Germany/Ireland — Sept. 08, 2010

I hadn't uploaded pictures before my previous post. Click on them to enlarge for a better view. Click again to enlarge even more.

Here's one I took looking easterly from my room at the B+B on Tuesday, Sept. 7, while I was waiting to get to car looked at in the garage. It shows St. Macartan's Cathedral, which was built on a hill east of the town in the 19th century. Although the cathedral is in Monaghan town, the diocese is called the Diocese of Clones (pronounced CLO ness), a town about 10 miles west of Monaghan. Below the cathedral, you can see the roof of a nearby building.

On Wednesday morning I waited for the replacement vehicle. By 10:20 it had not arrived, so I called and learned that the only thing they had with automatic transmission was a commercial SUV. I accepted that rather than an ordinary sized car with standard transmission. All my experience in driving has involved shifting with my right hand, and I felt it would be too demanding to have to shift with my left hand, along with the other unfamiliar elements of driving on the left. They promised the vehicle by 1:00, and rather than make the Canadians and Willie McKenna curtail their visit to Donagh in order to get me back in plenty of time, I told them to go without me. I had a leaflet from the Tourist Centre for a walking tour of the town, so I set out. My walk began going in reverse direction along the route I had driven to the B+B on Monday evening. For a bit more information, here's the link to the wiki article about the town.

You can find more, if you're at all interested, by googling Monaghan. There's pretty good site sponsored by the tourism bureau. So browse to your heart's content.

At the top of the slope of Dublin Road is the main square, or "diamond," as they call it in Ireland, and on the north side of the diamond is the brick Westenra Arms Hotel. In the center of the diamond is the Rossmore memorial. Westenra is the family name of the earls of Rossmore and the memorial honors a member of the family who died accidentally in his youth. (If you look closely you can see not only the two s's of the name but also the o to the left and the m to the right at the level just above the arches.) The diamond was under reconstruction at the time, and the orange temporary fencing protects a work area.

In the above and subsequent photos, you see a number of fairly substantial buildings, many of stone. In the early and mid- 19th century, the town was relatively prosperous and these grand buildings could be built in the center of town.

After passing through the diamond, I came to the courthouse (also undergoing repairs) on the southeast side of the street (which is gradually curving toward the south). The column in front of the courthouse is a monument to the seven fatal victims of a car bombing in 1974 — part of the decades-long conflict between loyalists and nationalists. The names of the victims are inscribed in the vertical pieces — one vertical for each victim, not all visible from this side.

The bank of Ireland. To the left is the beginning of North Road, which is where the bombing happened. To both sides you can see buildings of a more ordinary size and character.

Looking west along Mill St.

This is the Monaghan County Museum. After the vehicle was delivered, I visited the museum. It has interesting exhibits showing and explaining artifacts from prehistoric times to the 20th century. So there is a good bit of cultural anthropology, I think you'd call it, along with historical information.

The Market House. I had passed by on the other side when I drove into town.

St. Joseph's Church, where I went to Mass on Tuesday.

Park St., looking southerly, toward the roundabout. At the left you can see a corner of the church. Just beyond is a sign alerting drivers to the roundabout. The park is beyond the roundabout. When I came into town I drove from the roundabout toward the area from which this picture was taken.

West side of Park St. You can see the same yellow sign as in the previous picture. A bit to the left is the Veritas Bookshop and Gallery. I forgot to mention in  my previous post that after Mass on Tuesday (before the accident) I went in there to browse around and found The Cost of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, in English translation, and I bought it. I read some of it during the rest of my trip. Unfortunately I set it aside when I got home, so it's probably less that half finished. It is a very thought-provoking book.

The replacement vehicle was delivered about 12:50. I think it might almost be called a van, rather than an SUV. Anyway, it had a large flat area behind the driver's  seat, with doors at the sides and rear — no second row for passengers. The window in the rear doors was tinted, making it difficult the view things behind, and since the distance to the window was longer than in ordinary cars, the field of vision was cut down.

After my visit to the museum, I headed north along route N2 (which eventually gets you to Derry). It's about four or five miles to Emyvale. From Emyvale, a winding road goes about two or three miles to Glaslough. The name Donagh does not appear on current maps, but it is apparently the area from Emyvale to the border with Northern Ireland (County Tyrone), including Glaslough.

