A Week of Wandering: Munich

Here is a thorough account of M.'s and my journeyings, which will fall into this schedule (estimated times):

August 19th, 10:15 p.m. - August 21st, 8:52 a.m.: Munich
August 21st, 10:55 a.m. - 3:45 p.m. - Füssen
August 21st, 5:50 p.m. - 10:45 p.m. - Munich
August 22nd, 8:30 a.m. - August 23rd, 1:30 p.m.: Kevelaer
August 23rd, 3:30 p.m. - 6:30 p.m.: Nürnberg
August 23rd, 8:00 p.m. - August 25th, 9:41 a.m.: Würzburg
August 25th, 9:41 a.m. - 2:30 p.m.: Rothenburg ob der Tauber
August 25th, 10:13 p.m.: Back in Berlin!

Our arrival in Munich I have described, I believe, sufficiently. After my internet session, which was expensive at 1 Euro for 20 minutes, we locked our bags to the metal double bed, took our purses, and went off for a walk on our own account. Though the M— C— Hostel is nominally on the Landsberger Straße, it is really on the Bayerstraße, a broad unhappy wasteland of clean large buildings leading down to the Hauptbahnhof and the joyous bustle at the square with the great modern fountain and flowers and light brown façade of the Osram building. There are two tram lines running down the centre, patched road to either side, but the sidewalks are a trifle too narrow, if one factors in pedestrians, and cyclists speeding past each other in opposite directions as half of them are apparently too lazy to ride along their rightful side of the street. Across from us there were two tall brick buildings which were presumably from the late 19th century: an Augustiner beer house, which has a nice but expensive air, and a beer distillery, with a large brick smokestack. The distillery emanates a disagreeable yeasty odour that filled our room.

As we walked down the street, we saw signs for Bavaria's state congress ("Landtag") elections. The represented political parties were the CSU, Green Party, and the Ökologisch-Demokratische Partei, and the posters for the last two were spattered with brown liquid or torn up the next time we walked past. Street construction workers were laying a new strip of asphalt along the edge of the road, which made for an unpleasant interlude in the promenade, near the long-stretching European Patent Office with its bridge over the street. Then we turned right toward turquoise church spires that we spotted over the apartment buildings, to find St. Paul's, a nice Neogothic church (built 1897-1906) that was unremarkable but most satisfactory, with its generous sprinkling of gargoyles, a demonic bull sculpture that jutted out above a doorway in companionship with a grinning sheep, a flying buttress or two, knobbly arches over the doorways, and the golden weathervanes that perched on the spires' peaks.

Turning back, we returned to the hostel to find that the free guided tour of the city would start shortly. If we started at the hostel, however, we would have had to take the bus, and we were determined to avoid this. I was particularly determined, as I had spent 249 Euros on my train pass, and had arrived in Munich as the proud but anxious possessor of only a 10 Euro bill and small change. For some reason (presumably because I have a weekly withdrawal limit, which I had reached), the EC automated teller machines would not allow me to withdraw any more money after I took out 50 Euros at the Munich Hauptbahnhof on the day of our arrival.

* * *

So we walked up the Bayerstraße, through the cheerful fountain square, along the Neuhauser Straße with its gate and its fruit vendor stands and its upscale shops, to the uproar that is Marienplatz. By the time we saw the Platz, I had a most favourable impression of Munich. There were many people, not only tourists but also natives, strolling about the streets, so it was alive; these people were well-dressed and often had a relaxed and intelligent air; the flowers and older buildings were beautiful; the streets and sidewalks were reasonably well tended; and I liked the trams. When we reached Marienplatz, I liked the Neues Rathaus very much, though the Glockenspiel and its cutesy figures dancing around to the chiming tune of the Marseillaise and who knows what else are not quite my cup of tea. The edifice is intricate, impressive, and venerably aged, has a suitable air of mystery in its interior courtyards and otherwise, and I love the banks of pink flowers that lend life and vigour. Earlier on I was trying to explain the visible difference between Gothic and Neogothic (a subject I admittedly don't know much about) to M., and one difference that came to mind is that Neogothic buildings are often simplified or adhere to familiar patterns to avoid the strain of imagining and executing more fanciful and original designs. But this criticism cannot be levelled at the Neues Rathaus, even if it was built in the first decade of the 20th century.

* * *

In the middle of the square there is, of course, the Mariensäule, built after Munich was spared by the Swedish army during the Thirty Years' War, from 1638. It is a red stone pillar, whose base is defended by four armed bronze cherubs who are trampling on a basilisk (=plague), a snake (=heresy=Protestantism), a dragon (=famine), and a lion (=warfare), and whose tip is graced by the golden statue of Mary. There were three or four young people in red T-shirts standing there, surrounded by a flock of tourists. One of the people bellowed out in an Aussie or Kiwi accent that we should get our free tickets from him, which M. and I promptly did. At length we were given an introduction to the tour, herded into the courtyard of the Neues Rathaus, half-voluntarily crowded together to pose for a group photo (I was concealed behind a tall person, and quite content to leave it that way), and then divided into groups. Then we wandered off and saw a fair list of the major sites in Munich, with the sole glaring omissions of St. Lukas, the Michaelskirche, the Nymphenburg Palace, and the Alte and Neue Pinakothek.

