w o r d s

… but doesn’t want to. A tale from the Black Forest in Germany.

Once upon a time, in 1791, to be exact, some Benedictine monks in the Black Forest decided to wean the folks in the nearby village off their beloved Schnapps (brandy). Folks were just drinking too much, and often things got out of hand. They were good people, hardworking mountain folk, who lived a short, harsh life logging, farming and making charcoal, deep in the Black Forest. So the Schnapps they made, their moonshine, was the only distraction, the one thing that made life seem a little less harsh. Yet, they drank too much, and the Schnapps also contributed to the shortness of many a man’s life.

So the monks decided that their best chance of cutting down the consuption of Schnapps, was to offer a more nutritious beverage: beer. Monks had been brewing in Germany for as long as any one remembered, and it was a natural thing to suggest for these Benidictine brothers. And so they started the brewery “Am Roten Haus” (The Red House) in Grafenhausen. At roughly 1000 Meters (3000 feet) altitude, it is today the highest brewery in Germany. In 1806 , the brewery became the property of the Grand-Dukes of Baden, and after WWI, the brewery was state-owned.

When I started drinking beer, the Rothaus brews were always a taste of country, and they reminded me of visiting my grandparents. We lived in Stuttgart, and you could not get any Rothaus there (a couple hours’ drive from the Black Forest). Especially in the South, beer is a very regional thing. Every area has its brew. If you’re lost, and you see a Bar, or a Gasthaus, and you see which beer they sell, you can figure out where you are, down to the ZIP code, in some areas.

So Rothaus was the mountain beer, and it had (and has) a very provincial image. They have not changed the label design in 30 years! So when I read in the Spiegel Online that Rothaus has become somewhat of a “cult beer,” I almost dropped my laptop. Apparently, about 100 bars in Berlin sell Rothaus beers and it’s the second most popular beer in Cologne. They just cannot brew enough to satisfy demand. And yet, they don’t even advertise aggressively. I mean it’s great beer. The Tannezäpfle is one of the best Pilsener beers in Germany. But it’s not a hip, sexy beer. Its image is downright boring and provincial.

So are the folks at the brewery excited about all this attention? Do they have plans to expand to fill the demand? Come up with a clever marketing strategy? No. They are quite dubious about this. Their little brewery is just fine the way it is - thank you very much.

Actually, the reasoning is more like this: if they expanded they’d have to buld a new brewery in the valley and they would loose the connection with the community of Grafenhausen. They also might loose the image of the little country brewery, which is a big part of the brand appeal to city folk. And the seven springs where they draw the water can only produce so much water - yet the quality of the water is a huge aspect of quality of the final product.

So what to do? Well, it’s really not that big a deal: brew a decent beer, take care of the local market (90 percent of the beer is still consumed within the state of Baden Württemberg), and see if there is some left over for the city slickers up north.

Nome net huodla, gell! Gsundheit!

Wal Mart is throwing the towel in Germany! Looks like they’ll sell their 85 German stores at a loss of $1Billion to Germany’s largest retailer Metro. I despise Wal Mart, and I find an odd sense of satisfaction in the news that German stubborn attitudes brought Wal Mart, the death star of retail, to its knees. I can just see Grandma Mayer slapping the bagger at the checkout on his fingers: “Those are MY groceries, young man - leave them alone! I bought ‘em -I’ll bag ‘em!”

Maybe stubborn consumer attitudes hurt Wal Mart, but stubborn worker attitudes really gave Wal Mart the rest. You just try telling German store workers they cannot unionize! Wal Mart sports a patronizing corporate “culture” which encourages ratting on fellow workers, frowns on dating fellow workers (not that I think that that’s generally a smart idea) and generally aims at disenfranchising its employees. This did not go over too well with the German workforce and gave Wal Mart a really negative image in the eyes of the consumer.

Seems like Germans have this funny, antiquated sense that store clerks should be competent professionals, and that they should be treated as such by their employers. Those silly Krautheimers and their attitudes!

President Bush is visiting (de) Angela Merkel’s home district in the eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The cute, historic town of Stralsund is under siege: all cars had to be removed to lots outside the town, gutters are welded shut, mailboxes sealed, stores cannot open, and residents are even prohibited from opening their WINDOWS in July! (Remember very few German houses have A/C). And to top it off, no one knows who will foot the 20-million-Euro bill for the visit.

