Well, Wednesday we woke up and rode the train to Leipzig. Train rides with German ticket collectors can be confusing. All of our group had the same tickets, but the ticket-stamper-guy stamped most of our group, and fussed at a couple of group members whose tickets were seemingly the same. Unlike the trams or airplanes, the trains don't have English translation for their announcements so it's always a guess as to what they're saying. Once we got to Leipzig, we headed out on a two hour walking tour with a guide. Leipzig didn't have quite as much TOTAL destruction as Dresden during the war, so we got to see a lot more original buildings...not recreations on the same site or anything! After the tour, a few of us got schnitzel at a local outdoor cafe, then headed to our Bach competition. We were not competing (obviously: we'd be a rag tag bunch of three flutes, two saxophones, a trumpet, and a bunch of vocalists), but we had tickets to see a certain portion of the competition. We listened to a twelve piece string ensemble (violins, violas, cellos, string basses, and a harpsicord) play a lesser-known younger Bach (his son, that is) piece and two Bach sonatas. It was amazing. These musicians are for real, as I've said before. During the concert, we'd been anxiously awaiting score update texts from the Germany/Spain World Cup Semi-finals, but nothing had arrived. We rushed afterwards to the nearest big screen with Germans in tow, and watched the remainder of the game. It was rough...and let me tell you: Germans. do. not. like. to. lose. On the way back to the hostel after the game, we saw people burning Spanish flags and a lot of people were screaming or semi-belligerent, but of course traveling as a big group has its advantages and we managed to survive unscathed.
Thursday, we traveled to the Bach museum which was pretty neat minus most of the exhibits being exclusively in German and the lack of photography (it wasn't allowed). I think it was definitely a once in a lifetime opportunity to gaze upon ACTUAL MANUSCRIPTS totally written by Bach's own hand. His final draft penmanship was great; his first draftts were a bit sloppy...but whose wouldn't be? It's weird to be so near to something so old and significant. After the Bach tour, we toured the Thomaskirche (Saint Thomas Church) where Bach worked as a composer and cantor for about 25 years of his life. He composed new music for the church every Sunday except for a handful during that time! The church itself is remarkable; there's been a church at that site since the early 13th century, and the last large exterior remodeling was done in the 1700s. The organ inside was enormous, and we actually got to hear an organist rehearsing when we toured. That's something I won't soon forget; it was so beautiful! After the Bach tour, we grabbed a quick lunch (a road-side bratwurst for a euro-fifty) and headed to the Mendelssohn Haus. This was the first english head-set guide we'd encountered, and I shared a headset with Kathleen who is a good bit shorter than me, so manuvering through the house was pretty comical. The Mendelssohn Haus actually has the original flooring from the 19th century, and had a lot of interesting memorabilia mixed in with the weird stuff (a tuft of his hair, and another death mask. Gross), but all in all, I think it's the most authentic museum in a home we've seen so far (although, the only other one is Weber). Afterwards, we took a collective in our bunks back at the hostel, and headed out to the Auerbachs Keller. The Keller dates back in records to the fifteenth century. Goethe, the famous German writer, visted the Keller often and eventually wrote about it in his work, Faust. It's the only mentioned specific scene in Leipzig in the whole book, and the murals inside that inspired his version of Faust are original. The Auerbachs Keller has been estimated by two sources as the fifth most visited restaurant in the world (strangely enough, next to Caesar's palace in Las Vegas...go figure). We had shnitzel and potatoes, and I loved every minute of it. One of my favorite moments of the trip so far was when two of our groupmates leaned into the famous touristy barrel they have set up (much like the Faust scene) and accidentally put weight on the spigots, and wine began to flow forth (just as it did in Faust)! I was playing photographer for them at that moment with one of their cameras, but boy do I wish I had that picture myself! Haha. After the Keller, we went to a discotheque and danced to American music...which is confusing while in Europe, but almost flattering, and certainly fun!
Today, we had a free day and some of us decided to venture out to the Leipzig Zoo. It's by far the biggest zoo I've ever seen. It took us about two hours to make the shortest suggested loop of the zoo, but it was a nice assortment of animals, and I think we all really enjoyed it (especially the aquarium). Then we headed to the Volkerschlachtdenkmal (the Monument to the Battle of Nations) the tallest monument in EUROPE. We found out that for four euros, you could climb to the top of this 300 foot structure. Well, they didn't exactly tell you there was an elevator that cost a euro. We climbed up the spindliest little spiral staircase I've ever seen to make it to the middle. I stopped at the middle (after about 250 steps in a scary, narrow passage) and the rest of the group eventually made it to the top! The view of Leipzig was beautiful, but I do NOT like heights (as was evidenced by my 1995 plea to not see Pocahantas at Disney world to avoid a ten foot platform with steps)! Next, we stopped and had coffee and cake (at the traditional 4:00 hour!) at the Coffe Baum (yes, only one 'e'...not sure why) which is the oldest coffee house in the world. It opened in 1720, and many big names frequented it in Leipzig: Goethe, Schumann, etc.) we had an apple cream cake that was out of this world, and the break from walking was nice, too! Afterwards, we breezed through the all-German Stasi museum, and packed up our things from the hostel and headed for home!
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