When I reached Emyvale, I stopped to check the tourist information sign (they have one in every town) to make sure I found the right road to Glaslough. And I noticed a building called Donagh Oratory across the street. It looked as it it might be a Protestant chapel, but when I got inside, it proved to be Catholic. The stained glass windows extending to the floor are unusual. To the right is a tabernacle in the shape of a celtic cross.

The road from Emyvale was two lanes wide, and in many places there was no shoulder, and frequently walls and hedges prevented a view up the road of more than 20 or thirty yards. Needless to say, I went fairly slowly.

When I got to Glaslough, I headed south, and stopped just outside town and took these pictures looking northwesterly and southwesterly. Emyvale is somewhere out there. More importantly, this is countryside which must have been familiar to ancestors of mine 200 years ago. When I went back into Glaslough, I found a sign (not the one below) which showed Donagh Cemetery somewhere in the area included in these photographs. No doubt ancestors of mine a buried there, since it is centuries old. I found the one-lane road which goes by it, but I did not find the cemetery itself. Willie brought the Canadians there. So it's unfortunate I wasn't able to go with them.

This sign on the road south of Glaslough is what let me know I was just south of town when I took the pictures. It's a very small town. In the upper left is the street that runs north and south. I guess Castle Leslie is the building in the lower left. The Frommer Guide mentions that Winston Churchill was a guest there, as were W. B. Yeats and Mick Jagger (on different occasions). It's also where Sir Paul McCartney married Heather Mills in 2002. Actually I was wrong I couple of posts back when I said Frommer's only mentions Castle Leslie among things in County Monaghan: their section on County Fermanagh also mentions Snaffles Brasserie in the Castle Leslie Hunting Lodge as a good place to dine.

On my way back from Donagh to Monaghan Town, I stopped a little south of Emyvale and took this picture of St. Patrick's Church. I don't know if it was built before my ancestors emigrated, but is has a tablet commemorating Canon Patrick Moynagh, who was the priest who encouraged emigration from the area to Prince Edward Island.

Here again is the link for a wiki article on County Monaghan.

I've Been Busy

Sorry for the interruption to my travelogue. I've been pretty busy with a church project and concerts in Boston Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. Wednesday, it was chamber music — a piano recital, Thursday Gustav Mahler's 9th Symphony at the Boston Symphony, and Friday the 1926 opera "Cardillac" by Paul Hindemith.

The symphony concert was remarkable because the Music Director of the BSO, James Levine, who was scheduled to conduct, was physically unable to do so because of severe back pain. In his place, Sean Newhouse, a 30 year old assistant conductor, stepped in on a few hours' notice and led a Boston Symphony concert for the first time. I was there, and he appeared confident and in control the whole time, and he got a standing ovation at the end — well deserved IMO.

Anyway, I should be able to return to posting about my travels, and showing some pics, in another day or two.

Germany/Ireland — Sept. 07, 2010

After a full breakfast of eggs, sausage, pudding, bacon, toast, and tea (with orange juice to begin), I strolled around for a bit. I checked out the church which people had been leaving as I drove past the previous evening. It was Catholic, and had a Mass scheduled at 10:00.  At about 9:50 I got to the Tourist Information Centre, where the lady had maps of the town, bus schedules (I planned to take the bus to Dublin one day during my visit) and various leaflets. When I told her that my great-great-grandmother — who had emigrated from County Monaghan to Prince Edward Island with her husband, James White, in the early 1840's — was born a McKenna, she said I must meet Willie McKenna, who is a fount of information about the County, the McKennas, and the PEI connection.

I got back to the church at about 10:10 and was surprised to find that there was standing room only (with seats for at least 400). This is in a town with a population a little over 6,000 (my parish has about as many Catholics, and we get one tenth as many for weekday Mass — and that's not bad for our area).

