Creative Writing Critique Swiss Book Prize 2009(Satis Shroff, Freiburg)
MEHR MEER
A translator and essayist
Born in 1946 in Slovakia,
Grew up in Switzerland,
Living in Zürich,
Won the Swiss Buch.09 award
And 50,000 Swiss Franks.
The jury was delighted
With her ‘Mehr Meer,’
Written with a pen
Dipped in beauty
That fills the world
With poetry.
With her More Seas,
She sailed past Peter Stamm
With his novel Seven Years,
Shortlisted contemporaries:
Eleonore Frey, Jürg Laederach,
Angelika Overath and Urs Widmer.
A tale about memories
Of a daughter,
Of Hungarian
And Slovenian descent,
With sojourns in Budapest,
Ljublijana, Triest, Zürich,
Leningrad and Paris.
The poetess of this passage
Of memories
Is Ilma Rakussa,
A sincere lady with a haircut,
Akin to Prince Valiant,
With a soft voice.
The atmosphere was sticky,
The visitors stiff,
Perspiring in their garments
At the Basler Erlenmatten Street.
What a pleasant surprise:
Buch.09 is going
Buch Basel again.
* * *
Creative Writing Critique: THE SWISS BOOK PRIZE 2008 (Satis Shroff, Freiburg)
Books galore at Basle 08. An author named Wolfang Bortlik went even so far as to say,
“books have now ( after the fixed price went down) the same character as commodities like socks and toothpaste.” Thereby implying that touching a book is like touching any other ware. It’s not a sacral but a profane object of delight. Which reminds me of the publisher who started reading a manuscript, then went to change his clothes and came out wearing a dark suit and a bow-tie to show reverence towards the would-be author. The book was a classic. ‘Education,’ said Dr. John G. Hibben, a one-time President of Princeton University,‘is the ability to meet life’s situations.’ He could have added the word ‘aqequately.’
‘What’s the difference between BookBasle and Book 08?’ you might ask. BookBasle is a thing of the past and was more or less a well-organised Fair. But Book 08 has new ambients, and for the first time Switzerland has created a Swiss Book Award for established and aspiring writers of this ravishingly beautiful Alpine Republic. I went to Morschach in Central Switzerland during the Summer holidays and thought I was already in Heaven, you know. Alone in 2007, 110 organisers and 152 participating publishing houses (small and big) were interested in Book 08. Now it’s over 400 publisher-stalls and rather international. ‘International’ in the Swiss context means, of course, publishers from big German and Austrian cities like: Munich, Frankfurt upon Main (not Frankfurt upon Oder), Berlin and Vienna. Lübbe is a good name, for instance, with Dan Brown’s ‘Sacrilege’ and others. If you prefer listening rather than talking or reading, there are author forums where the authors read from their latest books.
Now the question: who’s gonna read at Basle 08? I find Friday 14,2008 rather interesting not only because Cornelia Schinzzilarz, Adam Davies, Slavenka Draklic and György Dragoman will be reading and answering questions, but also this year’s Man Booker Prize recipient Aravind Adiga with ‘The White Tiger’ (German title ‘Der Weisse Tiger’ published by C.H. Beck, 2008. Aravind works as a correspondent for the newsmag Time and The Financial Times. He was born in 1974 and the protagonist of his first novel is Balram Halwai, (I love halwa from Mumbai, you know) who tells his story in the first person singular. Halwa has a fantastic charisma and shows you how you can climb the Indian mainstream ladder as a philosopher and entrepreneur---and ends as a murderer. You’ve probably read ‘Goodbye Lenin,’ dear reader. This time it’s ‘Goodbye Lemon,’ a touching novel with dark humour about memories, mourning and forgiveness written by Adam Davies.
In this fast-living, egoistic consumer society, relationships tend to be fragile. It’s often touch and go. A series of wrong words and the partner looks for and finds another. The Swiss journalist Karin-Dietl-Wichmann knows what she’s talking writing about in her ‘Lass dich endlich scheiden,’ (published by Heyne 2008) which means ‘File a divorce for Heaven’s Sake.’ She was married thrice and knows how to go about it and admonishes women, without batting an eye-lid, to evaluate their marriages and shows that there’s no reason to uphold a partnership where there’s no fundament.
‘Leben Spenden’ published by Zsolnay, 2008, which means ‘Donate Life’ is a book by one of the most well-known Croatian authors: Slavenka Drakulic. She had to go to the USA in September 2004 to get a kidney-transplantation. It wasn’t her first, you know.
‘Der weisse König’ which means ‘The White King’ is György Dragoman’s second novel. The first one was ‘The Book of Destruction’ with the German title ‘Das Buch der Zerstörung’ which received a literary prize. The current book is being translated at the moment into fifteen languages. Dragoman was born in 1973 in the Seven-Hills of Romania (Siebenbürgen) and lives since 1988 in Budapest. His books have been published by Suhrkamp, a German publishing house.
At last year’s BuchBasel Fair you could find strange books like: Das Kifferlexikon, a compact encyclopedia on Cannabis sativa (hash) and others books like ‘Das Joint Drehbuch’ with a pun on the verb ‘drehen’ and even a cooking book with the title ‘Das Rauschkochbuch.’ Thomas Kessler, an author from Basle, has even written a book with the title ‘Hanf in der Schweiz.’ At the moment Kessler is responsible for the Integration of Migrants at the Canton-Basle City. Another interesting character at the past BookBasel was Tom Kummer, a journalist, who’d written interviews with Hollywood stars. The problem was he’d met them only in his mind. Herr Kummer had an explanation: he said he was representing Borderline-Journalism in which reality is consciously mixed with fantasy. His incredible book? ‘Blow Up: The Story of My Life’. I personally think he made a hash of the genres. I’ve heard about borderline medical cases during my medical and social science studies, but this really beats it. A wonderful example for students of Creative Writing classes how not to create and stir fiction with non-fiction. If you do, then please declare your ingredient as fiction and you’re on the safe side.
Can a book, film or PC game have the same negative effect on small readers? There have been discussions about the Grimm Brothers and their Fairy Tales which are said to be ‘too brutal at times.’ I had a talk with a bespectacled, elderly Freiburger European ethnologist, Frau Schaufelberger, who lectures on the subject and she said, “No, I think that it’s good to have bad or scary tales also, otherwise we’ll be giving a wrong picture about real life to the children.” Compared to what the kiddies watch in TV and DVDs, the Grimm and other Fairy Tales around the world are tame, not-so-scary and have educational values for they uphold values and norms of the concerned societies and their cultures.
So who’s going to win the Swiss Book Prize 2008? There are five favourites. Lukas Bärfuss, Rolf Lappert, Adolf Muschg, Peter Stamm and Anja Jardine. It’s evident that the Swiss ladies are underrepresented in the alpine literary world. The Swiss Book Prize involves a matter of 50,000 Swiss Franks (the German Book Prize offers 25,000 Euros) and the four losers will go home with 2,500 Swiss Franks in their pockets, which is indeed a great discrepancy compared to the first prize. Well loser can’t be choosers, oder? But one thing is sure: all five authors will cash in on publicity, honour, privilege and special presentations at other diverse Book Fairs.
Anja Jardine, is a newcomer and her book carries the title ‘Als der Mond vom Himmel fiel’ which in English means ‘When the Moon fell from the Sky’ published by Klein & Aber, Zürich.). Lukas Bärfuss has written an explosive political book on Ruanda ‘Hundert Tage’ published by Wallstein, Göttingen. Author Adolf Muschg is already prominent and is known for his minimal writings that have maximum effect. His book has the title ‘Kinderhochzeit,’ a love story and a portrait of a family based in the Upper Rhine, published by Suhrkamp, Frankfurt. Peter Stamm is billed as a typical Swiss author with his normal tales about everyday life and his book ‘Wir fliegen’ has been published by S. Fischer, Frankfurt. Rolf Lappert has penned a major novel based in Ireland among other places, and he combines great story-telling with experimental makings. His book ‘Nach Hause schwimmen’ has been published by Carl Hanser, Munich. Lappert was nominated for the German Book Prize but didn’t make it. He’s 50 and lives in Ireland. Perhaps he’ll swim home to win the Swiss Prize. I wish him luck. This year’s German Book Prize winner is Uwe Tellkamp, a sympathetic fellow who also lives in Freiburg, like Yours Truly, and will also read from his prize-winning book ‘Der Turm’ which means ‘The Tower.’
Unlike the jury decisions of the Man Booker Prize in UK, the Swiss Jury has a Swiss yardstick called quality. The prize will be announced on November 15,2008 at the Book 08 in Basle.
The five critic in the jury are: Martin Ebel from the Tages-Anzeiger, Sandra Leis from Der Bund, Manfred Papst from the excellent NZZ am Sonntag, Hans Probst from Radio DRSZ and the free-lance critic Martin Zingg. Switzerland is small and everyone knows the other, and whether the literary prize will be renowned or not will naturally depend on the reputation of the jury and its sense and idea of excellence, curiosity and independence in decision-making and choosing a winner. Swiss TV will carry out the entire spectacle, of course, because it has to be a big event. To borrow a line from P. B. Shelley: if November comes, can the Christmas book-business be far behind?
Grüezi! Hope to see you there.
* * * *
About the Author:
Satis Shroff is a prolific writer and teaches Creative Writing at the Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg. http://www.zfs.uni-freiburg.de/zfs/dozent/lehrbeauftragte4/index_html/#shroff. He is a lecturer, poet and writer and the published author of five books: Im Schatten des Himalaya (book of poems in German), Through Nepalese Eyes (travelogue), Katmandu, Katmandu (poetry and prose anthology by Nepalese authors, edited by Satis Shroff), and two language books on the Nepalese language for DSE (Deutsche Stiftung für Entwicklungsdienst) & Horlemannverlag. He has written three feature articles in the Munich-based Nelles Verlag’s ‘Nepal’ on the Himalayan Kingdom’s Gurkhas, sacred mountains and Nepalese symbols and on Hinduism in ‘Nepal: Myths & Realities (Book Faith India) and his poem ‘Mental Molotovs’ was published in epd-Entwicklungsdienst (Frankfurt). His lyrical works have been published in literary poetry sites: Slow Trains, International Zeitschrift, World Poetry Society (WPS), New Writing North, Muses Review, The Megaphone, Pen Himalaya, Interpoetry. He is a member of “Writers of Peace,” poets, essayists, novelists (PEN), World Poetry Society (WPS) and The Asian Writer.
