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I first met long-time Swiss friend Eddy in 1972. We were in a seaplane flying to an Amex meeting at Kawau Island on the North Island of New Zealand.
Now, forty-six years later, we are meeting-up with other Amex friends in Leipzig, Germany.
While others recover from jetlag this morning, Eddy and I go out to visit the Monument to the Battle of the Nations, which opened in 1913. This is built on the site of an historic battle here in Leipzig in 1893. The unified armed forces of Russia, Prussia, Austria and Sweden prevailed in a decisive victory over Napoleon and his allies on German soil.
This incredible stone temple is a monument to death, victory, and fantasy architecture. It’s impressive, but has a very cold, militaristic feel. Nothing like the ‘roundness and warmth’ that creates a sense of community as in Byzantine architecture that we came to appreciate from Fannie our guide in Greece earlier this week.
I walked up too many steps and now the left cheek of my derrière is reminding me with sharp jolts of pain. Thankfully, intermittent rolls of thunder and rain beating on the window pane as I lie on the bed seems to soothe it some.