Kids

Okay, far too much in the way WWII ramblings. Here's a cute photo of Nicholas with a daycare update--and some stuff on Arlette below (together with a pic of her you may have seen before). Nicholas' Kinderladen is rather different from most daycares in the states, largely because parents are expected to chip in by cooking, cleaning up, or taking care of the kids during a few hours each month. This sort of private childcare (though it is subsidized by the state) is something relatively new here. There are also public daycares, which operate more like those in the states. We didn't quite understand the system when we signed Nicholas up (Janet not having any kids when she lived in Germany), but so far so good. We attended our first Elternabend the other night (Parents' night), and the other parents seem very nice, as we (or rather Janet and the others, my German not being up to it) discussed various plans, including a 'summer festival' for a weekend coming up soon. When one arrives each morning, a few parents are usually lingering up front, and you can help yourself to a cup of coffee. They seem to encourage parents to hang around for a few minutes (rather than trying to get us out of the way, as happens stateside). There are just 15 kids, and two teachers, a rather good ratio for kids this age (they take kids from 2 and a half years old till they start school at 6). My hasty research online shows that the Kinderladen movement, as it is sometimes called, is considered both anti-authoritarian (parents rather than the state in charge, I suppose) and communitarian (as it fosters bonds between parents, thus building community).

Settling in hasn't been terribly easy for Nicholas, who not only has to get to know new kids and new teachers but a new language (though both of his teachers speak enough English to communicate the important stuff with him). But he's doing pretty well, all told. This is his second week, and we've basically got him up to half-time. He's picking up bits and pieces of German already. We'll hope to get him up to, say, 9-3:00 by next week. The picture above now hangs at his school on a piece of construction paper with his birthday on it. On birthdays, by the way, the birthday child stays at home during the morning and then his classmates come to visit him at home for a party during the afternoon--another rather big difference from the traditional daycare. Janet has joked that she understands now why the German economy is in such bad shape--two-career parents, and especially single parents, would find this set-up hard to handle. But the flipside is that most Germans spend more time with their kids, and that is obviously a plus. We can certainly afford the time this year, though I'm hoping to put off my service time until my German improves a bit, so I'll be more an aid than a translation burden.


Speaking of updates, as I write Arlette is back from Bombay (a vist with Grossmutter and Grossvater), where she was neither (very) sick nor (very) flooded. She had a great time, it would seem, but we are glad to have her back. Her school, the John F. Kennedy School, starts rather late, not for almost two weeks (most German kids went back to school Monday). That gives us a bit more time to spend with her, and for her to get ready. Most of her classwork will be in English (all except for learning German), so she'll have it a bit easier than Nicholas in that regard. But we're expecting that the school will be quite challenging, rather more so than her school back in Carbondale (though the Carbondale public schools are just fine, they hardly attract the international studend body Arlette will find here).

Spandau Citadel

On July 25 we visited the Citadel at Spandau. The tower to the left, the Juliusturm, dates from the early 13th century, and is therefore one of the earliest structures still standing in Berlin. The bulk of the structure dates from the 16th century, when it represented the latest in (Italian-engineered) Renaissance fortifications, designed to meet the growing challenge of firearms. Spandau continued to be important militarily after these fortifications were obsolete, and during the second world war housed chemical weapons research. But the fort escaped much damage when the Russians, overrating its defensive potential (there were in fact only a few armed troops inside) held off on attacking it. Today, characteristically, it houses nothing more military than an outdoor cinema, and, in winter, numerous bats, which are apparently drawn to the cavernous vaulted passages through the walls.

Nicholas was game enough to climb the Julius Tower under his own power, impressing all of us. From the top of it one has a nice view of Spandau itself (which, in addition to some industrial ick contains an attractive altstadt we've yet to visit), and can even see back to Berlin. But overcast and drizzle made my pictures bland, so I spare you any.

