I did the usual Wuemmewiesen - Worpswede - Fischerhude - loop with a twist. 75 km of cycling with almost zero accumulated elevation done in precisely 2:30 hr. When I rode along a "Schrebergartenkolonie" (allotment gardens, my dictionary tells me - by the way that guy Moritz Schreber was pretty crazy and his kids became really crazy), I saw the below sign reading "Vernunft" or rationality, reason, in English.
We Germans like to be "vernuenftig" (the associate adjective) and one of our philosophers, Immanuel Kant even wrote at least two books about it "Critique of pure reason" and "Critique of practical reason". Not that I ever read them, neither do I know anyone who did. But for some reasons in Japan Germans are always associated with a few things: Beer and sausages for the simple minded, Beethoven and Arabesque for the cultural sophisticated and writers and poets such as Goethe, Schiller, Hegel and Kant for those who wan to torture us with their superior knowledge, as we really don't know much about these guys. Oh and I forgot Hitler and the war; impossible to count the taps on the shoulder after a few beers, sakes and a good plate of sashimi* "Next time, we together again, but without the Italians." I always found it amusing in the light that my mother is Italian by birth.
When I was working for Schindler Elevator KK in the late Nineties at their manufacturing plant in Fukuroi (the only claim to fame of the city being the 27th of the original Tokaido stations depicted by Hiroshige)the place was so remote from the next train station that I normally called a taxi after work to drive me there. It took me another hour to arrive at our home in Hamamatsu but the worse part of the commute was, that apparently one taxi driver grew fond of me because of my German background and did everything he could to take me to the station. So when I opened the door and after the usual barrage of aisatsu, he immediately started with "In contrast to Kant, Hegel states that ...." or other comments. My Japanese wasn't that good that I could possibly have understood what he was saying but in any case, even if I would have understand his words it was still doubtful that I would have understood it's meaning. Pure torture for 20 minutes. Obviously I had to keep up the pretense that I was the sophisticated German he expected, but on the other hand I was just tired from work and wanted to go home.
Oh, after checking YouTube just now, it seems that there is even a worse song by Sandra from Arabesque: "Hiroshima" OK, little boy, next time with Sandra.
I wrote that Ludwig with Tom on his wheel smashed my Togebaka record of Jerome's hill on the weekend, but looking at the blog that seemed to have happened already in June. Ludwig once told me that he could hardly believe that I was really that fast after he tried to break the record together with Gregg. So the fact that he is now much faster should add some cedibility to my original claim which was definitely not clenbuterolized.
Immanuel Kant caused me many headaches over 25 years ago when I was studying philosophy. He wrote refutations to just about every philosopher I studied and as such became a real nuisance. I think he just liked to argue, rather like my French sister-in-law.
ReplyDeletehey mobster, when you coming back to visit PEEK HQ? no more porridge for breakfast ~ promise. ;-)
ReplyDeleteHi Juliane,
ReplyDeleteyes it is time again to pay a visit to London, it`s lovely countryside and the magnificent PEEK HQ and its cheerful staff. However, teaching season has started and will last for the rest of the year. So it will become spring when the Kosumosu is blooming again.....