Satis Shroff is based in Freiburg (poems, fiction, non-fiction) and also writes on ecological, ethno-medical, culture-ethnological themes. He has studied Zoology and Botany in Nepal, Medicine and Social Sciences in Germany and Creative Writing in Freiburg and the United Kingdom. He describes himself as a mediator between western and eastern cultures and sees his future as a writer and poet. Since literature is one of the most important means of cross-cultural learning, he is dedicated to promoting and creating awareness for Creative Writing and transcultural togetherness in his writings, and in preserving an attitude of Miteinander in this world. He lectures in Basle (Switzerland) and in Germany at the Academy for Medical Professions (HAS, GKKPS, GKPS,OTA University Klinikum Freiburg) and the Center for Key Qualifications (University of Freiburg, where he is a Lehrbeauftragter for Creative Writing at the ZfS Uni Freiburg). Satis Shroff was awarded the German Academic Exchange Prize.
What others have said about the author:
Satis Shroff writes with intelligence, wit and grace. (Bruce Dobler, Associate Professor in Creative Writing MFA, University of Iowa).
‘Satis Shroff writes political poetry, about the war in Nepal, the sad fate of the Nepalese people, the emergence of neo-fascism in Germany. His bicultural perspective makes his poems rich, full of awe and at the same time heartbreakingly sad. I writing ‘home,’ he not only returns to his country of origin time and again, he also carries the fate of his people to readers in the West, and his task of writing thus is also a very important one in political terms. His true gift is to invent Nepalese metaphors and make them accessible to the West through his poetry.’ (Sandra Sigel, Writer, Germany).
'Brilliant, I enjoyed your poems thoroughly. I can hear the underlying German and Nepali thoughts within your English language. The strictness of the German form mixed with the vividness of your Nepalese mother tongue. An interesting mix. Nepal is a jewel on the Earth’s surface, her majesty and charm should be protected, and yet exposed with dignity through words. You do your country justice and I find your bicultural understanding so unique and a marvel to read.' Reviewed by Heide Poudel in WritersDen.com 6/4/2007.
'The manner in which Satis Shroff writes takes the reader right along with him. Extremely vivid and just enough and the irony of the music. Beautiful prosaic thought and astounding writing.
'Your muscles flex, the nerves flatter, the heart gallops,
As you feel how puny you are,
Among all those incessant and powerful waves.'
“Satis Shroff's writing is refined – pure undistilled.” (Susan Marie, www.Gather.com)
“I was extremely delighted with Satis Shroff’s work. Many people write poetry for years and never obtain the level of artistry that is present in his work. He is an elite poet with an undying passion for poetry.” Nigel Hillary, Publisher, Poetry Division - Noble House U.K.
Copyright © 2009, Satis Shroff. You may republish this article online provided you keep the byline, the author's note, and the active hyperlinks.
Saturday, November 21, 2009
Saturday, November 14, 2009
Deutsche Lieder aus dem Dreisamtal (Satis Shroff, Freiburg-Kappel)
Broadway Songs und Deutsche Lieder aus dem Dreisamtal (Satis Shroff)
Ich hätte nie gedacht, dass ich alte Deutsche Lieder und Broadway-Songs mit den einheimischen Deutschen des Männergesangsverein (Männerchor) in Freiburg-Kappel singen würde.
In den vergangenen Jahren wurde ich öfters von Alois aus Zähringen gefragt, ob ich nicht auch singen möchte. Aber ich hatte gezögert, weil ich zu beschäftigt mit meinen Vorträgen und Kinder gewesen war. Inzwischen ist der alte Alois an einer Herz-Attacke gestorben und ich vermisse sein freundliches Gesicht, wie er mich jedes Mal, wenn ich ihn in Zähringen traf mit einem Lächeln begrüßte.
Hier in Kappel singe ich nun als zweiter Tenor und es ist wirklich spannend. 20 Euro für die Mitgliedschaft und weitere 100 Euro für den blauen Rock, und Sie sind Teil des Chores, bereit für das Singen bei eigenen Konzerten und als Gastchor bei Festen in den verschiedenen Teilen des Dreisamtals. Ich konnte es nicht glauben. Tatsächlich probten wir deutsche und englische Lieder in Hochdorf mit den Damen dort und sangen mit den anderen Chören aus dem Dreisamtal in Buchenbach mit 600 deutschen Zuhörern und Applaudierern.
Das Dreisamtal besteht aus Kirchzarten, Oberried, Buchenbach und Stegen. Man hat einen herrlichen Ausblick auf das Dreisamtal, wenn man aus Buchenbach in Richtung Höllental über Himmelreich geht. Die angrenzenden Täler sind sehr romantisch mit grünen Wiesen, rauschenden Bächen und malerischen Schwarzwald Bauernhöfen, eine Mühle, die noch in Betrieb ist und die Ruinen der Burg Wiesneck. Da ist dann noch der Hansmeyerhof, ein Bauernhof Museum in der Nähe von Wagensteig. Unweit entfernt liegt Stegen, auf der sonnigen Seite des Dreisamtal. Das Schloss von Weiler wurde im Jahre 1663 erbaut und ist einen Besuch wert, ebenso wie die Schlangen-Kapelle in Wittental. Die barocken Kirche von Eschbach ist einer der schönsten in der Freiburger Gegend. Es gibt viele Schwarzwälder Bauernhöfe, die darauf warten von Ihnen entdeckt zu werden. Vom Lindenberg haben Sie einen ausgezeichneten Blick auf das Dreisamtal.
Die Chor-Mitglieder trugen ihre traditionellen Kostüme. Was für ein wunderbares Gefühl. Man spührte wie das Adrenalin in den Blutkreislauf strömte als mit den Anderen gesungen wurde. "Ein Chor ist nichts für Individualisten. Man muss einen harmonischen Klang haben ", das war immer die Mahnung des jungen Dirigenten Felix Rosskopf, wenn wir probten.
Es war das erste Mal seit dem Zweiten Weltkrieg, dass alle Dreisamtal Chöre kamen und zusammen sangen. Während des Krieges waren die Deutschen angehalten, Kriegs- und Vaterlandslieder zu singen. Buchenbach scheint ein Problem zu haben, das mittlerweile in den meisten Männer-gesangsvereinen in Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz deutlich wird. Die ältere Generation bricht wegen des Alters und aus Mangel an Mobilität weg und die jüngere "Love-Parade" Generation kümmert sich nicht um die Pflege der alten Tradition des Vaterland.
Die Sänger von Buchenbach sangen: Sing mit mir, Oh Shenandoah, Mit Musik geht alles besser. Die Sängerinnen und Sänger von St. Peter aus den hohen Schwarzwald sangen: Freude am Leben, welches mehr gesprochen als gesungen war. O du schöner Rosengarten, das war eine Liebeserklärung und ein anderes lyrisches Lied, welches Rot sind die Rosen hiess. Liebe ist immer ein beliebtes Thema.
Die Sängerinnen und Sänger aus Ebnet traten als gemischter Chor auf. "weil viele Männer verstorben sind oder den Verein verlassen haben.", so Klaus.
Die Ebneter Sänger sangen: Capri Fisher, Ich brech die Herzen der stolzesten Frauen, ein lady-killer song in deutscher Sprache und ein Walzer für dich und mich.
Der Männerchor aus Kirchzarten sang: Die Sonne erwacht, ein traditionelles deutsches Lied, Hymne, O Iris komponiert von Wolfgang Mozart.
Ich sah eine Menge von Sängern, die eine fliehende Stirn, leuchtend unter den Lichtern der Bühne, hatten. Die meisten von ihnen trugen eine Brille und alle waren für diesen Anlass gekleidet. Die Damen tragen lange, fließende Abendkleider oder kamen in den traditionellen Dirndeln des Schwarzwaldes, und die Männer in Trachten oder tadellosen Anzügen.
Kirchzarten liegt auf dem Weg zum Hirschsprung, Hinterzarten und Titisee, einem Gletschersee. In Kirchzarten können Nordic Walking machen, Golf spielen, entspannen im Kneipp-Zentrum mit Wassertherapie und man kann Französisch Boule spielen wie Peter Mayle (A Year in Provence).
Die Sängerinnen und Sänger aus Zarten sangen: Heimat, deine Sterne, Strangers in the Night, Are You Lonesome Tonight (deutsche Version).
Wir, von Kappel, sangen: "Ein Freund, ein guter Freund und La Le Lu ein Wiegenlied für Jung und Alt aus einem alten deutschen Film mit Heinz Rühmann in der Hauptrolle.
Die Sänger aus Oberried sangen am besten. Oberried ist für die höchsten Gipfel des Schwarzwaldes bekannt: Feldberg und Schauinsland. Es gibt ein Heimatmuseum genannt Schniederlihof, einen Steinbruch auf einem Hügel, das in ein Museum umgewandelt wurde, und natürlich die Unterhaltungpark Steinwasen. Die Vegetation in diesem Teil ist sub-alpine. Im Sommer kann man jede Menge Bergsteigen, Spaziergänge genießen und Picknicks auf den saftigen grünen Wiesen. Im Winter ist Oberriede ein Skiparadies. Hier ist ebenso Deutschlands erster Bergnatur Friedhof.
Zu einer anderen Gelegenheit wurden wir von den Hochdorfern als Gastsänger eingeladen. Das Thema war Filmmusik und wir sangen Lieder aus: Adiemus, Jungle Book, den Blauen Engel, Truxa, Gasparone, Lena's song, Gabriella's Song, Fünf Millionen suchen einen Erben, Frauen sind keine Engel (Frauen sind keine Engel), True Love, mein Heart Will auf (Titanic) Go, Nur nicht aus Liebe weinen, In mir klingt ein Lied, Für ein Nachtvoller Seligkeit (Kora Terry), Moon River (aus Breakfast at Tiffany's), Midnight Blues und Conquest of Paradise. Ein großer Bildschirm in der Nähe der Bühne wurde benutzt, um Szenen aus den Filmen zu zeigen. Auch wir Sänger wurden digital aufgenommen. Das deutsche Publikum zeigte sich sehr empfänglich und Felix Rosskopf gab sein Bestes. Der Applaus in der Hochdorfer Halle war donnernden. Die Standing Ovations am Ende haben uns sehr gefreut. Das war ein tolles Gefühl, als wir alle Die Eroberung des Paradieses mit Begeisterung sangen. Der Text ist eigentlich albern und künstlich, aber die Wirkung auf das Publikum ist großartig. Man konnte fühlen, wie der Funke vom Dirigenten über die Sänger zum Publikum übersprang. Das Singen dieser Lieder war eine fantastisches Wellness-Erlebnis und extrem in seiner therapeutischen Wirkung. Das tut im Herzen gut. Nachdem das Singen beendet ist, ist es üblich zusammen zu sitzen und etwas deutsches Bier oder Wein vor Ort zu Trinken. Man spricht über das Konzert, reißt Witze oder diskutiert über private Angelegenheiten , wenn man Lust hat.
