Across the spectrum of German culture

In the last several days I've been able to experience a wide variety of German culture. Last night I went to a concert in the Friedenkirche of Park Sanssouci in Potsdam, one of my favorite churches. Performing was an Israeli duo - a vocalist and guitarist - playing music of Mediterranean and Latin origin. I went with a postdoc from Spain, who was rather amused at the Spanish singing with a heavy Israeli accent. Much of the music was quite good; I found the pieces by an Italian composer to be the most enjoyable.

At the other end of the cultural spectrum, a group of people from the institute went to a Herta game on Sunday. Herta is the Berlin professional football (soccer) team. Games are played in the historic Olympia Stadium, which was built for the 1936 Olympic Games and was the site if Carl Lewis' amazing feats of running and jumping. Last Sunday there were 58,000 fans crowded into the stands cheering on the home team which beat Hoffenburg by a score of 1-0. The game was quite exciting, despite the rain (the stands, but not the field, are covered). The Germans are very efficient in how they run these games - whether it be the system selling beer in re-usable plastic cups on which there is a 1 euro deposit, or the highly-organized system of loading 58,000 cheering fans onto light-rail trains to take them back into the city following the game (the key is lots of big police officers). A ticket to the game includes a public transport pass good until 3am the next day, in case you decide to really celebrate...

All in all, two good evenings of culture.