Many Munich Memories

We spent a day and a half in Munich, and found it a lovely city to visit. I really didn’t know what to expect when we got to the city, but Munich is very friendly, sophisticated, Americanized (because of the occupation after World War II) and interesting. Now that I’ve been to Munich, I can see why some compare it to Boston.

Munich was created when a toll road needed to be established for the salt trade going from north to south. Munich means “of the monks” who lived in the area at the time, and an image of a monk is in the center of the city’s coat of arms.

Munich’s great churches and buildings are mostly baroque, and quite impressive to see. We visited the 14th-century church Frauenkirche to climb the steps, then take an elevator to the top for a sweeping 360-degree view of Munich. Then, we went to the city’s central square, the Marienplatz, to see the performance of the glockenspiel at 5:00.

After strolling along the Marienplatz, we stopped at an outdoor beer garden for refreshments. The whole idea of a beer garden was very foreign to all of us but Dave. Chloe and Jake thought it was completely strange, but by the second day saw it as part of the culture. I personally don’t like beer, but the beers of Germany are as superior to the American beers as the Italian espresso is to U.S. coffee.

Dave, Jake, Chloe and Joel attended the theatre that night, “Pirates of Penzance” – in German. They were delighted to see the performance and because they have performed in the show with Imago, they knew all the lines in English. The funniest part for them was the song, “Modern Major General,” done in German. It’s tounge twisting in English; it was ridiculous in German.

Caleb and I spent the evening exploring the shopping district. There was a “statue” of a German soldier that Caleb swore was a statue – until it moved. Caleb burst out laughing. The soldier-statue motioned Caleb over and gave him a hug. Caleb’s second delight came from running through the large fountain in his raincoat. He was soaked and giggling as he tried to dodge the spray.

The next day we went to the Deutsches Museum: The museum has a world-renowned collection of science and technology exhibits, and is located on the Isar River. This museum was so much better than we had anticipated, with all kinds of fascinating exhibits, and a Kinder area for lots of hands-on activities for kids.

After the museum, we strolled through the Englischer Garten, a large park area, probably the size of Central Park, with a swift river running through part of it. It was a hot day, and I would have given anything for my bathing suit, so I could jump in and float down the river with the current, as others were doing. We noticed a section where locals didn’t bother with bathing suits; some of us noticed, some didn’t 🙂

After walking through the garden, Jake, Dave and Joel took off for the BMW museum (high on their list), while Chloe Caleb and I went back to the shopping district (high on our list). Everyone was happy. Caleb bought a music box, Chloe bought a shirt and Dave bought a Z4. (just kidding, as far as I know). He told me they went to the factory, where people pick up their cars right off the assembly line. Ahh, how fun that must be! Maybe next time….