Wenn man sich so einem Verein verpflichtet hat, lernt man alles über sein Dorf und dessen Leute kennen.
Man sagt, wenn drei Deutsche zusammen kommen gründen sie einen Verein. Und so war es, als vor 75 Jahren ein Gesangverein versuchte die alten Lieder zu retten. In Buchenbach gründeten sie den Verein Edelweiss und ein Motto ist: "Wir amüsieren uns zu Tode." Ein Gesangverein ist ein Ort, wo man unterhalten wird, in dem Sie über Ihre Probleme mit Ihrem Gesang Kameraden sprechen und sich gegenseitig helfen. So war es seit Generationen, und diese Tradition wurde fortgesetzt. Zum Beispiel, wenn mein Freund Klaus Sütterle einen Teil seines alten Haus renovieren will, fragt er nur jemand aus dem Verein in einem der sozialen Trinkgelage nach Hilfe und schon ist bereits alles im Gange, ganz ohne Bürokratie. Es ist eine Politik des Gebens und Nehmens, wie in den alten Tagen.
Viele suchen nach einem Grund im Leben. Durch die Texte der Lieder und der Prozess des zusammen Singens im Chor hilft in der Gemeinde und dieses Handeln wiederum führt zu Begegnungen und Austausch von Ideen und Spaß am Leben.
Die Texte tragen dazu bei, die Werte, die in dieser technischen Welt verloren gehen zu erhalten, wenn Arbeit entfällt, Plätze wegrationalisiert werden und die Angst vor dem Verlust des Arbeitsplatzes steigt. Das hängt über dem Kopf wie das Schwert des Damokles. In einem Gesangverein ist es üblich seine Sorgen und sein Glück zu teilen, mit einander zu reden und sich einzuladen. Es gibt sicherlich eine Menge Vorzüge und Vorteile Mitglied in einem Verein oder Club zu sein.
Ich persönlich denke, es gibt nichts Besseres für die Seele, als laut zu singen, ein Gedicht laut zu rezitieren, weil wir alle mit einer Stimme ausgestattet sind, mit der wir eine Melodie erzeugen können. Wenn du mit anderen zusammen singst beginnst du zu realisieren, wie gut man singt, so verbessern Sie dann Ihre Stimme, Atmung und sozialen Fähigkeiten. In einem Chor können Sie Alltagsstress loswerden, kreativ sein und sich einen positiven Stress machen, anstatt einer negativen Stressbelastung zu erliegen.
Man hat immer ein Gefühl der Hochstimmung, wenn der letzte Akkord erklingt. Ah, das Singen bereitet soviel Freude. Statt deprimierender, frustrierender Gedanken, haben Sie positive Bilder und Gefühle, und entwickeln die Kraft in Ihrer Stimme mit Elan und wachsen mit dem Lied. Sie machen Musik mit Ihren Stimmen. Man sieht nur lächelnde Gesichter und so lächelt man zurück. Dieses Gefühl ist ansteckend. Man knüpft Kontakte zu Anderen vor und hinter der Bühne. Wenn Sie allein und traurig sind, singen und jubeln Sie sich froh. Ihr Gesang erheitert auch andere und Sie sind sozial integriert, bevor Sie es realisieren. Plötzlich singen Sie bei Konzerten alte, deutsche und neue, englische Lieder die bei Jung und Alt bekannt sind.
Singen hilft Hemmungen und soziale Barrieren abzubauen und führt zu einer Gemeinsamkeit unter den Menschen. Es gibt ein Miteinander, statt Vorurteile und Egoismus. Sie tun etwas für die Anderen und erwarten deshalb nicht, dass jemand etwas für sie tut. Sie teilen ihre Freude. Durch die Lieder bringen wir unsere Gefühle des Glücks und der Freude, der Trauer und des Leids zum Ausdruck. Wir erfreuen uns und finden Trost in den Texten der Lieder und lassen uns mitreissen von der überragenden Wirkung sakraler Musik. Durch das Singen werden Hormone wie Endorphine und Epinephrine (Adrenalin) freigesetzt. Das ist gut für den Kreislauf und fördert die Gesundheit.
Unter den Sängern haben wir Sprichwort.
Wo man singt da lass Dich nieder, böse Menschen kennen keine Lieder.
Das ist genau das was ich gemacht habe. Ein wunderbarer Ort auf dieser Erde, dieser Schwarzwald.
Herzlich Willkommen im Schwarzwald! Welcome to the Black Forest!
(The original article in English was published in The American Chronicle, a syndicate of 21 newspapers in the USA. Translation by my friend: Klaus Sütterle, Männergesangsverein Freiburg-Kappel). If you want to read more articles & poems by the author please yahoo or google for: satis shroff).
About the Author: Since literature is one of the most important means of cross-cultural learning, he is dedicated to promoting and creating awareness for Creative Writing and transcultural togetherness in his writings, and in preserving an attitude of Miteinander in this world. He lectures in Basle (Switzerland) and in Germany at the Academy for Medical Professions (University Klinikum Freiburg) and the Center for Key Qualifications, where he is a Lehrbeauftragter for Creative Writing at the ZfS Uni Freiburg). Satis Shroff was awarded the German Academic Exchange Prize.
Ich hätte nie gedacht, dass ich alte Deutsche Lieder und Broadway-Songs mit den einheimischen Deutschen des Männergesangsverein (Männerchor) in Freiburg-Kappel singen würde.
In den vergangenen Jahren wurde ich öfters von Alois aus Zähringen gefragt, ob ich nicht auch singen möchte. Aber ich hatte gezögert, weil ich zu beschäftigt mit meinen Vorträgen und Kinder gewesen war. Inzwischen ist der alte Alois an einer Herz-Attacke gestorben und ich vermisse sein freundliches Gesicht, wie er mich jedes Mal, wenn ich ihn in Zähringen traf mit einem Lächeln begrüßte.
Hier in Kappel singe ich nun als zweiter Tenor und es ist wirklich spannend. 20 Euro für die Mitgliedschaft und weitere 100 Euro für den blauen Rock, und Sie sind Teil des Chores, bereit für das Singen bei eigenen Konzerten und als Gastchor bei Festen in den verschiedenen Teilen des Dreisamtals. Ich konnte es nicht glauben. Tatsächlich probten wir deutsche und englische Lieder in Hochdorf mit den Damen dort und sangen mit den anderen Chören aus dem Dreisamtal in Buchenbach mit 600 deutschen Zuhörern und Applaudierern.
Das Dreisamtal besteht aus Kirchzarten, Oberried, Buchenbach und Stegen. Man hat einen herrlichen Ausblick auf das Dreisamtal, wenn man aus Buchenbach in Richtung Höllental über Himmelreich geht. Die angrenzenden Täler sind sehr romantisch mit grünen Wiesen, rauschenden Bächen und malerischen Schwarzwald Bauernhöfen, eine Mühle, die noch in Betrieb ist und die Ruinen der Burg Wiesneck. Da ist dann noch der Hansmeyerhof, ein Bauernhof Museum in der Nähe von Wagensteig. Unweit entfernt liegt Stegen, auf der sonnigen Seite des Dreisamtal. Das Schloss von Weiler wurde im Jahre 1663 erbaut und ist einen Besuch wert, ebenso wie die Schlangen-Kapelle in Wittental. Die barocken Kirche von Eschbach ist einer der schönsten in der Freiburger Gegend. Es gibt viele Schwarzwälder Bauernhöfe, die darauf warten von Ihnen entdeckt zu werden. Vom Lindenberg haben Sie einen ausgezeichneten Blick auf das Dreisamtal.
Die Chor-Mitglieder trugen ihre traditionellen Kostüme. Was für ein wunderbares Gefühl. Man spührte wie das Adrenalin in den Blutkreislauf strömte als mit den Anderen gesungen wurde. "Ein Chor ist nichts für Individualisten. Man muss einen harmonischen Klang haben ", das war immer die Mahnung des jungen Dirigenten Felix Rosskopf, wenn wir probten.
Es war das erste Mal seit dem Zweiten Weltkrieg, dass alle Dreisamtal Chöre kamen und zusammen sangen. Während des Krieges waren die Deutschen angehalten, Kriegs- und Vaterlandslieder zu singen. Buchenbach scheint ein Problem zu haben, das mittlerweile in den meisten Männer-gesangsvereinen in Deutschland, Österreich und der Schweiz deutlich wird. Die ältere Generation bricht wegen des Alters und aus Mangel an Mobilität weg und die jüngere "Love-Parade" Generation kümmert sich nicht um die Pflege der alten Tradition des Vaterland.
Die Sänger von Buchenbach sangen: Sing mit mir, Oh Shenandoah, Mit Musik geht alles besser. Die Sängerinnen und Sänger von St. Peter aus den hohen Schwarzwald sangen: Freude am Leben, welches mehr gesprochen als gesungen war. O du schöner Rosengarten, das war eine Liebeserklärung und ein anderes lyrisches Lied, welches Rot sind die Rosen hiess. Liebe ist immer ein beliebtes Thema.
Die Sängerinnen und Sänger aus Ebnet traten als gemischter Chor auf. "weil viele Männer verstorben sind oder den Verein verlassen haben.", so Klaus.
Die Ebneter Sänger sangen: Capri Fisher, Ich brech die Herzen der stolzesten Frauen, ein lady-killer song in deutscher Sprache und ein Walzer für dich und mich.