After Mass, I went to move the car from the lot which is free overnight but costs one Euro per hour during the day, to one where the parking is free (a little bit past an area of long term parking for €2 per day. At the entrance to the free lot, after some speed bumps, the way narrowed to a single lane, and there were steel posts on each side. I was noticing the buildings on the far side of the lot when there was a loud noise and the car stopped suddenly. I had hit the post on the left, smashing in the fender and breaking the housing for the headlight. The piece inside the tire well was in contact with the tire, and the front bumper was loose. I drove the car back to the €2 long-term parking area, and went back to the B+B, where the owner was very helpful about lending me her phone to call the rental company to report the accident, and her husband later led me to a repair shop. The owner there informed the rental company that the car was not driveable, and I was promised a replacement by 10:00 the next morning. Thank goodness I had decided to take full collision insurance.

I had thought I'd spend the day driving to spots of interest in the counties to the south of Monaghan, such as Slane, the Hill of Tara, Trim Castle, Mellifont Abbey, the Boyne, etc., as time permitted, with probably a second day on Thursday. But after the accident, I had to spend the afternoon handy to the telephone so as to be available to the rental company.

Late in the afternoon, I met a couple who were staying at the B+B. They were originally from PEI and also had Monaghan ancestors but now live in western Canada, and they were planning to meet Willie McKenna that evening in a pub. We went by ourselves to the pub at about 5:30 and got acquainted. Then at 10:00 we returned and met Willie McKenna. He was planning to take them to the area our ancestors had lived in, called Donagh, the following morning. They invited me to join them, and I said I would. We'd leave about 10:30.

Frommer's guide to Ireland does not mention County Monaghan as having anything worth seeing (except for a reference to Castle Leslie in the part on Northern Ireland!), but Monaghan Town is pleasant enough and has its points of interest. More about that tomorrow.

Germany/Ireland — Sept. 06, 2010

I said good bye to my hosts Monday morning, left Rothenburg at about 10:40 a.m., and arrived at the airport in Frankfurt at about 1:00 p.m. I'm still amazed at how quickly I was able to go between Frankfurt and Rothenburg. Maybe it's because the autobahn has been improved to avoid the traffic jam I always used to hit at Aschaffenburg. Maybe it's because I didn't stop along the way or take any secondary roads.

When I checked in, I was surprised to learn that I was flying business class to Dublin. It had originally been booked that way, but I hadn't noticed. The rest of the trip was economy class. The business class lounge was pleasant: free coffee, snacks, beer, wine, newspapers (and I had just bought one before going there!). But the best thing was on the plane: more room. There were two seats on each side instead of three. That extra space makes things very much more comfortable. I'm not sure if I'll go to Europe or Japan again, but if I do, and if I can afford it, I'm definitely going to go business class. Of course, the longer the flight, the more difference it makes (and probably the more it costs); but my travel tip for the day is: for long flights, go business if you can afford it.

I arrived at Dublin about 5:15 p.m., got my rental car, and was on my way by 6:00. On the approach to the motorway, there were lanes for Belfast, Dublin, and All Other. Of course, I took the All Other, but quickly left because it seemed to be headed to the southwest, and my destination, Monaghan, was north. After a short while I realized that I was getting nowhere fast and had no idea how to get to Monaghan from the spot where I was. A check of the map confirmed that I wanted highway N2 and I needed to get back on the motorway. So that's what I did. But during my useless side trip at one point I hit the curb with the left front tire so hard that I thought I'd better stop and check for damage. Thankfully, there was none.

Before I got to Ireland, I had thought that the danger in having to drive on the left would be a tendency  to move over to the right. But that only happened in parking lots and driveways. On the road the problem was not knowing how much space to leave on the left. Let's say x represents the driver's position and – the passenger's, | the side of the road, and . the center. When you drive on the right, the situation is:  |  .x–|  but when you're on the left it's:  |–x.  | . It's easy enough to keep to your side of the road, but judging the space you need to leave on the left is the hard part, because you've got to allow for the passenger side, which you're not used to.

