Tag: Culture
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Vienna: Guten Tag, Österreich
The hills are alive with the sound of music… not quite. With limited time on our hands and piles of laundry in our bags, the trip to Austria took to a different dimension. There were no Salzburg and Linz, but there was Mauthausen. There was no Stephansdom, but there was Schloss Schönbrunn. And there weren’t…
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Prague: Czechs and the City
It’s freezing and the hastily bought umbrella from a Jewish Quarter store is no use to the increasingly strong rains. The group — our group, plus a young American couple, another American middle-aged man, and a Swedish dude — tries very hard to raise the resolute commitment our Puerto Rican tour guide has. It’s one…
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Wilkommen in Deutschland 2: Eisenach
The following day, another castle is on our itinerary: the Wartburg in Eisenach. Arriving at the humble city early in the morning, which is a Saturday, we witness a small parade punctuating a leisure walk at a narrow, cobbled street. Flower stalls line the plaza as locals perform various traditional German tunes. We have our…
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Wilkommen in Deutschland 1: Heidelberg
Situated at the crossroads of Western and Central Europe, Germany exerts a significant influence not just on the continent but on the whole world as well. This is, after all, the nation that gave us Einstein, Luther, Bach, Marx and MP3. While a relative newcomer as a political entity, Germany is a veteran in a…
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Amsterdam: Bible Study at the Red Light District
A Bible study at the red light district? Why not? This is Amsterdam. Tolerance has been the calling card of the Netherlands’ capital and while of late there seemed to have been a penetrating examination in the Dutch society amongst themselves of whether too much open-mindedness can be bad, the debate seemed to have died…
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Paris: Je t’Aime
Hollywood, in its usual preference to bypass subtleties for in-your-face stereotypes, usually like to portray the French at, if not at their impossibly worst, their impossibly best. So, I thought, if travel writers and casual tourists alike wax lyrical about the French capital like superlatives about La Ville-Lumière are going out of fashion, then they’re probably leaving…
The Tourist Gaze 