Der Männerchor aus Kirchzarten sang: Die Sonne erwacht, ein traditionelles deutsches Lied, Hymne, O Iris komponiert von Wolfgang Mozart.
Ich sah eine Menge von Sängern, die eine fliehende Stirn, leuchtend unter den Lichtern der Bühne, hatten. Die meisten von ihnen trugen eine Brille und alle waren für diesen Anlass gekleidet. Die Damen tragen lange, fließende Abendkleider oder kamen in den traditionellen Dirndeln des Schwarzwaldes, und die Männer in Trachten oder tadellosen Anzügen.
Kirchzarten liegt auf dem Weg zum Hirschsprung, Hinterzarten und Titisee, einem Gletschersee. In Kirchzarten können Nordic Walking machen, Golf spielen, entspannen im Kneipp-Zentrum mit Wassertherapie und man kann Französisch Boule spielen wie Peter Mayle (A Year in Provence).
Die Sängerinnen und Sänger aus Zarten sangen: Heimat, deine Sterne, Strangers in the Night, Are You Lonesome Tonight (deutsche Version).
Wir, von Kappel, sangen: "Ein Freund, ein guter Freund und La Le Lu ein Wiegenlied für Jung und Alt aus einem alten deutschen Film mit Heinz Rühmann in der Hauptrolle.
Die Sänger aus Oberried sangen am besten. Oberried ist für die höchsten Gipfel des Schwarzwaldes bekannt: Feldberg und Schauinsland. Es gibt ein Heimatmuseum genannt Schniederlihof, einen Steinbruch auf einem Hügel, das in ein Museum umgewandelt wurde, und natürlich die Unterhaltungpark Steinwasen. Die Vegetation in diesem Teil ist sub-alpine. Im Sommer kann man jede Menge Bergsteigen, Spaziergänge genießen und Picknicks auf den saftigen grünen Wiesen. Im Winter ist Oberriede ein Skiparadies. Hier ist ebenso Deutschlands erster Bergnatur Friedhof.
Zu einer anderen Gelegenheit wurden wir von den Hochdorfern als Gastsänger eingeladen. Das Thema war Filmmusik und wir sangen Lieder aus: Adiemus, Jungle Book, den Blauen Engel, Truxa, Gasparone, Lena's song, Gabriella's Song, Fünf Millionen suchen einen Erben, Frauen sind keine Engel (Frauen sind keine Engel), True Love, mein Heart Will auf (Titanic) Go, Nur nicht aus Liebe weinen, In mir klingt ein Lied, Für ein Nachtvoller Seligkeit (Kora Terry), Moon River (aus Breakfast at Tiffany's), Midnight Blues und Conquest of Paradise. Ein großer Bildschirm in der Nähe der Bühne wurde benutzt, um Szenen aus den Filmen zu zeigen. Auch wir Sänger wurden digital aufgenommen. Das deutsche Publikum zeigte sich sehr empfänglich und Felix Rosskopf gab sein Bestes. Der Applaus in der Hochdorfer Halle war donnernden. Die Standing Ovations am Ende haben uns sehr gefreut. Das war ein tolles Gefühl, als wir alle Die Eroberung des Paradieses mit Begeisterung sangen. Der Text ist eigentlich albern und künstlich, aber die Wirkung auf das Publikum ist großartig. Man konnte fühlen, wie der Funke vom Dirigenten über die Sänger zum Publikum übersprang. Das Singen dieser Lieder war eine fantastisches Wellness-Erlebnis und extrem in seiner therapeutischen Wirkung. Das tut im Herzen gut. Nachdem das Singen beendet ist, ist es üblich zusammen zu sitzen und etwas deutsches Bier oder Wein vor Ort zu Trinken. Man spricht über das Konzert, reißt Witze oder diskutiert über private Angelegenheiten , wenn man Lust hat.
Wenn man sich so einem Verein verpflichtet hat, lernt man alles über sein Dorf und dessen Leute kennen.
Man sagt, wenn drei Deutsche zusammen kommen gründen sie einen Verein. Und so war es, als vor 75 Jahren ein Gesangverein versuchte die alten Lieder zu retten. In Buchenbach gründeten sie den Verein Edelweiss und ein Motto ist: "Wir amüsieren uns zu Tode." Ein Gesangverein ist ein Ort, wo man unterhalten wird, in dem Sie über Ihre Probleme mit Ihrem Gesang Kameraden sprechen und sich gegenseitig helfen. So war es seit Generationen, und diese Tradition wurde fortgesetzt. Zum Beispiel, wenn mein Freund Klaus Sütterle einen Teil seines alten Haus renovieren will, fragt er nur jemand aus dem Verein in einem der sozialen Trinkgelage nach Hilfe und schon ist bereits alles im Gange, ganz ohne Bürokratie. Es ist eine Politik des Gebens und Nehmens, wie in den alten Tagen.
Viele suchen nach einem Grund im Leben. Durch die Texte der Lieder und der Prozess des zusammen Singens im Chor hilft in der Gemeinde und dieses Handeln wiederum führt zu Begegnungen und Austausch von Ideen und Spaß am Leben.
Die Texte tragen dazu bei, die Werte, die in dieser technischen Welt verloren gehen zu erhalten, wenn Arbeit entfällt, Plätze wegrationalisiert werden und die Angst vor dem Verlust des Arbeitsplatzes steigt. Das hängt über dem Kopf wie das Schwert des Damokles. In einem Gesangverein ist es üblich seine Sorgen und sein Glück zu teilen, mit einander zu reden und sich einzuladen. Es gibt sicherlich eine Menge Vorzüge und Vorteile Mitglied in einem Verein oder Club zu sein.
Ich persönlich denke, es gibt nichts Besseres für die Seele, als laut zu singen, ein Gedicht laut zu rezitieren, weil wir alle mit einer Stimme ausgestattet sind, mit der wir eine Melodie erzeugen können. Wenn du mit anderen zusammen singst beginnst du zu realisieren, wie gut man singt, so verbessern Sie dann Ihre Stimme, Atmung und sozialen Fähigkeiten. In einem Chor können Sie Alltagsstress loswerden, kreativ sein und sich einen positiven Stress machen, anstatt einer negativen Stressbelastung zu erliegen.
Man hat immer ein Gefühl der Hochstimmung, wenn der letzte Akkord erklingt. Ah, das Singen bereitet soviel Freude. Statt deprimierender, frustrierender Gedanken, haben Sie positive Bilder und Gefühle, und entwickeln die Kraft in Ihrer Stimme mit Elan und wachsen mit dem Lied. Sie machen Musik mit Ihren Stimmen. Man sieht nur lächelnde Gesichter und so lächelt man zurück. Dieses Gefühl ist ansteckend. Man knüpft Kontakte zu Anderen vor und hinter der Bühne. Wenn Sie allein und traurig sind, singen und jubeln Sie sich froh. Ihr Gesang erheitert auch andere und Sie sind sozial integriert, bevor Sie es realisieren. Plötzlich singen Sie bei Konzerten alte, deutsche und neue, englische Lieder die bei Jung und Alt bekannt sind.
Singen hilft Hemmungen und soziale Barrieren abzubauen und führt zu einer Gemeinsamkeit unter den Menschen. Es gibt ein Miteinander, statt Vorurteile und Egoismus. Sie tun etwas für die Anderen und erwarten deshalb nicht, dass jemand etwas für sie tut. Sie teilen ihre Freude. Durch die Lieder bringen wir unsere Gefühle des Glücks und der Freude, der Trauer und des Leids zum Ausdruck. Wir erfreuen uns und finden Trost in den Texten der Lieder und lassen uns mitreissen von der überragenden Wirkung sakraler Musik. Durch das Singen werden Hormone wie Endorphine und Epinephrine (Adrenalin) freigesetzt. Das ist gut für den Kreislauf und fördert die Gesundheit.
Unter den Sängern haben wir Sprichwort.
Wo man singt da lass Dich nieder, böse Menschen kennen keine Lieder.
Das ist genau das was ich gemacht habe. Ein wunderbarer Ort auf dieser Erde, dieser Schwarzwald.
Herzlich Willkommen im Schwarzwald! Welcome to the Black Forest!
(The original article in English was published in The American Chronicle, a syndicate of 21 newspapers in the USA. Translation by my friend: Klaus Sütterle, Männergesangsverein Freiburg-Kappel). If you want to read more articles & poems by the author please yahoo or google for: satis shroff).
About the Author: Since literature is one of the most important means of cross-cultural learning, he is dedicated to promoting and creating awareness for Creative Writing and transcultural togetherness in his writings, and in preserving an attitude of Miteinander in this world. He lectures in Basle (Switzerland) and in Germany at the Academy for Medical Professions (University Klinikum Freiburg) and the Center for Key Qualifications, where he is a Lehrbeauftragter for Creative Writing at the ZfS Uni Freiburg). Satis Shroff was awarded the German Academic Exchange Prize.
Thursday, November 5, 2009
My Heart is Nepali (Satis Shroff, Freiburg-Kappel)
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A Poem in Nepali (c) By Satis Shroff, Freiburg-Kappel
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Himalayas (c) satisshroff
Memoir:
Ludmilla Tüting: “My Heart Is Nepali” (Satis Shroff)
Ludmilla Tüting is a robust, well-read, emancipated, bespectacled Teutonic woman who makes no secret of the fact that she lives in a Berlin Hinterhof (backyard) in Kreuzberg (West Berlin) and yearns to see a horizon, especially with pagoda-silhouettes in the distance. It almost sounds as though Berlin is a city with the lost horizon.
She oscillates between Kathmandu and Berlin, and is very much active in the field of ‘sanfte’(soft)-tourism, which means tourism with insight. She spent her 50th Birthday on 27th of May 1996 with her Nepalese friends in the monastery of Thangpoche. She is concerned about the negative aspects of tourism and write the information-service ‘Tourism Watch’. To potential tourists in the German-speaking world, she’s a Nepal-specialist, who cares about Nepal’s cultural and natural heritage, as is evident through her travel books.
I met her at the Volkerkunde Museum in Freiburg, the metropolis of the south-west Black Forest, and the occasion was one of a series of talks held under the aegis of ‘Contemporary Painting from Nepal’ to promote cultural and religious development in Nepal.
