A Day in München

Guten tag everyone! Just a quick blog update to detail my last full day in Munich. I stayed up pretty late last night writing the blog about my arrival here, the visit to Salzburg, etc. so I woke up later today than yesterday. It was OK though and welcomed rest from the very busy days we've had...

So we first ate at a restaurant called "Cafe Münchener Freiheit" in a nice, posh area of town called "Schwabing":

http://www.muenchner-freiheit.de/

I had a combination of müslei with fruit, some pears and cheese, and a really big omelet. Actually I couldn't finish it all but it was really good. At this breakfast I got to meet a friend of Raff's named Katha. She is a dancer, a journalist, radio broadcaster, and an all around highly energetic and lovely girl. We hit it off right away!

After breakfast, we then hopped on to the U-bahn and headed off to Marienplatz, one of the central parts of Munich City Center (and a very historic place). Here are some pictures:







Later we headed to the nearby Jewish Museum:

Judisches Museum München

It's a fantastically done museum about the history and impact on Jewish culture and lives in the Bavarian region, especially imparting the fact about how important it is to be open and honest about German past with them and to learn from it for the future. They have some really nice exhibits about how western culture tends to generalize and stereotype other people simply by way of their skin, their mannerisms, their accents, etc. It wasn't just Jewish culture, they gave examples of many others. Anyway, I really enjoyed it and I'm glad I went...

Next up we went to Pinakothek Area (major musem area) where we first had a quiet moment endulging ourselves with hot chocolate, tea and fresh pear & ginger juice - all at a hip restaurant called Tresniejwski:

Tresznjewski

Katha and I took a nice picture together:



That set us in the right mood to see painted canvas on painted walls at the Pinakothek New Art Musem, focusing on 19th and 20th century art. Saw some Van Gough, some Monet, Manet, and a number of others. Didn't realize it at the time but Raff took some clandestine photos of me perusing through the museum:




Later we came back towards home and met up with Gab and parents for a fantastic dinner at a small Italian restaurant in their village. It was really quite lovely and a chance for me to see the Pollak family all together one more time before my departure tomorrow...

So that's about it - Raff and I are sitting here on the couch doing computer stuff and watching some TV. Tomorrow I leave for Mumbai and I arrive early in the morning, so I probably won't be able to update the blog for a day or 2...

Namaste to you all :-)