szczecin { stettin }

last stop on our poland trip was the former german city stettin (scszecin), a sad example about destructive power of wars .... not only germany lost that beautiful lands and lagoon around the river oder { odra } for ever, but there is even 60 years after the war still so much destruction + ugliness in the very centre of szczecin { stettin } that there is no doubt about the sheer devastation wars leave behind
just jump over to (english language) wikipedia: ... Allied air raids in 1944 and heavy fighting between the German and Soviet armies destroyed 65% of Stettin's buildings and almost all of the city centre, the seaport and local industries. ... curiously says the german language wikipedia, that the old city centre and the port were destroyed by 90% and the remaining parts of stettin by 70% ... i'm not going to seek how many people were killed during and short after the war as i'm still too depressed from swinemünde { Świnoujście } where the allied bombs killed 23,000 out of 40,000 inhabitants :-(

last but not least, szczecin is famous also for the solidarity (solidarnosc) movement and its leader lech walesa which was in 1980 the beginning of the end of socialism in eastern europe

pictures:

old town hall (museum of history today) + main old city square

the 2 restored building facades

inside the museum of history

 
poverty in the the post war socialistic era 

 
graffiti

 

oder river { odra } short before its mouth into the baltic sea

 

 castle

 

more PL-pictures here

NO WARS
.

oktoberfest 2014

tooooo many people out there today ... we have moved to the beer garden next to oktoberfest / theresienwiese ... much cheaper and nice as well .... cheers

there was a bombing in 1980 ... R.I.P

as there was no chance to get a half of a table today, we have moved from thereienwiese to cirkuswiese:

almost all of us

more pictures from 2013 + 2014 here

more coming soon or never 😀

schongau

our 20th wedding anniversary celebration, day #2 on the way home from neuschwanstein => let's see some parts of the world we didn't seen yet => let's visit the medieval city of schongau + the river lech 😄

 bridge over the lech river

lech river - birds of paradise?

more pictures? HERE :-)

anything else? coming soon or never ;o)

eof

lech walesa

i have met a great visionary 2day :)

former polish revolutionary leader of the movement solidarity / solidarnosc (which started in stettin / szczecin in 1980) and later polish president lech walesa hold a speach in the emperor's hall of  munich's residenz, the place where bavarian kings lived for thousands of years ...

lets share few notes, so u can create your own ideas abt the highly interesting evening ;-):

• faith, visions, freedom, solidarity, revolution, great sense of humor, nobel prize for peace
• the polish pope john paul ll was a major hope for poland and a force which has brought millions of polish people together and actually enabled the revolution ... 
• soviet union, communist party ... radish-like communists in eastern europe (only from outside red ;-) ... 
• helmut kohl, hans-dietrich gentscher, berlin wall, mikhail gorbachev ... btw all 'professional' politicians and other leaders/kings (both western and eastern) didnt believe the system change is possible/probable, theyve just rational counted the number of tanks, soldiers, rockets etc and compared that to walesa's vision of change ... thx goodness, all of them were wrong!!! even the so lauded gorbachev told german politicians only 1 month before the berlin wall has fallen forever, that they can start talking abt 'the wall' in 100 years. how wrong was he, my dear!
• egypt +  tunisia + arabic poverty & social disparity driven revolutions
• great chance 4 freedom + peaceful development in our generation without state boarders, badly needed consumers instead of enemies (a new era, isnt it?), globalization ... 
• grotesque western democracy, politicians led/driven not by visions but by television ... 
• common values, united europe led by germany (btw, in germany there isnt a single person who whould publicly speak abt leadership or even think abt stuff like that! at least ive never heard abt person/leader like that cos the hitler era collective guilt feeling/believes last still to heavily over germany!)
• even in western world there is soo much to do (so many jobs meanigful) like eg better multi-layer roads without crossroads and without traffic jams etc
• dont mix politics with religion, ...
• horrible classical music + yummy finger food + drinks ....

what abt my own resume? let's dream how the WORLD COULD LOOK LIKE and let's make that vision true. if people united cannot be defeated :-)

.... and much much more .... comimg soon or never ...

folks, pls don't worry abt my pictures quality, an other guest promised to send me few of his pictures which i will prolly post later on :-)

#1

#2

here we go! lets switch 2 high quality pictures now (source/copyright by robert stefaniak, may 19th 2011, residence munich)

#3

#4

#5 (there was some music as well :-)

#6 (giving advice 2 homo sapiens (via polish-german interpreters as well) how to create a better, free, peaceful, prosperous, fair, SOLIDARY WORLD!)