München

I am constantly getting the coin-toss decision, between pronouncing "ch" as "sh" or that gutteral sound, wrong.  Somebody told me that if it follows an 's' then it's "sh", but on listening to what people actually say I'm thinking that's similar to a rule in English.  Anyway, I'm reliably told with München you can let rip with the gutteral sounds as if you were Welsh.  Don't blame me if you run into problems by misinterpreting that.

I haven't taken a lot of photos in Munich, mainly because I've just been sleeping there while visiting the outskirts during the day.  Then when I go to places I probably should photograph, I don't bother.  For instance, I went to the Hofbräuhaus today, and didn't even get my camera out.  I didn't even get a beer.  Maybe it's always this busy, or maybe it's a delayed May day celebration, but I couldn't find a seat.  It sure did make me hungry, though.  I get the feeling it's more enjoyable with a larger group than one, though.  Seems to be set up for crowds.

Earlier in the week I popped along to the Frülingsfest, which seems to be everywhere in Bavaria but in Munich is held on a small portion of the grounds that Oktoberfest is held on.  Given how much of this land is not used it must be a pale imitation, although once inside a beer tent, how would you even know?  It reminded me of the RNA Show, but focusing on beer tents.

One thing that had completely gone past me until this point is that you're supposed to tip somebody for going to the toilet.  I probably read that somewhere and forgot about it.  People say things to you in German that I assume are smart-arse when you don't.

Now forgive me for posting another photo of a church, but this is an establishing shot...

The cathedral in Munich.

Now I may be missing something here, and I apologise to the religious folk I'm about to offend, but surely these artists were taking the piss.

Jesus chilling out with a lamb in Munich.

Now I'm sure it could be argued that I'm not sorry at all for offending people, so I'll try to clarify my thoughts.  The sort of iconography I'm accustomed to from my upbringing in Australia tends to distil the themes and images into a fairly modern and digestible form, probably because colonial Australia hasn't been around for very long.  Going into these cathedrals in Germany you see different artwork around the place that can be centuries apart.  What's more, is that there's a lot of art that is quite topical to the time that it was produced, and is really intended to be understood by its contemporary audience, not scum from the future like me.  Because an artwork was produced for a specific location, it remains there.  In Australia, where not a lot of art has been custom made for a church (and if it has, it's not too old), any artwork displayed is chosen for fitting in with a more modern religious perspective.  In Europe the original art is still there, even if it's open to wild postmodern misinterpretation by people like me.

Some people suggest that the only thing studying philosophy does is to prepare you for rationalising anything.  Others may disagree that I successfully rationalised my stance at all.

On a lighter note, the Ubahn station at Marienplatz is super-cool.

Some of the subway trains you get look to be of a similar vintage, with vinyl wood grain veneer panelling everywhere in the interior.  I would have taken a photo of that, but I was embarrassed.  In Australia you can be interpreted as a terrorist for taking photos of public transport.  Who knows what happens in Germany.  You should see the uniforms the authorities have here.  I'm way too scared to point a camera at them.  Trainspotters beware...