Ludmilla Tüting talked about ‘Fascinating Nepal, the Sunny and Shady Sides’ and belted out slides and information and described Nepal as a wonderful country. And the other theme was: ‘Tourism with Insight isn’t in Demand: the Ecological Damage through Tourism in Nepal’ which was more or less what the interested Nepal-fan will find in ‘Bikas-Binas’, a thought-provoking book on Nepal’s ecological aspects, especially environmental pollution in the Himalayas, published by Ms.Tüting and my college-friend Kunda Dixit, a reputed Nepali journalist, who is the executive director of International Press Service since decades and also the chief editor and publisher of The Nepali Times.
Ms. Tüting’s talk, delivered with what the Germans are wont to call the Berlin-lip (Berlinerschnauze) has a pedagogic and practical value, and she tried not only to show what a tourist from abroad does wrong in Nepal, but also suggested how a tourist should behave and dress in Nepal. All in all, it sounded like the German book of etiquette called ‘Knigge’ for potential travellers to Nepal.
In the past there have been a good many transparency slide-shows and talks under the aegis of the Badische Zeitung, the Freiburger University and the Volkshochschule with jet-set gurus, rimpoches, meditations, experts on ‘boksas and boksis’, shamanism, Tibetan lamaism, tai-chi, taoism, yen-oriented-zen and what-have-yous. It is a fact that every Hans-Rudi-and-Fritz who’s been to Nepal or the Himalayas struts around as an expert on matters pertaining to the Home of the Snows.
Some bother to do a bit of background research and some don’t, and the result is a series of howlers. Like the bloke who’d written a thesis on traditions in Nepal and held a slide-show at the University’s eye-clinic auditorium maximum. The pictures of the Nepalese countryside were, as usual, breathtaking. Pokhara, Kathmandu, Jomsom, the Khumbu area and then a slide of Bhimsen’s pillar was shown and our expert quipped, ‘that’s the only mosque in Nepal.’
Or the time a Swabian expedition physician from Stuttgart held a vortrag (talk) at the university’s audi-max (auditorium maximum). A colour-slide of a big group of Nepalese porters flashed across the screen. The porters were shown watching the alpine expedition members eating their sumptuous supper, with every imaginable European dish and the comment was: ‘The Nepalese are used to eating once a day, so they just looked at us while we ate’ (sic). A decent German sitting near me named Dr. Petersen, who was a professor of microbiology, remarked, “Solche Geschmacklosigkeit!” (lack of taste or finesse), but it didn’t seem to disturb our Swabian Himalayan hero. Most Nepalese eat two big meals: at lunch and dinnertime, with quite a few snacks thrown in-between. And when you visit a Nepalese household you’re offered hot tea and snacks too, depending upon the wealth and status of the family.
Every time I heard such unkind, thoughtless remarks I’d groan and my blood pressure would shoot up and my ECG registered tachycardie and I’d probably developed ulcers. Oh, my mucosa. The remedy would be to avoid such stressors in the form of slide-shows, but I couldn’t. I had to tell myself: simmer down, old boy, the scenery is beautiful. And it is. If it weren’t for the ravishing beauty of rural Nepal and Kathmandu Valley’s artistic and cultural treasures...You just had to use ear-plugs (Oxopax) and relish the vistas of Nepal’s splendour: its uniqueness, its smiling people always with what the British call, a stiff upper lip, and what the Germans call ‘sich nie runter kriegen lassen,’ despite the decade old war between the government troops and the Maoists in the past.
Another time a European couple came to my apartment with a thick album full of photographs of images of Gods and Godesses and the ‘experts’ wanted me to identify what, and where, they’d photographed in Nepal, for it was to be published as a pictorial book on the temples of Nepal. Some experts, I thought. The pair looked like the junkies in the Freak Street in the early seventies. Like the legendary Nepalese, one helped where one could, though I had to shake my head after they left.
Ludmilla has been going to Nepal since 1974. However, when you remind her of her ‘globe-trotter’ image in those days, she likes to forget it all, because she’d apparently made some mistakes and has learned from the mistakes of the past. And now ecology seems to be her passion. She wishes to ‘sensitise’ the potential tourists through her slide-shows, TV appearances and bring attention to the Nepalese rules of etiquette so as to feel at home in Nepal, despite the cultural shock and change.
‘Tourists are terrorists’ flashes across the screen, and Ludmilla explains that she’d photographed a graffiti on the Berlin Wall in Kreuzberg. Every time a tourist visits another country, they get a culture shock: the language barrier, the question of mentality, alien customs, and as a result they return to their countries loaded with a lot of prejudices. Then she shows a bus-load of tourists pottering about the Hanuman Dhoka Palace. She says that some of the tourists were angry at her when she photographed them. The tourists seem to reserve the right to photograph every country and its people as something normal, without bothering to ask them for permission. “Wir haben schon bezahlt!“ is their line of argument. Doesn’t it smell of cultural imperialism, after the motto: I’ve paid in dollars, marks, francs and yen for the trip, so you natives have to oblige and pose for me. The point is the tourists have paid their travel agencies back in Frankfurt, Munich, Stuttgart or Kathmandu, and not the persons and objects they’re photographing. The payment allows one to land in a country, but how one behaves in a foreign country is another matter.
‘Today it’s possible to go around the world in 18 days’ she says, ‘and everywhere you have people perpetually in a big hurry. She talks about globe-trotters who travel around the on their own, and write books with secret insider tips on how to get the maximum out of a land with the minimum of your money. A poor porter with a mountain of load comprising cooking-utensils appears and that brings Ludmilla to talk about a certain expedition leader’s successful climb to the summit of a Himalayan peak, ‘we’d didn’t have any losses. Only a porter died’. Then she reminds the listeners that the porters don’t have any health-insurance or accident-insurance or pension in the German sense.
‘Funeral-pyres at Pashupatinath are an eternal theme for tourists’, says Ludmilla with a groan, and she describes tourists with camcorders at the ghats. ‘You wouldn’t want a foreign visitor to take the burial ceremony of your near and dear ones, would you?’ asks Ludmilla.
It was interesting to know that there’s a makeshift video-hut at Tatopani along the Jomsom trail for the benefit of the local Nepalese, the trekking-tourists and their porters. ‘I saw ‘Gandhi’ on this trek’ she said, thereby meaning Sir Attenborough’s film. You might even get to see the newest Hollywood and Bollywood films up there. Pico Iyer’s ‘Video Night in Kathmandu’ might still be interesting-reading for the Nepalophile, for he has ‘the knack of recording every shimmy’. A poster advertising ‘Thrilling Animal Sacrifices at Dakshinkali’ apparently from ‘Bikas-Binas’ (development-destruction) made one wonder about the so-called ‘sizzling, romantic, thrilling, action-packed’ box-office cocktails produced in Bollywood’s celluloid, DVD factories.
‘If you want to meet people and get to know them, you have to travel slowly’ says Ludmilla Tüting. Then she talks about the wonders of the polaroid camera at the Nepalese customs office. Men are ruled by toys. She says, ‘If you take a snapshot of a customs officer and hand him the photograph, you’ll pass the barrier with no difficulty.’
Does tourism mean foreign exchange for Nepal? Apparently not, according to her, with imported food from Australia, lighting from Holland, whisky from Scotland, air-conditioning from Canada. She shows Pokhara in 1974. Corrugated iron-sheets are being transported on the backs of porters along the Jomsom trail for the construction of small mountain restaurants.
A Gurung woman in her traditional dress, frying tasty circular sel-rotis in her tea-shop in the open-air, appears and good old Ludmilla advises the audience about the advantages of acquiring immunity or fortifying it through gamma-globulin and the advantages of tetanus-shots prior to a trip to the Himalayas.
After the show I went with Ludmilla to a Freiburger tavern named Zum Störchen for a drink and a chat. Toni Hagen, a geologist-turned development-worker from Lenzerheide, who held a double Ph.D. and was billed to talk about the development of Nepal from 1950 to 1987 and the role of developmental-cooperation, also accompanied us. Toni Hagen was a celebrity in Nepal due to his geological pioneer work and publication. Alas, Hagen passed away sometime back after starring in an autobiographical film. Ingrid Kreide, who was in a hurry to return to Cologne, held a lecture on the history of Thanka-painters and the freedom of art in the Himalayan Kingdom of Nepal, and expressed her deep concern regarding the theft of Nepalese temple and ritual objects.
Ludmilla is a name to be reckoned with as a globetrotter, journalist, Nepal-expert in the German speaking world, and she criticises the alternative travel-scene. And she still fights for the rights of the underdogs in South Asia. She was for the Chipko-movement in India and decried the deforestation, ecological damage, fought for human rights of the Tibetans and Nepalese alike, wrote about development and destruction of so-called Third World countries. She once told Edith Kresta, the travel editor of the Tageszeitung (TAZ, Berlin): “My heart is Nepali, the rest is German.” Her base-camp in Catmandu is hotel Vajra run by Sabine Lehmann, a hotel with a theatre flair, and she’s working on a novel on climbing this time. She wants to emulate the characters of James Hilton’s novel The Lost Horizon, wherein people get very old and are not bothered with gerontological problems. She wants to live at least 108 years in this planet. One can only admire and wish her well in her endeavours and pedagogical critique.
Friday, October 30, 2009
Zeitgeistlyrik: Agony of War, Uprooted & Banished (Satis Shroff, Freiburg-Kappel)
(c) satisshroff, StagesStaufen: Bäuerin mit Beerkrug
Zeitgeistlyrik: Literature Nobel Prize Herta Müller 2009:
UPROOTED & BANISHED (Satis Shroff)
A Banat Swabian poetess
Was born in 1953
In a hamlet called Nitzkydorf,
Which lies in Romania.
She came to Berlin in 1987.
Wrote verses to mete out justice
To the fate of German Romanians,
Who were departed to work camps.
The other way round.
Jews died in concentration camps,
80,000 ethnic Germans from Romania,
Uprooted and banished,
Suffered hunger and death
In the Ukranian camps.
Survival strategies and dreams
At the end of the Second World War.
If Bertold Brecht’s Furcht und Elend
Im Dritten Reich
Told us about the Nazi terror,
Hertha’s verses and prose reveal
The sadness and angst of her lost people.
In a small hamlet in Banat,
Small Herta tells us
In her hard, Banat-German accent,
How hostile her home environment was.
