The year of the family

2008 has been a great year for catching up with my extended family. My mum is one of four and my dad is one of six. I have uncles, aunts and cousins as far as Canada, US, India and Germany.

So, when I say that in the year 2008, I will have seen every single member of my generation, the two generations that precede it and the one generation that proceeds it, it goes without saying that it is a privilege in this day and age to have the means and opportunity to claim such a feat. Four generations - and I'll have covered them all! A wedding in Canada earlier this year on my mum's side and my cousin's wedding in a couple of weeks on my dad's side has made this all possible. If for nothing else, this reason alone makes weddings awesome.

This leads me to our trip to Munich last weekend where I caught up with my cousin Nikhil and his lovely wife Kanyika (who I met for the first time). Munich is where we fell in love with German bread. French bread has much to recommend itself but my eyes have been opened. Dinkel Pur is where it's at. Dense and rich brown bread with nuts and seeds and just every amazing bit of goodness! I am currently on the search for a German bakery in Paris. I know that the French and Germans aren't particularly the best of friends so my search might be a tough one.

But, more important things first - we were treated to such a good time in Munich - an excellently informed walking tour of Munich, followed by an incredible day in the Alps. The weather could not have been better and the landscape was out of a movie. Just incredible. I will leave the photos to describe although, as is always the case, they don't really do justice to the real thing.

We started the four hour walk next to an old winter olympics ski jump site and made our way through a gorge and then ended up on top of an amazing mountain where you could see neighbouring snow capped maintains including the highest mountain in Germany (behind me!).

We then head out to a nearby giving incredible reflections in the water.


On its face, Munich is very much like any mid-sized European city. It has a town centre, usually old with some great churches and official buildings like the townhall (aptly called "Rathaus"). A couple of shopping strips (where Mel and I finally bought boots for winter) and some gardens. The Munich English Gardens are incredible at 3.7 square kilometres. It is apparently bigger than New York's Central Park but smaller than London's Richmond Park (thank you Wikipedia). With autumn in the air, how could one not take advantage of the leaves!

They have a small canal running through the gardens where thanks to some weird concoction, there is a permanent wave for surfers to try out their skills.

During our walking tour we came across this Random Christmas art installation in the town centre. You will see two girls working out a map with the town hall in the background and Mel's pilgrimage to the Munich branch of the mothership. Finally, what's a trip to Germany without Pretzels and Beer?




We visited the Olympic stadium that was host to the famous Munich olympics in 1972. This is a view from the adjoining sightseeing tower. We also visited BMW World! Where you can see all things BMW.

Our last destination was depressing - Dachau. The site of the first Nazi concentration camp. Used from 1933 to 1945 to house over 200,000 prisoners, it commenced as a camp for political activists against the Nazis. Soon, jews, gays and academics were also imprisoned during the war. It appears as a bit of a weird juxtaposition because it is set in some beautiful grounds. There are stunning trees that line the prisoner grounds. And yet, terrible atrocities were commited there. The site is now an incredible memorial with a museum and audio guides to take you through the whole site. I did not know but learnt quite quickly that Bavaria (the State in which Munich is located) was one of the central and first strongholds of the Nazis. Key political events leading to the rise of Nazism occured in the streets of Munich. The city has done a good job of not forgetting its history as a lesson for all future generations. The tourist information bureaus have loads of materials on Nazi history. Little guide books which talk about the terrible acts of war.

Munich has accepted the shame but wears it as a badge to warn against the possibility of repetition. It was moving to see that 60 years later, it balances the need to move on with a legacy to never forget. Here is a building left with bullet holes from the war as a constant reminder. There are apparently numerous examples like this.