“People speak sometimes about the “bestial” cruelty of man, but that is terribly unjust and offensive to beasts, no animal could ever be so cruel as a man, so artfully, so artistically cruel.”
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Wednesday
I look out the window and there are cobblestones embedded in the pathway. A scar of the past that runs as far as I can see in both directions. The testament to man’s stupidity and pride.
I was old enough to see the wall come down. I watched it unfold on the news and didn’t grasp what was happening.
If you need to build a 151 km wall to stop your population from escaping, you need to take a look at your political ideology.
All it took was a splendid speech from Regan in 1987 and half a million people protesting on the streets two years later for the wall to come down.
For over thirty years Berlin was divided on political pride and paranoia. Over 100 people died attempting to cross from west to east. Some 600 as a result of the border regime.
The height of the Cold War.
Peter Fetcher was 18 years old when he and a friend, Helmut Kulbeik, attempted to cross in 1962.
The wall was not simply a wall. There was a dead zone between two walls. A kill zone known as the death strip. Peter and Helmut made it over the East wall and managed to cross the death strip. Helmut made the climb.
Peter was shot in the pelvis by the Eastern guards and fell into the barbed wire. Here he lay, screaming in pain as he bled to death over an hour. All this is in front of the Western soldiers and media. They threw him bandages, which he could not reach. Afraid of being shot themselves, no one attempted to save Peter.
In the end, after he died, a Western soldier crossed the death strip and removed the body, an agonising hour too late.
“Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom.”
Bertrand Russell
I make breakfast and we discuss our trip to Plauen.
The trip is uneventful as we take the freeway to save time.
We chose Plauen more as a geographical half way point to either Austria or Czechia.
It turns out to be a picturesque village.
We stop at STEYR Almgasthof Plauen for lunch and a beer.
Shell orders the hirsch stroganoff and I order the eisbein. We share the strudel.
There is a wine shop across the road.
It is not often you are in a small village in Germany and you walk into an unremarkable wine store and find an iconic Rioja that is twenty years old from an outstanding vintage.
And yet there it is.
We head to our apartment and I quickly detour to the groceries so we have breakfast for tomorrow morning.
As soon as I get home I open the bottle.
Slight dread when I realise I will be opening a wine from 2005 with a winged corkscrew.
Despite my care, the cork crumbles. On the second and third efforts, it crumbles some more. Eventually, it collapses into the bottle. I am mortified, Shell could not care less.
So here we are in Plauen, Germany; drinking a Rioja from Spain with cork floating in the glasses.
Perfect.
Tonight’s wine –
2005 R. López de Heredia Viña Tondonia Reserva (Rioja, Spain)
A stunning Rioja. Classic Rioja profile from an outstanding producer and an excellent vintage. Young and vibrant despite two decades. It is all leather, tobacco and dried herbs. Plenty of acid and the oak is present but not overwhelming. An iconic wine that deserves its reputation.
“Wine enters through the mouth,
Love, the eyes.
I raise the glass to my mouth,
I look at you,
I sigh.”William Butler Yeats
There are moments in life when you reflect on where you are, what you are doing and who you are with.
I lead an amazing life and I owe it all to Rachelle.
No god above could ever inspire
my love like She whom I admire.
The temple where each night I pray,
is the holy bed where nights She lay.A cup of wine.
A bed divine.
No world outside,
nor thoughts of time.Roman Payne
The food looks so good!! Wine sounds stunning.
A very cool wine. We watched a documentary on the winery a few years ago. I have always wanted to try it.