She speaks of her doubts and fears,
For it is plain to see:
She’s made of another genetic material
That made her vulnerable to her environs,
Like underdogs everywhere in this world.
How unbearable for Romanians,
The Banat-Germans had their own
Culture, tradition
And way of life.
But pray, don’t ethnic Germans say
The same things about migrants
Eking out a living here?
Hertha speaks a poetic language
Of a gone but not lost past,
Of the misery, angst and terror
Felt by her people.
Her books emphasise
The cruel, inhuman face of communism,
Under Nicolae Ceausescu.
A chronist walking
Along the thin line,
Between poetry and terror,
Where every line is a cry
Against injustice
With pregnant titles:
The Fox Was even Then a Hunter (1992),
Herztier (1994),
In the Hair-knots Lives a Lady,
The King (Ceausescu) Bows and Kills (2000)
The Pale Gentleman and the Mocca Cups (2005).
Herta said:
‘My innermost desire is to write
I can live with it.’
Her literary style is precise,
Laconic and matter-of-fact.
Despite her publications,
Ms. Müller was a nobody.
Without her notes on Oskar Pastiors
She couldn’t have penned ‘Atemschaukel.’
It became more than a swing of breath.
She was shadowed, interrogated and persecuted.
Günter Grass said:
‘I’m very satisfied with the Literature Prize
For Herta from Stockholm.’
Karasek quipped:
‘My mantra is always for Philip Roth,’
And sounded like: ‘My Heart Belongs to Daddy.’
Germany’s literary pope
Marcel Reich-Ranicki:
‘I plead for Roth and wish to say
No more.’
Literary critics form the USA commented:
‘We suggest Philip Roth, Thomas Pynchon,
Joyce Carol Oates
Or Bob Dylan.’
The Swedish Academy gave the prize
For the fourteenth time
To Germany.
Poor Romania.
* * *
(Sketch © 2007 Satis Shroff, Freiburg)
THE AGONY OF WAR (Satis Shroff)
Once upon a time there was a seventeen year old boy
Who lived in the Polish city of Danzig.
He was ordered to join the Waffen-SS,
Hitler’s elite division.
Oh, what an honour for a seventeen year old,
Almost a privilege to join the Waffen-SS.
The boy said, “Wir wurden von früh bis spät
Geschliffen und sollten
Zur Sau gemacht werden.”
A Russian grenade shrapnel brought his role
In the war to an abrupt end.
That was on April 20, 1945.
In the same evening,
He was brought to Meissen,
Where he came to know about his Vaterland’s defeat.
The war was lost long ago.
He realised how an ordinary soldier
Became helpless after being used as a tool in the war,
Following orders that didn’t demand heroism
In the brutal reality of war.
It was a streak of luck,
And his inability to ride a bicycle,
That saved his skin
At the Russian-held village of Niederlausitz.
His comrades rode the bicycle,
And he was obliged to give them fire-support
With a maschine-gun.
His seven comrades and the officer
Were slain by the Russians.
The only survivor was a boy
Of seventeen.
He abandoned his light maschine-gun,
And left the house of the bicycle-seller,
Through the backyard garden
With its creaky gate.
What were the chances in the days of the Third Reich
For a 17 year old boy named Günter Grass
To understand the world?
The BBC was a feindliche radio,
And Goebbels’ propaganda maschinery
Was in full swing.
There was no time to reflect in those days.
Fürcht und Elend im Dritten Reich,
Wrote Bertold Brecht later.
Why did he wait till he was almost eighty?
Why did he torment his soul all these years?
Why didn’t he tell the bitter truth,
About his tragi-comical role in the war
With the Waffen-SS?
He was a Hitlerjunge,
A young Nazi.
Faithful till the end.
A boy who was seduced by the Waffen-SS.
His excuse:
„Ich habe mich verführen lassen.“
The reality of the war brought
Endless death and suffering.
He felt the fear in his bones,
His eyes were opened at last.
Günter Grass is a figure,
You think you know well.
Yet he’s aloof
And you hardly know him,
This literary titan.
He breathes literature
And political engagement.
In his new book:
Beim Häuten der Zwiebeln
He confides he has lived from page to page,
And from book to book.
Is he a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde?
Doctor Faustus and Mephistopheles,
In the same breast?
Grass belongs to us,
For he has spent the time with us.
It was his personal weakness
Not to tell earlier.
He’s a playwright, director and actor
Of his own creativeness,
And tells his own tale.
His characters Oskar and Mahlke weren’t holy Joes.
It was his way of indirectly showing
What went inside him.
Ach, his true confession took time.
It was like peeling an onion with tears,
One layer after the other.
Better late than never.
* * *
On Her Majesty’s Lyrical Service:
Poet Laureate (Satis Shrof)
Wanted:
A person who writes in lyrical form,
Composes verses for occasions,
Good stanzas in favour of kings and queens,
Princes and Princesses,
For the price of 5000 Sterling pounds
And, of course, 650 bottles
Of Sherry,
To inspire the poet.
And the title of Poet Laureate.
A court poet is a smith of verses,
Not a bass-guitarist
Of the royal band
Based in Buckingham.
Beginners need not apply.
Candidates should be
A professor of English Literature.
The last Poet Laureate penned
Verses in praise of Edward
And his beautiful Sophie,
A hundred years of the Queen Mother
And the latter’s sad demise.
The Queen’s diamond wedding anniversary,
A rap-rhyme for rosy-cheeked Prince William,
When he turned twenty-one.
Yeah! ‘Better stand back
Here’s a age attack.’
He even congratulated Charles and Camilla
On their belated marriage.
The Prince was overwhelmed
When he heard Motion’s
‘Spring Wedding.’
But all verses weren’t,
As we say in Germany:
Friede, Freude, Eierkuchen.
Motion’s ‘Cost of Life’ on Paddington,
‘Causa belli’ emphasised
Elections, money, empire,
Oil and Dad.
Themes and lyrics that bother us,
Day in and day out.
The rulers and battles won are expected
To be praised to Heaven,
Like Master Henry,
Ben Jonson et al have done
In 1668 John Dryden was sacked
Not for his bad verses,
But for changing his confession.
Sir Walter Raleigh and William Morris
Didn’t relinquish their freedom
And said politely: No thank you, Ma’am.
And with it a keg of wine
From the Canary Isles,
That could have been theirs.
Free literary productivity and court-poetry
Are strange bedfellows indeed.
In these times of gender-studies,l
Women’s quotes and emancipation,
It wouldn’t be far-fetched
If Carol Ann Duffy,
A Scottish poetess,
Became the next Poetess Laureate.
What a lass!
She’s openly gay,
Didn’t you say?
Has fire anyway.
What a thankless job:
A royal lyrical whisperer,
Striving for public relations
In poetry prize panels,
In the name of poetry.
A thankless job:
Take it
Or leave it.
* * *
GORDON STILL WALKING 2009 (Satis Shroff, Freiburg)
‘I will not walk away,’
Said PM Gordon Brown.
His ministers had walked out on him.
Disgusted with his inner circle
Of soccer-fans
And other fads.
Manchester is United,
Labour isn’t.
Was he walking by a rule?
Mr. Brown ruled with two circles:
His soccer-crazy inner circle
With Ed Balls,
An outer one with grey mice.
He was walking down a lonely road,
It seemed.
When he walked in,
He walked into Blairites.
Gordon was walking into his political savings.
Could he steer Britain’s economy
Out of the big recession?
He walked his legs off,
Pleading to Labourites to stay.
It wasn’t a walk over
For Brown’s pride,
When ministers refuse to walk
Together with him,
After the debacle at the Euro polls.
He racked his brains,
Came up with a belated inquiry
Into the Iraq war,
To save his skin.
In a last bid he reshuffled
His cabinet cards:
Darling, Miliband and Balls
Held their jobs.
Gordon promoted:
Johnson, Jowell, Mandelson,
Cooper, Burham, Ham.
Eh, was it worth to promote Ainsworth?
A soap-opera supper,
Where guests prefer
To sit and walk out at will.
Gordon is certainly walking on air.
It’s become more a walk
On a razor’s edge.
If this silly Labour circus goes on
In Downing No. 10,
He is most likely to walk
On all fours.
The battle is lost,
Er steht auf verlorene Posten.
The rats have sprung overboard.
Councils like Lancashire, Derbyshire,
Stafford, Nottinghamshire
Have become Tory counties.
Labour lost 250,
Conservatives gained 217 seats.
Captain Brown remains adamant,
And runs his ship.
I’m afraid it’s not Trafalgar.
Perhaps Cap’n Bleigh?
He clutches his crutches
And mutters:
‘I will not walk away.’
Brown has a strategy:
He hopes to limp towards autumn,
Defying the wind against him.
Can he bend it like Beckham?
Captain Brown, still at the helm,
Insists: ‘I will not waver,
Or walk away.’
Britain doesn’t know:
Whether to be awed
Or amused.
And thereby hangs
A tale.
Drinking Darjeeling Tea in England 2008 (Satis Shroff, Freiburg)
Beware the Ides of March
Manchester will be a milestone
In Gordon Brown’s polit-life.
Your economic ‘competence’
Has become an Achilles heel,
Your weak point.
The people’s party of New Labour
Wants to get rid of you.
These are the rumours
Heard in the trendy streets of London.
Twelve months ago Gordon Brown
Was the Messiah of Brit politics,
After Blair’s disastrous role in the Labour.
Alas, the new Messiah
Lost his face,
Within a short time.
His weakness: decision making.
England is nervous, fidgety,
For Labour fears a possible loss,
Of its 353 Under House seats.
Above the English cabinet
Looms a Damocles sword.
Will Labour watch,
Drink Darjeeling,
Till a debacle develops?
Labour is in a dilemma.
Hush, help is near.
David Miliband is going vitriolic.
A silly season indeed,
Drinking Darjeeling tea in England.