Way to win the “hearts and minds” of the folks in Stralsund …

The NY Times has a story about an odd bit of information from pre-invasion Iraq: apparently German spies in Baghdad provided pretty important information about the Iraqi defenses to the US-led invasion forces.

Two German intelligence agents in Baghdad obtained a copy of Saddam Hussein’s plan to defend the Iraqi capital, which a German official passed on to American commanders a month before the invasion, according to a classified study by the United States military.

In providing the Iraqi document, German intelligence officials offered more significant assistance to the United States than their government has publicly acknowledged. The plan gave the American military an extraordinary window into Iraq’s top-level deliberations, including where and how Mr. Hussein planned to deploy his most loyal troops.
German Intelligence Gave U.S. Iraqi Defense Plan, Report Says, by Michael Gordon, NY Times, Feb. 26, 2006.

Although Germany’s then-chancellor Schröder vigorously argued against the invasion, German troops did perform duties that directly, and controversially, supported the war: they manned AWACS planes and checked for possible effects of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons in Kuwait. Germany was, and is, a major logistics hub for the US military, and German troops provide security at those facilities. So Germany was hardly neutral in this conflict, despite all the political rhetoric. Of course, now we know that Chancellor Schröder was angling for his Gazprom job, so he may have already been working for his new boss Putin.

Morally, the invasion was wrong, I think. For Germany it would have been better to stay neutral. But that would have created a major confrontation with the US, and no one in the German government then had the stomach for that. So now we’re all so “schockiert” that German spooks supplied plans to the US? I mean, once these guys had the plans for the defense of Baghdad, what were they going to do with them? Return them to Saddam’s guys? “Hey look what I found in my fax machine! I think this belongs to you guys ….” Sure, they went to General Tommy with that. Big deal. At that point, the invasion was going to happen anyway. So making it easier for the Americans to oust Saddam was not an unreasonable moral choice.

I am really torn when I ponder the pre-holiday sellout by Germany’s ex-chancellor Schröder to Putin’s little racket Gazprom. Which is the bigger scandal? His cynical, middle-finger-in-your-face exit from the public arena? Or is it even worse that it is apparently perfectly legal to conduct foreign policy for the German people for seven years while netwoking your way into a lucrative job with an international company controlled by the Russian government? And I also want to know what Fischer knew about Schröder’s plans.

Clearly, politicians who retire from the public arena will often sell their experience and contacts to the highest bidder. That’s the reality, and we can probably live with that, as long as we can see clearly that official business is not too blatantly influenced by private economic interests. But the Gazprom job puts Schröder on the same level with Dick Cheney, who lets the U.S. energy industry write its own regulatory framework, and who is clearly in the pocket of companies that profit from the mess in Iraq. And his new job might put Schröder into the same executive suite with Putin, who is exploiting his elected office for his personal enrichment like a banana-republic potentate.

So the $50.000-question is this: when the interests of his employer are in conflict with the national economic interests, or maybe even security interests, of Germany, where will Schröder’s loyalties lie? Will the former chancellor of Germany condone, or even support corporate decisions against German interests? Or will he lobby for German interests at Gazprom? What will it be Herr Bundeskanzler a.D.? Krimsekt und Kaviar oder Riesling und Nordseekrabben?

Das politische Frankenstein Monster starb sofort, als man die Zutaten ins Reagenzglas verzweifelter Machtpolitik zusammen mischte:

In dem Punkt waren sich die Spitzen von Grünen und Union einig: Nett sei es gewesen, dass man überhaupt einmal zusammen saß. Das war fast alles, was die Sondierungsrunde der drei Parteien heute als Ergebnis vorzuweisen hatte. Die Jamaika-Koalition ist passé - zumindest in dieser Legislaturperiode.
Sondierung: Union und Gr�ne beerdigen Schwampel - Politik - SPIEGEL ONLINE - Nachrichten

Ja - grosse Überraschung!

Und jetzt? Der Deutsche Wähler hat ein klares, deutliches “Ähh - weiss ich nich!” ausgesprochen. Die Deutschen Politiker saufen Wahlsekt statt Realitätswasser und erklären sich rundherum zum Sieger. Frau Merkel knirsch mit den Zähnen (macht die eh immer) and erklät den Sieg, Herr Schröder grinst (macht der auch immer) obwohl Rot-Grün verloren hat.