Well, it was raining fairly heavily (the remnants of Hurricane Earl), which cut down on the view, but the highway was good and well marked. The roundabouts, which some people seem to think are a problem, actually were helpful. They prevented any tendency to drift into the wrong lane when making a turn. So I arrived in Monagahn Town without any trouble. But I didn't know exactly how to find Ashleigh House, the B+B where I was staying. Fortunately, I had just enough memory of the map of the town to guess that when I came to the roundabout, I should go right. I did so and then just kept going as the road curved slowly around to the right. Presently, there was Ashleigh House on the left side of the road. Even though I wasn't completely sure I was still on the right road, it wasn't pure luck. I had studied the map enough to be able to guess correctly that I should keep going through town until I got to the roundabout (although a  right turn  a block sooner would also have worked) and to make an educated guess about how to proceed from the roundabout.

So at 8:00 p.m., about 11 hours after leaving Rothenburg (2 flying, 4 in airports, and 5 on the road), I was in Monaghan, having successfully driven on the left for the first time in my 50 years of driving, and ready to explore one of my ancestral homelands.

Reflecting on Rothenburg

The main thing I think my experience with Stefan and the Junge Schar tells me is that it is possible for a closeted gay man to have satisfying friendships with straight guys. It's obvious that most of the people I've mentioned genuinely like me. If I lived there, I have no doubt I could be in a close friendship with some of them. Just knowing that they like me is very affirming.

On my most recent visit, most of my conversations didn't get beyond the stage of "It's great to see you. It's wonderful being back," and the like. It was only after I left that it occurred to me that I should have asked people something like, "What's been going on with you since the last time I saw you?" Then we'd have had better and longer conversations. But I never was a skilled conversationalist. Next time I'll know better.

Why haven't I made many close friendships at home, if I could make such a good start in Germany? Maybe I felt freer, less guarded, there somehow. It does seem to me that if I had handled things differently here, I could have developed some close and enduring friendships. But I spent so much time for so many years in local government that I didn't have much time for socializing. In addition, it took me a long to accept my orientation. For a long time, my natural shyness was exacerbated by my lack of self-acceptance. I felt safer in non-social settings.

I've never felt that I needed to be in a sexual relationship to be happy. I think my life so far has in fact been reasonably happy. I've had a generally satisfying career with plenty of friendly acquaintances; I've been involved in activities I've enjoyed. But I have been a loner, and if I had managed to develop a friendship with someone here like the one with Stefan, it would be even better. Of course, my life isn't over yet (as of the time I'm typing this) so maybe I can still make improvements.

Getting back to Rothenburg for a moment: their calendar of celebrations is really impressive. They have a festival of several days at Pentecost, then there's the Imperial Free City Days in September, another celebration in October, and a Christmas festival. It's a great place to be. Of course, I've only been there during these festival times, and if I lived there, the routine life would be something quite different from these peak moments. But I get the impression that the culture is still different from here. I think I could really enjoy being one of the regulars who meet at the pub.

Germany/Ireland — Sept. 05, 2010

On Sunday, after breakfast Stefan's Dad and I walked into the city to go to Mass, a distance of maybe a mile and a half. On previous visits, I've been able to follow the homily pretty well, but there is a new pastor, and he is a bit more intellectual. The vocabulary was often unfamiliar, and at times when I could catch the words, I couldn't get his point.

Back at the house, we had dinner. The vegetables, potatoes and salad, were home grown. The bouquet I bought from Uli Müller is on the table.

Stefan's dad.

Stefan's mom. A couple of Stefan's dad's paintings can be seen on the wall behind her.

After dinner, we went back into the city for the 2:30 performance of the play, "Der Meistertrunk," which tells the tale of how ex-mayor Nusch saved the city — conquered by imperial field marshal Count Tilly — by drinking 3 1/4 liters of wine non-stop on a challenge from Tilly. On our way there, we visited the Feldschmiede and saw Hannes, who had visited the U.S. a couple of years ago. Unfortunately, I don't seem to have any pictures of him, which is surprising. I thought I took some. The play is staged in the Kaisersaal — the Imperial Hall — of City Hall.

The stage in the Kaisersaal.

Stefan's wife, Petra.

Sloggi, as City Herald. He was a Hans Staudt jun. in the Junge Schar during some of my early visits.

By the way, the nicknames that many of the people have — Sloggi, Horaz, Stupfi, Geige, Erni, Texas, Kiefer — are often names that they were given when they joined the Junge Schar. Sometimes they just have a regular nickname, like Manni for Manfred, but frequently it has nothing to do with their real name. For example, Erni got his nickname because they thought he looked like the character Ernie on the children's TV program "Sesame Street."

