Pictures from Germany and Prague

The inside of the hall where the Berlin Philharmonic plays








I snuck a picture once Seiji Ozawa got on stage... o:)









The main entrance of the zoo (or at least the prettiest) - The Elephant Gate









The Berlin Cathedral








The Bradenburg Gate, which was just barely in East Berlin territory, and through which people stormed when the wall came down in November, 1989.








This is the largest section of the Berlin Wall that is still standing









This is the Holocaust memorial right by the Brandenburg Gate, in the center of the city. Walking through it didn't do much to me, possibly because I kept running into other people from our tour, and because I went a little quickly, but it's definitely an interesting monument. As explained by Torben (our guide), it was built more as a way for the perpetrators to remember what they had done, and less for the victims. The Jewish population of Berlin, actually, decided not to have anything to do with the memorial, as for them, it's impossible to forget the Holocaust.







A view of the Reichstag from the Spree River (great name for a river, don't you think?)








This mirror funnel contraption runs straight through the middle of the dome - it's really cool









Me at the top of the dome - you can see Tiergarten, with the carillon of Tiergarten, in the background









The Pergamon altar








The Gate of Ishtar











Dresden:




The Dresden Castle - The Crown Gate (named for obvious reasons :)









The Cathedral in Dresden








Frauenkirche, which has just recently finished being restored. The interesting part about the destruction of this church, if you can call destruction interesting, is that it escaped the bombings completely unscathed. The following day, however, the heat and the vibrations from the ground caused the church to collapse completely. You can see the old walls in comparison with the new walls in this picture.





The inside of Frauenkirche










The mosaic of the Saxon Rulers









The outside of the opera house - the Dresden opera house was definitely the prettiest one I was in this past week








The Emperor's Box








The dome inside the opera house - the entire dome was painted with portraits of people, mostly famous musicians (Mozart, Beethoven, etc)





One thing I forgot to mention in my blog post, though - the Dresden bombing. The city is still, 50 years later, in the process of renovation, but for the most part, all the main buildlings have been rebuilt, and rather than looking like a city completely destroyed, today it just looks like a city with a few construction projects going on. Our guide definitely didn't let us forget that the city had been carpet bombed - almost every building we stopped at, he had a picture to show of what that building had looked like in February of 1945, and it was never pretty...

Leipzig:



We were really excited to ride a double decker bus from Dresden to Leipzig... :)







Nikolaikirche











Thomaskirche











The statue of Johann Sebastian Bach outside Thomaskirche









Prague:



The Astronomical Clock of Prague
The legend with this clock (which isn't true), is that the council of Prague didn't want the man who had built the clock to build any mroe astronomical clocks, so the council had him blinded in the middle of the night. After that, he had a friend take him up to the top of the clock, and he messed it up in revenge, and for 100 years no one could figure out how to make the clock work again. But, the clock works fine today. :)





The Cathedral
If you can tell from the picture, the right hand tower is bigger than left hand one. This is to symbolize Adam and Eve, and Adam is shading Eve, protecting her from the sun.







A good view of the city, and especially of the Lesser Quarter, one of the first areas of the city of Prague to be populated








This statue is in memorial to Franz Kafka - I forget why he's important to Prague (I can't remember if he's from Prague, or not), but I though the statue was pretty cool. It's supposed to symbolize the feelings of lonliness, alienation, and the like that Kafka writes about.






Me with the statue of John somebody (not the Baptist)
There are four traditions that accompany rubbing the statue, but I only remember three. You will either have good luck, return to Prague (someday), or, if you're female, get pregnant (someday). I figured there was nothing wrong with rubbing the statue. :)









Another view of the city, from the hill Claire and I climbed Friday evening