulties.
few most interesting pictures:
big and small ararat (3896 metres and 5137 metres high respectively), the holy mountain of all armenians is in kurdistan (turkey) today
armenia is the first christian state on earth, so there were many opportunities to burn a candle a to place a wish, my dears. christianity became the national religion in 301 AD if i remember that date correctly
surb hripsime church from 7th century in vagharshapat / etchmiadzin / etschmiadsin / echmiadzin (finished 618 A.D.) was the first of many unesco world cultural heritage sites we have visited in armenia ~ at this place was before a mausoleum (church) from late 4th century A.D. for the roman nun hripsime and her nun-sisters murdered around the year 300 A.D. on command of the armenian king trdat III.
genocide memorial, yerevan
yerevan / eriwan / jerewan / jerevan
geghard monastery
pre-christian hellenistic temple in garni
chor virap monastery + ararat, the only peak far and wide. no wonder that noah's ark docked here (arca noae)
noravank monastery
areni, the probably oldest wine making area of the world (and a name for a local wine sort)
hills, hills, hills
coming closer to the selim pass
a lonely volcano in the armenian highlands south of lake sevan
swimming in lake sevan at 1,900 metres above the sea level
goshavank monastery (or gosh monastery as avank means church/monastery, i believe)
there were many industrial ruins from soviet times in armenia and georgia. this factory in vanadzor is still in business, i think
dancing with the hotel personnel in haghpat
alaverdi / haghpat
haghpat monastery
akhtala monastery
russia meets armenia
mane, the armenian cognac / brandy and yes, ararat cognac is the next famous brand
armenian alphabet and numbers
many, many more pictures which capture my memories (together 200 often commented pictures) are HERE, so watch just the overview first and zoom in only for the most interesting ones, otherwise it will be boring for you, i guess :-)
and here are my notes i made during our round trip (mostly in german as we were a group of 16 elderly and unfortunately often really complicated tourists from germany):
barylouis armenia - good morning (good light) - guten morgen
the country with the nicest women i have ever seen. there were hundreds of Kim Kardashians walking in the streets of yerevan ;-) ... and a country of mountains and stones
the first Christian state of the world (since 301 a.d.)
the armenians call their country hayastan
Jerewan - 2800 Jahre alt... 782 v. Chr.
Diaspora - 7 Mio der 10 Mio Armenier leben im Ausland
1915 Genozid in Westarmenien (Türkei) mit 1 - 1,5 mio ermordeten Armeniern
301 n. chr. Christentum erste Staatsreligion weltweit... besuch der Kirche surb hripsime aus dem 7. Jhdt.
Viele UNESCO weltkulturerbestätten, meistens ohne Eintrittsgeld, da der Tourismus noch kaum entwickelt ist
1512 wurde das erste armenische Buch (in Venedig) geDRUCKT
1991 Unabhängigkeit nach dem zerfall der sovietunion
Ararat, 5165m, heutige türkei, 2 NATO Militärbasen :-(
Superschöne Frauen, thousands of Kim Kardashians walking in the streets of Yerevan
Sauberes Wasser, gesundes Essen, saubere Straßen
405 n. Chr. armenisches alphabet erfunden mit 36 Buchstaben. Heute 39 Buchstaben, bis 17xx wurden Buchstaben auch als zahlen benutzt... Alphabet-Reihen: Einser, Zehner, Tausender...
Lastiver igevan - ijevan - ijevan - hiking in north armenia => Daravand - hotel
traurige flötenmusik (duduk ~ Aprikosenrohr)
Sewansee - 1900m hoch, 80 km lang, bis max. 50 km breit und seit der sovietischen wasserstromnutzung ist der wasserspiegel um 19m gesunken. So war die sewan Halbinsel früher eine Insel.... In der Chruschtschowzeit durch einen Kanal mit Wasserzufluss gerettet und der wasserspiegel um 3-4m auf das heutige wunschniveau angestiegen
Molokovci (Molokanen) - milk drinkers - russische Minderheit zwangsumgesiedelt vor 150 Jahren in der Zarenzeit aufgrund religiöser Rebellion (keine Priester, kein Alkohol, kein Fernseher usw) - mußten keine Steuern zahlen, dafür die pässe bewachen und den postdienst unterstützen
Werbungen vom armenischen Cognac im Internet googlen
1988 Erdbeben, 90er Jahre Wirtschaftskrise insbesondere wg. Zerfall der sovietunion. Danach Energiekrise wegen Krieg um bergkarabach und handelsblokade durch Türkei und Aserbaidschan, darüber hinaus Bombardements und Zerstörung der russischen Gasleitungen durch Aserbaidschaner => 50% aller Wälder abgeholzt :-(
Viele schachweltmeister (Einzel, Mannschaft) ... tigran petrosian... sogar der weltbeste Schachspieler der Welt, garri kasparow, ist mütterlicherseits Armenier und väterlicherseits Jude.
reise-erkenntnis: Sozialismus / sovietische Zeit (SK, CZ, PL, AM, GE, ...) ist noch prägnanter / verbindender als 20 jahre Ehe :-)
Industrieschlucht (kupfer) an der Grenze zu Georgien (Alaverdi)
Korruption und Vetternwirtschaft im Staatsdienst / Politik => Volk leidet und muss hohe steuern zahlen (z.b. 32% bei autoimport gebrauchter Fahrzeuge aus Georgien auf einen von der Regierung festgelegten Tabellenwert, der den tatsächlichen Kaufpreis oft um 100% übersteigt => 64% Steuer). Da aufgrund Korruption auch die Spenden von auslandsarmeniern ausbleiben (kirk kirkorian, charles aznavour & co.), versucht der Staat über Gebühren und schikaneähnliche autoverkehrsstrafen das staatsbudget aufbessern => die Akademiker verkaufen Postkarten oder fahren Taxi in Jerewan UND der armenische exodus insbesondere nach Georgien und Russland geht ungebremst weiter
Wie auch immer, ich drücke dem wunderschönen Land und den so sympathischen Leuten in Armenien die Daumen, damit sie erst einmal ihre korrupten Politiker loswerden und ihr uraltes Land + ihre Kultur bewahren können => GOOD LUCK, ARMENIA
last but not least, some armenian sounds (duduk music ~ wooden pipe)