The Junge Schar are about to take the oath to defend the city. In the green jacket, holding the flag, is Pierre, who was a new member the time I went on stage with them. "In my day" we massed on the right side.

Stefan as Count Tilly, Horaz as his Jesuit chaplain, a member of the city council, possibly Mayor Bezold. The people with large hats are a couple of the member's of Tilly's staff.

Former Mayor Nusch says he'll accept the challenge. The beaker is to his left on the table.

He begins to drink.

After several minutes, he's almost finished — to the astonishment of Tilly and his generals.

The city is saved. In red and white is Mayor Bezold's niece. If I'm not mistaken, Manni is the imperial officer behind the beaker. The standing councillors are Hans Staudt sen. (whose son was killed in the battle) and Mayor Bezold.

Curtain call. The girl with the apron is the cellarer's daughter. She came up with the idea of giving the generals a drink, which mellowed them and led to Tilly's issuing the challenge that Nusch successfully undertook. BTW, this photo shows a mistake that Stefan made. If you enlarge it as much as possible, you can see his wedding ring on his right hand. He forgot to take it off when getting ready for the play, and when he took his gloves off, there it was. But Tilly never married, and was quite ascetic. In fact, he apparently didn't usually drink wine, which is why after having some he mellowed and relented on having the councillors hanged and the city plundered and issued the challenge

After the play Stefan and I went to an area where a group called the Panduren were having their "cast party." A number of them are also former Junge Scharlers, and again it was pleasant to visit with them. After a while the Junge Schar came and joined the party. First they sang a couple of their songs. When they were singing my favorite, "Jenseits des Tales," someone motioned to me to join them, so I got to stand in the front row and sing along. It was definitely one of the high points of the weekend. (BTW, if any of my readers know the song, I should point out that the Junge Schar sing a three stanza version in which it is the damp earth that heals the young king.)

When the party wound down, around 9:00, we went to the tavern Zum Ochsen (the Ox), which is a favorite gathering spot. The place was nearly full when we got there, but Stefan, Petra, a couple of their neighbors, and I got a table. I had an excellent meal of medallions of veal with yellow chanterelle mushrooms. A half dozen or so of the Junge Schar were at sidewalk tables outside.

BTW, as I mentioned both to Stefan and his daughter, Stefan is a real "babe magnet." In his early days in the Junge Schar, he was the favorite photo object for the young girls who'd watch the Schar set up and dismantle their camp. And it seems that there are always women who want to talk to him.

I'll have some general comments on my return to Rothenburg in a subsequent post.

Thinking about St. Valentine's Day

Several bloggers mentioned how sad it made them feel that they didn't have a special someone to be with on Valentine's Day. OTOH, being alone didn't bother me at all. I've been thinking about the difference in our feelings. I don't mean to criticize anybody, but I'm always sorry to see people feeling bad, and it would be better, IMO, if folks didn't feel unhappy on that occasion. So why the difference between my feelings and other people's?

There have been a number of people I've known that I would have liked to have an intimate friendship with. But whatever longings I've had have been directed toward a specific individual. I've never had the feeling, "I'm doomed to unhappiness unless I find someone to love." So I ask myself why so many people have the idea that their lives are necessarily unhappy/unfulfilled/miserable/[insert your own adjective] unless and until they are in an intimate relationship with someone. Did they grow up in a culture which propagandized them to believe that they couldn't be happy alone, whereas I grew up in one which was less fixated on "sexual fulfillment?" Is it just a different personality? Are people more impatient now?

Anyway, it has seemed to me that people (and I see them even in their mid teens) who are convinced that they cannot be happy until they have "someone" are actually making themselves miserable when they don't have to be. I've never had "someone." There were a couple of times when I seemed close to developing a true and lasting emotionally intimate friendship. And when the other person broke it off, it was painful. But the pain subsided and went away, leaving only nostalgia. The rest of the time, I was fine.