About the Author:
Satis Shroff is based in Freiburg (poems, fiction, non-fiction) and also writes on ecological, ethno-medical, culture-ethnological themes. He has studied Zoology and Botany in Nepal, Medicine and Social Sciences in Germany and Creative Writing in Freiburg and the United Kingdom. He describes himself as a mediator between western and eastern cultures and sees his future as a writer and poet. Since literature is one of the most important means of cross-cultural learning, he is dedicated to promoting and creating awareness for Creative Writing and transcultural togetherness in his writings, and in preserving an attitude of Miteinander in this world. He lectures in Basle (Switzerland) and in Germany at the Academy for Medical Professions (University Klinikum Freiburg) and the Center for Key Qualifications (University of Freiburg, where he is a Lehrbeauftragter for Creative Writing at the ZfS Uni Freiburg). Satis Shroff was awarded the German Academic Exchange Prize.
His lyrical works have been published in literary poetry sites: Slow Trains, International Zeitschrift, World Poetry Society (WPS), New Writing North, Muses Review, The Megaphone, Pen Himalaya, Interpoetry. He is a member of “Writers of Peace,” poets, essayists, novelists (PEN), World Poetry Society (WPS) and The Asian Writer.
Copyright © 2009, Satis Shroff. You may republish this article online provided you keep the byline, the author's note, and the active hyperlinks.
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Satis Shroff on Boloji.com: Twice Poet of the Week
Satis Shroff
Satis Shroff is a writer and poet based in Freiburg (poems, fiction, non-fiction) who also writes on ethno-medical, culture-ethnological themes, and writes regularly for The American Chronicle. He has studied Zoology and Botany in Nepal, Medicine and Social Science in Germany and Creative Writing in Freiburg and Manchester. He describes himself as a mediator between western and eastern cultures and sees his future as a writer and poet. Satis Shroff was awarded the German Academic Exchange Prize. He is a lecturer in Basle (Switzerland).
Selected as Poet of the Week
on February 18, 2007 and again on June 22, 2008
Analysis
The British and the Gurkhas: World Apart?
Book Reviews
Kathmandu Blues: The Inheritance of Loss and Intercultural Competence
Yaks and Yetis
Cinema
Darjeeling Limited: A Journey to India and Within
Environment
Live and Let Live:
Wildlife Versus Humans in Beautiful Nepal
Health
Complementary and Modern Medicine: Strange Bedfellows?
Memoirs
Back to the Village Dreams
Ethnic Roots Abroad
Impressions From Central Switzerland
Places
Votive Images of the Mountain Chapel at Stoos
Poetry
A Gurkha Mother
Bombay Brothel
Deleting Lives in the Cyberworld
Grow with Love
Kathmandu is Nepal
My Nepal, Quo Vadis?
Music Between East and West
My Nightmare
Nirmala: Between Terror & Ecstasy
Oh Kirtipur
The Agony of War
The Garden
The Holy Cows of Kathmandu
The Loss of Mental Metamorphosis
The Lure of the Himalayas
The Ocean of Wisdom
The Sea Swells
The Street Where I Live
When the Soul Leaves
Society
A Hindu Wedding in Nepal
Drinking Tea in Darjeeling
How Winter is Banished in Germany
Travelogues
Flying Over the Himalayas
In Love with Venice
On Doctor Faustus and Mephistopheles
On This Spot a Lotus Bloomed
Satis Shroff is a writer and poet based in Freiburg (poems, fiction, non-fiction) who also writes on ethno-medical, culture-ethnological themes, and writes regularly for The American Chronicle. He has studied Zoology and Botany in Nepal, Medicine and Social Science in Germany and Creative Writing in Freiburg and Manchester. He describes himself as a mediator between western and eastern cultures and sees his future as a writer and poet. Satis Shroff was awarded the German Academic Exchange Prize. He is a lecturer in Basle (Switzerland).
Selected as Poet of the Week
on February 18, 2007 and again on June 22, 2008
Analysis
The British and the Gurkhas: World Apart?
Book Reviews
Kathmandu Blues: The Inheritance of Loss and Intercultural Competence
Yaks and Yetis
Cinema
Darjeeling Limited: A Journey to India and Within
Environment
Live and Let Live:
Wildlife Versus Humans in Beautiful Nepal
Health
Complementary and Modern Medicine: Strange Bedfellows?
Memoirs
Back to the Village Dreams
Ethnic Roots Abroad
Impressions From Central Switzerland
Places
Votive Images of the Mountain Chapel at Stoos
Poetry
A Gurkha Mother
Bombay Brothel
Deleting Lives in the Cyberworld
Grow with Love
Kathmandu is Nepal
My Nepal, Quo Vadis?
Music Between East and West
My Nightmare
Nirmala: Between Terror & Ecstasy
Oh Kirtipur
The Agony of War
The Garden
The Holy Cows of Kathmandu
The Loss of Mental Metamorphosis
The Lure of the Himalayas
The Ocean of Wisdom
The Sea Swells
The Street Where I Live
When the Soul Leaves
Society
A Hindu Wedding in Nepal
Drinking Tea in Darjeeling
How Winter is Banished in Germany
Travelogues
Flying Over the Himalayas
In Love with Venice
On Doctor Faustus and Mephistopheles
On This Spot a Lotus Bloomed
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
Vincent van Gogh: BEAUTY IS EVERYWHERE (Satis Shroff)
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(c)Art by satisshroff, A homage to van Gogh
VAN GOGH: BETWEEN HEAVEN AND EARTH (Satis Shroff, Freiburg-Kappel)
If you love Nature truly,
you’ll find it beautiful everywhere
(Vincent van Gogh)
If you want to see Vincent van Gogh’s landscape paintings then Basle (Switzerland) is the place to go. The Kunstmuseum Basel has the world’s first showing of the landscape paintings, although in autumn-winter 2008-09 there was a major exhibition at Vienna’s Albertina on van Gogh’s paintings and drawings with 150 of the artist’s works, and his expressive use of the of the brush, prior to which the artist had done strong drawings with all the details. They were then coloured in his own distinctive way. The Harvest in Provence in oil was first drawn with brown and graphite sticks.
Vincent van Gogh was one of the most productive artists. He painted 900 pictures and 1100 drawings and sketches on paper. He decided to be an artist when he was 27 years old. Ernest Hemingway and van Gogh have one thing in common: both used a gun to end their lives. Van Gogh lived only 37 years. He followed his brother Theo’s advice and went to live in Auvers near Paris, where he was medically treated by Dr. Paul Gachet, a neurologist with a penchant for art. Prior to that he had psychic disturbances and cut his ear, had himself treated at the hospital in Arles, and since 1889 moved to the psychiatric home at Saint Remy.
Van Gogh was born in 1853 in Holland’s Groot-Zundert, and his father was a Protestant preacher. He was influenced by the countryside environment. He felt a deep love for Nature and also nostalgia for his village. He didn’t have a good time at school and as a result he began working in the Art and Graphic business Groupik & Cie. Since he wasn’t motivated in his job, he was fired and worked as a teacher and assistant preacher in England. But the University rejected his theological ambitions.
After a crisis in the family his brother Theo recommended him to become an artist. Vincent van Gogh started learning to draw and paint the hard way as an autodidact. Good news for people who want to do it on their own. He loved to paint dark landscapes and farmers during their working hours. He got closer to a woman, who used to sew clothes and occasionally engaged in the oldest profession in the world. Her name was Sien but the relationship ended after one and a half years.
Vincent van Gogh wanted to understand the contemporary art Impressionism, so he went to Paris in 1886. It was Paul Gauguin, Emile Bernard, Paul Signac and the bright outdoor paintings of the Impressionists that brought a great change in van Gogh’s paintings. He started using brighter colours and the city and the countryside became his motifs: gardens, parks, fields, olive groves and yineyards. The outcome was wonderful paintings daubed in yellows, blues, greens. He was on his way to discover his own artistic language.
The Basler exhibition is a reconstruction of van Gogh’s cycles of Nature and forms, with which he experimented, that are to be seen in the expositions. Van Gogh celebrated the uniqueness and glory of creation, and his deep bond with Nature are revealed in his outstanding works. I love the cypresses tat appear in van Gogh’s paintings and the theme of the cycles of Nature. About his fascination for Cypresses, Vincent van Gogh said this:
‘The cypresses are in my mind again and again. It’s strange that no one has painted them, the way I see them. In the lines and proportions they’re as beautiful as an Egyptian obelisk. And the green has a such s fine tone. It is the dark spec on a sun basked landscape, but it’s one of the most interesting black tones, and I can’t think of anything that’s more difficult to paint.’
Even though he had psychic problems, he painted pictures that were reassuring with warm colours that create joy and optimism, if not exhilaration in the eyes of the viewer, friend, art-lover, connoisseur. How right he was when he said: ‘Art is man plus nature. The art historian Julius Meier-Graefe wrote his story of a seeker of God to help build a legend about Vincent van Gogh in1921. Irving Stone’s book ‘Lust for Life’ (1934) was filmed by Vincent Minelli in 1956. Don McLean’s song ‘Vincent’ is a wonderful homage to van Gogh’s painting ‘starry night’ in which the painter is depicted as a misunderstood, suffering soul who was too good for this world. The lyric goes:
Now I understand,
What you’re trying to say
To me.
Even though van Gogh did a lot of landscapes, for him art wasn’t imitating nature. It was the feelings and thoughts evoked by nature that an artist brings to the canvas. It isn’t perspective or anatomy that’s relevant but the authenticity of one’s artistic expression. Van Gogh did it personally with strong colour lines and drawings, making his works of art an expression of his inner feelings and of nature that he adored. Van Gogh’s essential period of work lasted only intensive years which were made eternal by his contemporaries. Like van Gogh aptly said: ‘Some people have a big fire in their soul, and nobody comes to warm himself or herself in it.’
© Copyright 2009 by Satis Shroff
About the Author:
Satis Shroff is a prolific writer and teaches Creative Writing at the Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg. http://www.zfs.uni-freiburg.de/zfs/dozent/lehrbeauftragte4/index_html/#shroff. He is a lecturer, poet and writer and the published author of five books: Im Schatten des Himalaya (book of poems in German), Through Nepalese Eyes (travelogue), Katmandu, Katmandu (poetry and prose anthology by Nepalese authors, edited by Satis Shroff), and two language books on the Nepalese language for DSE (Deutsche Stiftung für Entwicklungsdienst) & Horlemannverlag. He has written three feature articles in the Munich-based Nelles Verlag’s ‘Nepal’ on the Himalayan Kingdom’s Gurkhas, sacred mountains and Nepalese symbols and on Hinduism in ‘Nepal: Myths & Realities (Book Faith India) and his poem ‘Mental Molotovs’ was published in epd-Entwicklungsdienst (Frankfurt). His lyrical works have been published in literary poetry sites: Slow Trains, International Zeitschrift, World Poetry Society (WPS), New Writing North, Muses Review, The Megaphone, Pen Himalaya, Interpoetry. He is a member of “Writers of Peace,” poets, essayists, novelists (PEN), World Poetry Society (WPS) and The Asian Writer.