Die Polit-genies haben sich während des Wahlkampfes so in die Ecke geredet, dass wenn die jetzt alle ihre “mit denen nie” Versprechen halten wollen, muss dann halt nochmal gewählt werden. Zunächt sehe ich nur Verlierer, kaum Gewinner:

• Rot-Grün ist abgewält
• Merkel’s CDU/CSU ist noch unpopulärer als Stoiber’s CDU/CSU!!
• Die FDP hat zwar alle neune gekegelt, aber auf Kosten der CDU und verliert wahrscheinlich die Regierungsbeteiligung, wenn es eine Elephantenhochzeit gibt
• Die Grünen stagnieren und, wie gesagt, Rot-Grün ist abgewählt
• Stoiber verliert sogar in Bayern an Popularität!
• Der Wähler/Fernsehzuschauer, weil sie sich dass ganze Geschwätz der Politiker und Kommentatoren anhören muss.

Gewinner?

• Schröder hat noch nicht ganz verloren: seine Taktik ging (fast) auf und er angelt nach einer Elephantenhochzeit, in der er für eine Weile Kanzler bleibt und in aller Ruhe zusieht wie sich die CDU selbst zerfleischt
• Die Linke hatten natürlich nichts zu verlieren, aber auch nichts wirklich zu gewinnen

Hier ist meine Lösung Deutschland wieder regierbar zu machen: die Mauer wieder aufbauen, aber nicht zwischen Ost und West, sondern zwischen Nord und Süd. Oder, sogar besser, der Anschluss Bayerns and Österreich.

O’zapft is! at the mother of all beer orgies, the oohmpah fest to end all oohmpah fests. With two mighty strokes the mayor of Munich drove the tap into the barrel of beer and handed the first beer to the Ministerpräsident (Governor) of the Free State of Bavaria. The natives went wild! Especially the Japanese, American and Australians in lederhosen, rearing to go native in pools of beer and piles of greasy haxen.

The Munich Wiesn - aka Oktoberfest - is open for business, and business they mean. Last year 5.9 million visitors drank 5.5 million liters (1.45 million gallons) of beer and ate 89 oxen. The beer price is up, again, at over 7 Euro ($ 8.50) per liter! The Wiesn supports 8000 full-time employees and another 4000 temps.

Now, allow me to get this straight: The Cincinnati Oktoberfest is not anywhere near the second-largest Oktoberfest in the world. At roughly 500.000 visitors they get an honorable mention. And I seriously doubt that Uncle Al’s and Capt. Windy’s hokey pokey is the World’s most annoying performance either …

Which of Germany’s largest Volksfest events is the largest is a matter of great contention and serious dispute. The rivals Munich Wiesn and Cannstadter Wasen have been going head-to-head for as long as I can remember (not that I ever really cared). Years ago, when I lived in Stuttgart, neighbouring Cannstadt proudly claimed to beat Munich by a couple hundred thousand visitors, but both events only relied on estimates. When the Cannstadt organizers did an actual tally, they came out way below their estimates, and never published the figures. Currently, they claim 5 million visitors annually, independent estimates for last year were 3 million visitor in Cannstadt.

Seit 1. August gilt jetzt also die neus Rechtschreibung - fast überall. Da dachte ich mir dass ich mir das mal genauer anschaue muss. Über Jahre war das ja ein Riesentheater und ich war also auf ein paar Überraschungenn gefasst. Die Überraschung war dann allerdings dass die sogenannte “Neue Rechtschreibung” tatsächlich nur eine handvoll Änderungen beinhaltet, die im Großen un Ganzen sinnvoll sind. Da werden doch nur ein paar Ungereimtheiten in der Deutschen Grammatik ausgebügelt, aber wie so oft im Leben werden Dinge die eigentlich gar keinen Unterschied machen zum Riesendrama.

Es spielt doch überhaupt eine Rolle ob man nun Kuss oder Kuß schreibt - solange sich nur alle einig sind was richtig ist. Das Einzige was noch viel lächerlicher ist als großspurig eine “Rechtschreibereform” zu verkünden ist wenn sich einzelne Bundesländer querlegen und mit dem Fuß stampfen und ganz trotzig sagen “Meine Suppe ess ich nicht!”

Na ja - wie dem auch sei. Auf der nächsten Seite sind die neuen Regeln …
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