THURSDAY 30th DAY 27 DENMARK TO GERMANY
Awoke to sunshine again. Walked to the town to visit the cathedral, renowned for its five aisles. Found a white interior, restored pillars and arches in soft greys, greens and browns, some pillars bearing strange little figures, each bearing a tiny pillar on its head. Some lovely wood carvings and more paintings of people, who maybe had donated money to the cathedral, each surrounded by a grey marble frame.
The altar was new, a semi-circular slab of pink marble, behind it a semi-circular dome of modern mosaics depicting scenes from the Bible. We climbed to the top of the cathedral tower for a view over the orange tiled rooftops of the town, and the pale green flatlands, the polders, stretching all around.
Meandered through the shops, the others gift-hunting, me just looking, my case space and weight are so limited. There were lots of gift shops filled with the sort of colourful bits and pieces which fill teenagers rooms at home, including a lot of delicate mobiles at heavy prices, pretty arrangements of dried flowers, used particularly in making candle arrangements. Also some attractive clothes shops but prices much higher than in London.
Finally drove on across the polders stopping briefly in the pretty little town of Tonder. It had obviously been rich in the past with a huge church, quite different from those seen elsewhere. The walls were whitewashed but lined with heavy ornate carvings painted in sombre primary colours and gold, a great deal of gold. The seats were of dark brown wood, those in the front row were facing each other, not quite sure why.
In the shops there was a lot of lace on view, there was also a lace museum and lots of lace hankies for sale. However, at £30 each I didn’t buy one. Sorry!
It’s very noticeable how shops, pavements, churches, museums and toilets cater for those in wheelchairs. Never noticed this care so much in other towns.
Road signs are now placed above car height and so are much easier to see. Also, the name of each town is placed at the road side on arrival and crossed out on departure, whilst the name of the next town is listed plus its distance away in kilometres. The names of more distant towns are also listed so navigation should be easier. However, our map is not up-to-date, it doesn’t show the latest stretches of motorway so it’s still sometimes confusing.
We decided to take the ferry across the River Elbe to cut driving time. Flat countryside led through reed-filled marshes alongside the vast grey-brown fast flowing river. We were lucky again, drove straight onto the ferry as it was about to leave.
This was an open car and lorry ferry with the bridge stretching over the open deck like the handle of a basket. The captain was perched inside and there was a small raised walkway for passengers to gaze at the muddy waters of the river and the grey mist hanging around the distant sun.
Thought for a difficult moment that we’d caught the wrong ferry for, as it turned out of the jetty into the river, it headed towards the sea. However, fortunately that turned out to be a tactical manoeuvre to avoid a long sandy island in its path. Finally it swung around to face the opposite shore, avoiding large ocean-going ships en route.
What strange scenery, grey water, grey reeds and sandy island stretches with an occasional row of poplar trees straggling across an empty horizon, a fehorses and cows grazing, no sign of habitation.
We arrived in Germany after a forty-five minute crossing and drove through small towns and villages discovering that hotels and guest houses were not readily available. Finally found a little gasthaus in the most foul smelling place I’ve been in for ages, there must be a silage maker around.
It was too late to risk driving on so took the rooms available. The building was new and clean, and we feasted on sausages one foot long with chips, peas and carrots followed by an ice cream for £3.00. At last, a price drop to something more realistic.
FRIDAY 1st DAY 28 GERMANY
We awoke to the foul aroma. How people live here I don’t know. We left rapidly.
Driving south the countryside was very monotonous, maize fields, cattle, rivers busy with industrial barges, houses with increasingly sloping roofs, and traffic jams on the autobahn. It was Friday afternoon and it was the beginning of weekend traffic. We were blocked for nearly an hour by an accident.
Finally we arrived at Botrop, a small town on the fringe of the big industrial area of the Ruhr where Margaret, a German friend of Anne-Marie lives. She took my place as Language Assistant at L’Ecole Normale des Institutrices in Macon, after I’d returned to England in 1968.
I met her years ago when she and Anne-Marie came to stay with me in Italy for a few days holiday. She became a French teacher, married Eric, a lawyer and now they have two children. Jan, a boy of twelve and Anne Lena, a girl of eight, both very much at ease with unknown adults and also fluent in French!
They live in a beautiful home, very spacious rooms, lots of light wood, tiling and carpeted flooring with views onto pretty little gardens back and front. Downstairs the ‘cellar’ is rather like in America, a ‘games room’, alongside laundry and spare room, whilst in the attic lives granny!