Satis Shroff is based in Freiburg (poems, fiction, non-fiction) and also writes on ecological, ethno-medical, culture-ethnological themes. He has studied Zoology and Botany in Nepal, Medicine and Social Sciences in Germany and Creative Writing in Freiburg and the United Kingdom. He describes himself as a mediator between western and eastern cultures and sees his future as a writer and poet. Since literature is one of the most important means of cross-cultural learning, he is dedicated to promoting and creating awareness for Creative Writing and transcultural togetherness in his writings, and in preserving an attitude of Miteinander in this world. He lectures in Basle (Switzerland) and in Germany at the Academy for Medical Professions (University Klinikum Freiburg) and the Center for Key Qualifications (University of Freiburg, where he is a Lehrbeauftragter for Creative Writing). Satis Shroff was awarded the German Academic Exchange Prize.
What others have said about the author:
„Die Schilderungen von Satis Shroff in ‘Through Nepalese Eyes’ sind faszinierend und geben uns die Möglichkeit, unsere Welt mit neuen Augen zu sehen.“ (Alice Grünfelder von Unionsverlag / Limmat Verlag, Zürich).
Satis Shroff writes with intelligence, wit and grace. (Bruce Dobler, Associate Professor in Creative Writing MFA, University of Iowa).
‘Satis Shroff writes political poetry, about the war in Nepal, the sad fate of the Nepalese people, the emergence of neo-fascism in Germany. His bicultural perspective makes his poems rich, full of awe and at the same time heartbreakingly sad. I writing ‘home,’ he not only returns to his country of origin time and again, he also carries the fate of his people to readers in the West, and his task of writing thus is also a very important one in political terms. His true gift is to invent Nepalese metaphors and make them accessible to the West through his poetry.’ (Sandra Sigel, Writer, Germany).
“I was extremely delighted with Satis Shroff’s work. Many people write poetry for years and never obtain the level of artistry that is present in his work. He is an elite poet with an undying passion for poetry.” Nigel Hillary, Publisher, Poetry Division - Noble House U.K.
© Copyright 2009 by Satis Shroff. You may republish this article online provided you keep the byline, the author's note, and the active hyperlinks.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Walking Along the Southern Vosges in France (Satis Shroff)
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Art+by+satisshroff,+Eguisheim+excellent+wines..JPG)
(c) Art satisshroff 2009: Eguisheim-excellent Alsatian wines & countryside
A WALK ALONG THE SOUTHERN VOSGES IN FRANCE (Satis Shroff)
Frankenthal-Missleheim is an excellent nature reserve in the South Vosges of France. You can go along the Col de la Schlucht, which is a gorge, via Trois-Fours, past Martinswald to Frankenthal and Holneck, where you can see the formation vegetables des cirques glacieres.
However, the first advice to wanderers and trekkers in the Southern Vosges is: don’t use a car, keep your dog on a leash, camping is strictly forbidden and don’t leave the paths. Mountain bikes, horse riding and cross country skiing allowed only on trails more than two metres wide. There were so many trees lying across the trails and you cannot imagine someone skiing along the Col de la Schlucht without bumping on horizontal tree trunks. Or you’d have to be a stunt skiier. And it is a long and intensive walk along the French countryside.
Let me introduce you Ms. Waldtraut Kapp, an elderly matron (nurse) from Freiburg with a penchant for flowers and herbs. It’s always good to refresh my knowledge of Botany with hers. She’s a self-taught botanist and knows a lot about gardening and botanical specimens from the Black Forest and the Vosges. She has inherited a wonderful house with exotic garden from a lady physician with whom she had worked in the past. Frau Kapp is an old fashioned, tradition-conscious lady, and even though she has only a training as a nurse, she has widened her horizon through reading books, travelling and talking with interesting people. Her knowledge of classical German literature would make a student envious, and yet she remains humble and interested in a lot of things.
Frau Kapp has been to Namibia and written a 2000 word article on the botanical pecularities of that country. It is August and there are blue gentian meadows everywhere in the Vosges. A gentian is called an ‘Enzian’ in German, made popular by the pale, blonde bard with goggles named Heino who makes his appearances during folk festivals, mostly in German TV. The meadows along the trails have Alpine anemones, pfeilchen, fever clover or to give it the Irish name: shamrock and rausch berries. It’s a rhapsody of orchids and blue and yellow daffodils which we call Narzissen in German.
As we walk towards the Martinswand you see some French locals doing rock-climbing. Then comes a moor at the Martinswand. A wand has nothing to do with fairies but is just a wall in the German language.
Along the gorge the scenery is beautiful at an elevation of 1139 metres. There are valleys winding between blue misty hills with the veil rising slowly, revealing the Vosges. We come across a clear blue lake with dark fir trees surrounding it like sentries. Now and again you come across waterfalls cascading into pools which are littered with rocks. A serene and majestic countryside. You discern the fresh smell of forest undergrowth, wet decaying leaves as you walk below the tall trees, and are rewarded in the clearing with a magnificent view of the Vosges and the grass is lime green. You notice at least four biotopes: the high moor as you walk, beech forests and rocky cliffs and crags.
There’s the Lac de Forlet some four kilometres from Soultzeren castle, where the traditional Munster cheese is still made. Munster is only nineteen kilometres from Colmar, which has houses like in the mountains with sturdy walls. You can see the farmers called Marcaire, from the word ‘to milk,’ still manufacturing the genuine Munster farmhouse cheese with their hands. The milk is left for a day and the tasty cream is skimmed off. Fresh milk is added to it and this mixture of old and new milk is heated to 35 degrees Centigrade in a big copper pot. Thereafter, it is removed from the heat and an enzyme is added to curdle the mixture. What remains is the ferment which is decanted into a wooden mould. It is left to solidify in the night. A month later you have relish the mature farmhouse cheese from the damp cellar.
The terrain has become slippery, narrow, stony and full of obstacles: trees lying across, small tunnels and rusty, fixed-iron-ladders. You picnic at 1pm in a French trench on the lee side of a hillock. During the World War II there was heavy bloody fighting in these very trenches. anemones and gentians grown now over the grave s of the fallen German and French soldiers. There’s an uncanny peace and serenity about the trenches as you munch your food. There are green grassy meadows here now with larks chirping incessantly where once the whining of bullets from rifles, shells from artillery and mortar made a killing field out of this lovely terrain. The cries of the birds are broken only by the thunder of the French Mirage-jets doing their sorties over the blue Vosges.
I know my father-in-law telling me that he was a POW in France on his way back from the devastating and traumatic experiences of Stalingrad and had nothing to eat. A kind French lady had cooked pancakes for him and other German stragglers on their way home to Freiburg. Since he didn’t have anything to put the pancakes in, he stuffed them in his army trousers. He speaks highly of the French people even to this day. A good deed in need is something you’ll never forget as long as you live.
You’ve been zig-zagging down the Col de la Schlucht which is a long journey along the scree strewn path. ‘Bon jour!’ say the other trekkers as they come up the steep gorge abreast of you. You do likewise: ‘Bon jour!’ with a tired smile, in case you’re not out of breath. As you trudge on you notice at least eight rock-climbers crawling like Spiderman on a cliff. You are rewarded with a splendid view of the beech and spruce forest till you reach Frankenthal at a height of 1030m from a height of 1330 m along a steep valley.
In a nearby café you relish coffee with rhubarb cake after the arduous journey. Nearby is an old stone house which is reminiscent of an old mill, where a French duo are making cheese. A small French girl with freckles like Astrid Lindgren’s Pipi Lngstockings, her brother and mother are laughing aloud. The girl has a hopelessly bent aluminium spoon in the hand, the king used during the post-World War days, as a side-product of the aviation industry. She shows it to you and shrugs her small shoulders lightly. You notice that it doesn’t take words to communicate something funny to someone: gestures alone suffice. The rhubarb cake is a bit hard at the base and its been fun eating cakes with spoons. In Germany you always get forks for cakes. Nevertheless, you notice that the Fench are very cultivated. Even in a countryside picnic, eating out in the fresh air, the French bring their own chairs, tables, table-cloths and appropriate cutlery.
We meet Mr. Winterhalter, a thick-set German in his late sixties, with a bandaged hand (carpal syndrom), a gardener with love for flowers and admiration for Frau Waldtraut. There seems to be love in the autumn of their or is it late summer? You’re amused for in Germany we say: you never know where love falls, meaning thereby that you literally ‘fall’ in love.
Mr. Winterhalter says: ‘I was in Russia from the age of 18 till 22 and was wounded four times. I was decorated with the German Iron Cross.’
An old warrior, you think.
He goes on to say with a feigned laugh, ‘I’d have rather done my gardening than go to the Front. But we were forced to enlist.’
Frau Waldtraut is planning to bring along pensioned tourists from Freiburg to the Vosges and is trying to plan the excursion. She times the route including where to make a picnic with her usual German thoroughness. We say adieu to her and Mr. Winterhalter as she spreads out map of the Vosges and begins to ponder over the route.
They bid you farewell and say in unison: ‘Aufwiedersehen!’
You’ve enjoyed the walk back and marched at a brisk pace thanks to the good trekking shoes and remember that it had been fun stepping on stones along the way at the same time taking in the beautiful countryside of the Vosges. You think a walk in the Nature is a wonderful gift that you have made to yourself. You feel tired but elated in the end.
If you’re visiting Feiburg (Germany), Basle (Switzerland) or Colmar (France) you ought to do a bit of wine-tasting at the local vintner’s in Requewihr or Eguisheim. If you prefer German wines then in Freiburg, Endingen, Ihringen to name a few. Eguisheim is known as the Cradle of Viticulture in Alsace. Even if you’re not an expert on wines you can learn and taste the different varieties of the choicest wines in the characteristic long-stemmed glass known as the ‘Alsatian tulip,’ and discover the truth in wine: in vino veritas.
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