The tour itself was quite friendly and conscientiously thought through. The jokes (in-jokes that are intended to give one the sense of being initiated into special knowledge, mildly amusing anecdotes, or puns) and the information were carefully scripted and popularized; and this information was designed to enlighten people who know nothing about Germany, except for the concepts of Berlin and Hitler and sauerkraut. But that is a question of taste and not of quality. As for the other people in the group, they were mostly Australian, Irish, Canadian, Brazilian, Portuguese, or German.

The Frauenkirche did not impress me much. The "Devil's Footstep" in the entrance of the church is a tame imprint of a human shoe (surely the devil has cloven hooves?) with a little smear coming off the heel, as I've seen often enough in asphalt or in cement if someone has walked on it too soon. — I'm a terrible grouch, I know. (c: — The Altes Rathaus and St. Peter did not impress me much either, though we entered neither, so maybe I would have felt differently about them if I had. Beside the Altes Rathaus there is a statue of Juliet, which was donated by the city of Verona, and the legend goes that those who place flowers in her arms will find love; at this point in the tour I was skeptical again, and thought what a convenient thing it is that there are so many lucky sculptures in places which just happen to want to attract tourists.

After these stalwart older buildings, we ambled along the rich shopping street of the Maximilianstraße, with its ridiculously expensive objects and reasonably nice buildings, then to the environs of the Theatinerkirche and the Residenz, the latter of which was unimpressive when we saw it because it was obscured on one side by a sheeting due to renovation. We also passed the Hofbräuhaus, where we were refreshed by a tasteless anecdote or two. The tour guide also broached newer history, extremely soberly, and he lowered his voice and wanted us to crowd closer to him whenever he mentioned the Nazi era. He pointed out the spot where Hitler was almost assassinated, and then the trail in brass(?) cobblestones that marks the route where people would walk in the 1930s and 40s to avoid having to give the Nazi salute at the spot, as well as a plaque on the wall of a building which, as a Jewish-owned department store, was destroyed on Kristallnacht. His thesis on Munich's attitude toward the Nazi years was that it prefers to quietly remember and to look forward, unlike Berlin, with its ostentatious Holocaust Memorial. I did not like the new Jewish Synagogue at all, not least because the colours and bleakness reminded me a good deal of Nazi architecture. When the tour guide explained that the rough blocks of tan-coloured stone at one end of the building are intended to represent the desert, I felt marginally fonder of it, but learning that the black superstructure is intended to represent the tent of Jacob still did nothing for me.

We stopped at the Viktualienmarkt, which I liked very much, with its flourishing range of pricy fresh fruit and vegetables, honey and wines. The tour guide company is hand-in-glove with Starbucks, so we were encouraged to enter it, but M. and I bought green grapes at the market instead. We finished the tour at the Hofgarten, where a violinist was standing in an echoing portico playing the "greatest hits" (Kreisler's "Liebesfreud," etc.) with much absorption and sincerity. I worried about how much to tip the tour guide; before we went on the tour, I had thought that it was free because the hostel was paying the guides, but it wasn't. The guide had mentioned earlier that his rent was 450 Euros per month, and at another point that he contributes a portion of his earnings to his tour guide company. As M. and I were the first to tip him, and at least a third of the rest of the group had no apparent intention of doing so, I was wondering how he can scrape together enough money to live. His aspect was dejected as he accepted the 3 Euros I gave him (I would have made it more if I hadn't wanted to give money to the violinist, too), and I felt guilty about it.

As for the violinist, I did give the money, and later when we returned to the Garten I quickly talked with him. He had a round pink face and beetling brows, a country- rather than city-dwelling aspect, and was presumably in his sixties. He had studied at a conservatory in Minsk, then played in a symphonic orchestra for years, and that now he teaches. When I had said that I had liked his playing, he offered one of his CDs; but I refused to buy any as nicely as I could, and felt guilty again, this time for giving the impression that I was admiring his music without being willing to go so far as parting with any money (I don't think he had seen me throw the coins into the violin case earlier).

We walked on to the Englischer Garten, which Papa and Mama had highly recommended, and found the park beautiful, but the prospect of a long walk was not enchanting to either M. or me, so we soon turned back toward the city. It was fun to watch the surfers in the mechanically created "whitewater" where the river water flows in near the Japanese tea house, though, and we liked the "temple" that overlooks the south of the park and the Frauenkirche. As we passed the art gallery, we also passed someone who looked like Günter Grass, at which point I was quite excited. But I always tell myself that, where famous people and lavish furnishings/buildings/etc. are concerned, the order of the day is nil admirari, unless the admiration is a genuine and spontaneous response to their worth and not their fame or pomp.

Then we went back to the hostel, quite tired, buying provisions at Galeria Kaufhof along the way. I ate and drank a little, showered, cried a little, and then went to sleep early.