Dresden, Saxony…gorgeous view

Dresden is a remarkably beautiful town. It’s the capitol of the state of Saxony in the country of Germany. Unlike Berlin which is a city/state.
It’s hard to believe that most of the town, well practically the entire town, had to be rebuilt from the ground up after World War II. Our tour guide, Tom Ehrlich, who could definitely serve as Brad Pitt’s stand-in, showed us pictures of what Dresden looked like after Russia’s air bombings in 1945. Thousands were killed and the town was leveled with merely shells of buildings left standing. It has taken nearly 70 years to rebuild. Some of the buildings finished as early as 1993. Masons used what pieces of sand stone were left to try to reconstruct Dresden to its original version. But you can tell where the original pieces start because of the black sand stones on the statues and brick moldings. Every corner warranted a picture. It was that cool! Unfortunately, I haven’t learned yet how to post them all.
Below is my group, RIAS Fall 2012,(good looking crowd,huh) sitting in one of the “chill out” houses of King Augustus the Strong’s courtyard. He once held a wedding for his son which lasted 30 days. I’m sure there’s more things important to remember about him but the one thing that sticks out in my mind was that he had a beautiful mansion built for one of his many mistresses with a bridge connecting it to the palace. With his Queen in the palace! Then on the other side a bridge connected to the church. In the words of our tour guide, “I call that rude!” 🙂 My sentiments exactly.
Our evening ended with a traditional German dinner and our guest was a professor of economics and former mayor of Dresden, Dr. Georg Milbradt. He talked about the Euro Debt Crisis in-depth. It seems parliament has a different opinion than Dr. Milbradt about what to do with debt laden Greece. Dr. Milbradt, from what I gathered, believes Greece should put a tight belt on its spending and work themselves out of the debt situation rather than depend on Germany or other countries in the Euro Zone to bail them out. Taxing others to pay for Greece’s irresponsible leaders…who he says ignored warning signs…bothers some Germans. On the other hand, the countries started this treaty with the intent to unify. They are one with one currency. Together, the euro is strong. And if they turn their backs on Greece and the people who are reeling from unemployment and uncertainty then what does that say about why the Eurozone was formed in the first place. I don’t know.
I’m still learning about all of this but I can keep learning over a hot plate of German food. We visit the Volkswagen plant tomorrow. Till’ then…