Margaret speaks fluent French, Eric a reasonable amount, but Jan wanted to practise his English. After three years study he could easily hold a conversation with me. So the evening was spent in a trilingual conversation catching up on recent years.
SATURDAY 2nd DAY 29 GERMANY TO ENGLAND
Awoke to rain, grateful not to be driving any long distance.
After a leisurely breakfast we all set off to Jan’s school which was having an Open Day, celebrating various activities in connection with Green Peace. There were lots of excited youngsters around, all with light brown or fair hair and fresh complexions dressed in the universal jeans and sweat shirts of youth. Amongst them I counted just one Turkish child and four Vietnamese children. It’s years since I’ve been surrounded by such a homogeneous group.
They were playing games, watching videos, eating healthy food, well-supported by their parents. It was strange to see so many well-dressed, beautifully made-up mothers in their forties, our age group.
Walked home to lunch through a pleasant leafy suburb. Notice a tendency for more variegated bushes and shrubs in gardens, with flower-filled window boxes rather than gardens as in England filled with lawns and flower beds.
After lunch we drove to the local art gallery, created to house the work of the famous local artist, Joseph Alstrup. He’s very well known for his experiments with colour based on a series of over-lapping squares. Apparently, he was also a well-known teacher and Anne-Marie uses his ideas with some of her pupils.
The gallery was a very attractive building, light, spacious and airy with huge picture windows looking out onto greenery. Most of the main gallery was filled with a huge range of the celebrated ‘square’ paintings, but a lower gallery exhibited works by the Belgian sculptor Pol Bury. Intriguing moving pieces, one series set upon copper pillars about waist high with different arrangements of wood or metal shapes above each other. They were making gentle unexpected movements set off by hidden electric currents.
Others hung from walls. Balls and other shapes of wood somehow attached to a back piece of wood, making noises when they touched each other as they moved. Finally, huge pieces of metal mounted over water, or with water flowing from moving globes or petal-like pieces. Most unusual. There was also a small exhibition of photographs by a black American depicting life in black communities in the States in the 1940s, very bleak. Apparently, despite the industrial nature of this area there is a lot of artistic activity.
We drove to Dusseldorf, just forty-five minutes away. We’d noticed high wood fencing alongside the same motorway earlier but hadn’t realised its function was to reduce the noise level for those living alongside.
I had a grand ‘Au Revoir’ from everybody, life’s going to seem exceedingly quiet for a while! It’s going to feel very strange to cross another border yet this time I’ll be able to speak the language without any difficulty.
The Air Canada crew looked as drab in their uniforms as an American Delta Airlines crew, charcoal grey suits with maroon bow ties, looking older, more strained and less glamorous than usual airline staff.
The clouds cleared as we took off permitting a glimpse of the wide River Rhine meandering through flat fields of corn waiting to be harvested, alongside fields already burnt black. The wide river gradually wound its way through the North German industrial area, past huge furnaces and high thin towers belching smoke up into the clouds until nothing but billowing white could be seen below.
Less than an hour later we were descending through the clouds to a wonderful aerial view of London, the River Thames looking like a small river used for afternoon boating, Hyde Park, Green Park, the Albert Hall, Kew Gardens, a wonderful introduction to the City for any first-time tourist, a Welcome Home for me.
In the Arrivals Hall the wait for luggage took nearly as long as the flight. Someone had bought a souvenir crate of German beer which had disintegrated, cans were rolling all along the moving luggage carrier. I wonder whether all were retrieved by the owner?
At the passport desks were large notices reminding all passengers returning from Kuwait to make contact, not sure why. I’m looking forward to reading a newspaper in English after a month-long break.
It was noticeable how people filtered into the separate UK/European/Others queues for passport control where even UK and European passport photos were carefully matched with faces, quite different from the casual nod given by a border official as we passed from Denmark into Germany.
The tube journey home was hot and tiring. Emerged at Turnpike Lane to be amazed, as usual, by all the Asian, Caribbean and African faces all around. Suddenly feel like a stranger but I guess back at work I’ll soon be feeling at home.
THE END OF SUMMER 1990! LA FIN DU VOYAGE EN FINLANDE!
Love Pen
"Au Revoir
2022 - London, silver birch in my Health Club garden,
memories of Finland so long ago.
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Next Week : A holiday in England for those interested in Writing -
'Fen Farm Autobiographies' - Part 1 of 2.
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