Spandau is most famous today, no doubt, for housing a single Nazi prisoner, the decidedly odd Rudolf Hess. Hess was one of Hitlers most loyal and longest serving subordinates, but lost power to more ambitous men in Hitler's entourage during the 1930's, and held a largerly ceremonial post by May 1941, when, as the Germans were preparing their ill-fated attack on Russia, Hess decided to embark on a one-man mission to Britain, hoping to reach the English king, George the 6th, and arrange for peace between Britain and Germany. Hess seemed unstable to the British, and was repudiated by Hitler; he was imprisoned by the British, and convicted at Nuremberg trials for his role in Nazi war crimes. He was long the only prisoner in Spandau, and committed suicide at the age of 93 in 1987 (though his son always claimed that he was murdered by the British). Hess was not held in the Spandau citidel, I learned (after looking for some trace of this at the citadel) but in a prison located nearby. As he became (and still is) an object of veneration among German neo-nazis, that prison was destroyed after Hess's death, and its pulverished remains were dumped out at sea. The site was covered by an innocuous parking garage, the better to prevent it becoming a place to celebrate Hess as a sort of Nazi martyr. I naively thought this something of an overreaction, especially given Hess's instability--wouldn't even a Neo-nazi pick someone less nuts?--before I surfed a bit for information on Hess and found several websites pushing books claiming that the Nuremberg trials were a complete "perversion" of justice. Presumably one reason Hess is so popular is that revisionist historians (i.e., right-wing wackos) like to claim that Hitler didn't want war with England (or America), but only with less attractive nations to the east: Hess's mission to England seems to support this view. Everything I've read from more creditable sources suggests otherwise: before more pressing matters intervened, Hitler hoped to build a high-seas navy that could compete with those of England and the US. No need for that if all one needs is a bit of lebensraum in Poland. But too much on this theme.

A more mundane bit on Hess. During part of the time Janet was in Berlin, she worked as a supply clerk for the US Army, and when the Americans took their turn looking after Hess, her unit handled matters like ordering his clothes. She remembers her boss showing them Hess's underwear. They were special order, as he was incontinent by this time.

Schloss Charlottenburg

On top is a picture of Schloss Charlottenburg, to which we paid a quick visit on July 23. We wandered around the grounds without paying our euros to go inside, despite Nicholas' insistent demands to see all the glories of baroque Prussia. This palace was begun by the Frederick who is known as the Great Elector before he dared call himself king of Prussia (hence the Elector business), and was meant as a summer residence for his wife, Sophie Charlotte (whence Charlottenburg). The place is surrounded by a vast garden, now a popular spot for weekend strollers and joggers in addition to tourists. I'd say it was a oasis of green within the busy city, but Berlin has so many such green places that the oasis metaphor wears a bit thin. With its zoning keeping buildings fairly low (usually no more than five storeys or so) and the numerous parks, Berlin hardly feels overpoweringly urban to me (but then again we live in a fairly low-key residential part of the city). This abundance of greenery was particularly important during the Cold War, when West Berlin was an island surrounded by the Berlin Wall. Back then the city's economy was highly subsidized, as its industrial base had been destroyed by the war and the isolation within East Germany, and few major corporations wanted to risk placing important assets in what seemed a very dangerous place. While the wall is gone, Berlin remains in some ways a less busy place than the other major cities of Germany: there are far fewer major corporations headquartered here than in places like Stuttgart and Hamburg, and the pace of life is apparently a bit slower.

Well, back to us. Our, or at least my favorite spot on the Schloss Charlottenburg grounds was the Mausoleum (pictured above) holding the remains of some of the Hohlenzollern Royalty, most famous those of Queen Louisa (to the right), spouse of Frederick III. Louisa had the misfortune to be on the scene for

Prussia's worst times (until the end of the Hohlenzollern house in 1919), when the kingdom was defeated by Napoleon. She died in 1810, too early for the redemption of Prussia, which aided the British at Waterloo in 1815. The mausoleum, a work of Schinkel, the great

est Prussian architect, retains even today a quiet beauty. The burial chamber (which contains Louisa's spouse, and one subsequent Hohlenzollern couple) was lit just enough by side windows to allow one to see the fine scupltures atop the marble caskets. Despite the long time, and immense history, that's passed since Louisa passed from the scene, the chamber was somber and suitably funereal even on our visit. The most beloved members of the Prussian monarchy seem to have been the queens: hence Louisa here, and Charlottenburg. Only Friederich the Great seems to get much good press among the males, presumably because he combined enlightenment, by some definitions, with conque

st.