So I certainly understand when someone feels the pain of an unrequited love or a broken relationship. But my best wish for people in other situations of singleness is that they could learn to stop making themselves miserable by telling themselves that they are miserable. I'd much rather see people being able to be content, enjoying the good things they do have.

What it comes down to is: I want to encourage people who were truly unhappy about not having a Valentine on Valentine's Day to try to rethink, to ask themselves why they can't be happy and single if other people can. I hope people can question their assumptions, be patient, and let themselves be content if it's at all possible. I'm sad that they're sad.

Germany/Ireland — Sept. 04, 2010

It was Stefan's 45th birthday. Coincidentally it was also Horaz's 45th birthday. Horaz was born a few hours before Stefan, and he was going to have a Frühschoppen (literally "morning pint") to which Stefan and I would go. By the time Stefan arrived at his parents' home it was already after noon, so I joked that it would now be a Nachmittagschoppen (afternoon pint), but he said that on one of his recent birthdays (he might have said the 40th) he had a Frühschoppen which began at 10 a.m. and ended at 5 p.m. on the next day.

At the Frühschoppen. Jürgen, in the red shirt, is having a morsel of Weißwurst, a veal sausage, with mustard. They told me I was eating it wrong by leaving the skin on, but I like natural sausage casing. Also in the picture, Manni and his wife Elke.

Stupfi, Christine, Geige's wife whose name I didn't get, Geige, and my glass of Weißbier, a slightly sour and cloudy beer made with wheat. It is the regular beer for the summer. The yard in the background made me forget that this spot is inside the city walls until we left and arrived at a familiar location also inside the walls.

Michael, Stefan, and Horaz. Michael is the only one of the guys who was not a member of the Junge Schar. As on the previous evening, people seemed to be happy to see me again, and I was certainly happy to see them.

About 3:00 Stefan and I left to see some of the happenings for the Festival. Unlike the Pentecost Festival in the spring, which is all about the Meistertrunk which saved the city in 1631, the Imperial Free City Days, celebrate centuries of history. There is a new microbrewery, but we didn't need any more beer at that point so we proceeded to the crusader knights' encampment just outside the walls in the area to the left of the Galgentor.

Eventually I was drawn to the Knights of the Holy Sepulcher, and very deeply moved by the earnestness with which a knight prayed before battle

 After putting on some of his armor, he returned to pray, this time with another knight on each side.

Then there was a battle, which the Christians lost.

 We went back inside through the Rödertor,

and found the Loser Haufen just inside the Markusbogen (St. Mark's arch), another part of the inner fortifications, like yesterday's Weisser Turm. Texas (in America, we'd probably say "Tex") is on the left, Manni in the dark jacket, and Geige far right.

Stupfi is to the left of Texas. One of their songs was "Es wollt' ein Bauer früh aufsteh'n," which tells what happens when a farmer comes home and discovers the pastor in the bedroom.

We got to the Grüner Markt about 5:00. On Friday it was empty, but now there were tables and umbrellas. We had some supper — meat with sauce, bread, and beer. The Spielmannszug had about half the square roped off, and they played some of their music, before having some supper.

The Junge Schar arrived, with Uwe, made up as the bloodied messenger, in the lead. They set up in front of the food stand, visible in the first two shots, and performed a few of their songs. If you click twice on the second photo, you can read the menu. If you know German and German food, you can understand it.  All prices are in euros.

The Feldschmiede (field smithy) was at the north end of the square, opposite the food stand. The blacksmith in the first picture is the man who made the candle holder that Hannes gave me after his visit. In the center of the second picture, the pointed thing is the item he was working on it the first picture.

The city herald has mustered some musicians to accompany him on his rounds.

The best place for viewing the fireworks on Saturday evening is the Tauber River valley below the city on the southwestern side. But we were a bit lat and Stefan was afraid we could not find a good spot. So instead we went to the Criminal Museum, where he knows the janitor, and were permitted to join about twenty rather distinguished looking people in the garden, which is adjacent to the city walls. There was an opening if the trees which afforded a good view of the fireworks.

In addition to the fireworks, they have flares, which give an impression of the city in flames. Here's a view of the Criminal Museum from the garden.

I was back to Stefan's parents home about 10:30, and had a bit of a snack and some halting conversation with them. And so to bed.