Rotary Club of Hove

                         Founded 1933 RI No 3630 RIBI No 393

Participants: John and Gilly Austin, Adrian Hillary Ball, Ted Bartup, Gordon and Jane Cummings, Peter and Pam Fowle, David and Brenda Haycock, David and Christine Henderson, Bob and Sheila Hinton, Ken Jones, John Mainwood, Bob and Ann Mulholland, Roger and Jan Patterson, Tad and Halina Phillips-Filipowicz, Keith Upton and Gwen Leach, George and Sylvia Robinson, Paul and Isobel Thrasher and Tony and Joan Woodthorpe,

This party would be joined later on in the proceedings by Clive and Jane Chapple, and Robin and Penny Chandler, who made their own way by car.

The majority of the party gathered on a fine and sunny morning in Goldstone Crescent to meet what turned out to be a mint new coach supplied by the Brighton and Hove Bus Company.

There were some worries that morning, because there had been a major accident on the A23 the day before, as a result of which eight people died, which had caused the road to be closed in both directions between Patcham and Hickstead.

Fortunately for us and all the tens of thousands of other commuters the road was opened one hour before we were due to set off, which dispelled any anxiety we had about being on time at Heathrow Airport.

As it was, the traffic between Goldstone Crescent and the Black Lion Patcham, where we were due to pick up the remainder of the party, was pretty bad and we were five minutes or so late getting there.

With our full party on board we set off for the airport, and unusually so for a Monday morning rush hour, the traffic was pretty reasonable and the journey passed quite quickly, what with Hillary acting as a "trolley dolly" dispensing coffee from the machine at the rear of the coach to one and all.

Earlier on I mentioned the fact that the coach was brand new. The driver informed us that it had only been put on the road a week before at a cost of some quarter of a million pounds. He mentioned in passing that if the wing mirrors needed replacing at any time, it would cost some £1,800.

The checking in procedures at Heathrow went off very smoothly, thanks to our tour leader Hillary, and the comparatively short one and a half hour flight found us arriving in Berlin at about 3.30pm.

Actually we were not sure if we had landed in Berlin or Manchester, because the weather was very drab and overcast.

Our coach, complete with Jurgen, the tour guide met and drove us to our hotel. On the twenty minute or so journey to the Golden Tulip Hotel Park Consul on the Alt-Moabit, two miles or so from the centre of Berlin, Jurgen regaled us with his views on the reunification of Germany. He also pointed out various sights on the way. He told us that "To some people, mainly people from the East, the Berlin Wall still exists in their mind.

Despite some very interesting room sharing, according to the receptionist, with the Woodthorpes sharing with Keith Upton and Ted Bartup, the transfer to the hotel went quite smoothly.

During the afternoon, various people had been out looking to see where we could eat that evening and eventually we all plumped for a very interesting Bavarian restaurant, The Paulaner, some five minutes walk from the hotel.

The Paulaner restaurant turned out to be a very good choice. The service was quite slow, but considering that a party of thirty people or more had arrived with very little notice, the staff coped very well. I think most people agreed that the food was excellent and the friendly atmosphere of that evening boded well for the rest of the week.

-1-

All up for a fairly early breakfast today because our coach was to pick us up for a morning’s tour of central Berlin. We left the hotel promptly at 10am in the company of Charlie, the driver, and Jurgen, the same tour guide as on the previous day and they took us on a three hour tour of Berlin, and I don’t think one small detail was lost. Jurgen rattled off hundreds of facts and figures about the various statues and buildings. He seemed to know the birthdays and passing away dates of every well known figure in the history of Berlin. It was quite an amazing tour de force.

Our first stop was in PotsdamerPlatz which is the centre of a traffic circle and has several streets branching out from it. Apparently, before World War II it was one of the busiest road junctions in all of Europe. Most of the area was destroyed during the numerous heavy bombardments of Berlin. When the city was divided into East and West the Platz was cut in half and after 1963 the Berlin Wall ran right through it, causing the whole area to become totally uninhabited. The Berlin Wall came down in 1989, and on July 21, 1990, a gigantic charity concert was held to commemorate the end of the division between East and West Germany. The concert took place on the then empty PotsdamerPlatz and featured many superstars of the time. After 1990, the square became the focus of attention again, because it an attractive location, suddenly near the centre of the city. The area was split into four sections, each of which was sold to a commercial investor, who then planned the new construction. The largest of these four parts went to Daimler-Benz, which is now part of Daimler-Chrysler, who employed Reno Piano, the world famous Italian architect to come up with a master plan for the new construction. He then subcontracted the building and designing of the individual buildings to many architects from all over Europe.

The second largest part of PotsdamerPlatz went to Sony, the Japanese conglomerate, and this was designed by Helmut Jahn. Bob and Sheila Hinton remarked on the fact that they had visited the site when it was in its very earliest stage of construction and they were amazed by the changes that had been made.

We boarded the coach after about an hour’s sightseeing of PotsdamerPlatz and continued on our tour of Berlin.

Jurgen feeding us yet more facts and figures Bob Hinton bravely turning his back on Spiderman The Reichstag, complete with Sir Norman

We completed our morning’s tour with a look at Checkpoint Charlie, The Reichstag and The Brandenburg Gate. The coach dropped us all back at the Hotel and the party split up somewhat, with a large group retiring to an Italian restaurant, immediately next door to the restaurant we visited last night. At approximately 1.15 UK time I rang President Stephen, who along with a dozen or so Hove Rotarians were attending a very informal Rotary Meeting, to wish them good fellowship from us all in Berlin.

After lunch, most people went off to do their own thing, or just chill out in their rooms at the hotel.

Tuesday evening was given over to a trip to a Bierkellar in Spandau, a suburb of Berlin, which had been organised by David Henderson, who had recommended it to us from a previous visit. It was a very pleasant surprise to see Clive and Jan Chapple, who had arrived in Berlin, after the long drive from Hove, earlier that day.

The meal was typically German, with a first course of Egg Noodle Soup with diced Pork, followed by a main course of a Knuckle of Pork, with Sauerkraut and Dumplings. Just to complete this nice light!! meal we finished with Apple Strudel and Cream.

All this was washed down with lashings of bear, both light and dark. As soon as one jug was finished, another one appeared as if by magic!

-2-

Most of us left the bierkellar very bloated (and merry) on the coach at about 10pm.

I think nearly everyone went straight to their bedrooms, because it had been quite a long and tiring day.

Wednesday was designated a completely free day, enabling people to do whatever they fancied. I suspect that a lot of people just chilled out, because owing to the constant noise throughout the night from traffic outside, it left one feeling pretty tired before doing anything.

As it turned out there didn’t appear to be too many people doing this because a party of 21 of us decided to do a trip on the Spree River and various canals of Berlin. It was a lovely morning, ideal for this nice peaceful excursion and the jetty for the trip was only a few minutes walk from our hotel. Hilary organised the purchase of the block booking, which was unfortunate for her, because owing to a small mistake on the receipt she was known as Frau Balls for the rest of the day. It was a trip of some three and a half hours covering almost every landmark in Berlin.

The greatest excitement on our journey was that Ted Bartup was very stubborn about sitting down when we approached the numerous low bridges we passed under and the boat’s crew became very agitated on the approach to every bridge. John Mainwood suggested that we change his name from "Ted the Dead" to "Ted the Head!"

The trip was made somewhat complicated by the fact that the circuit around Berlin was the exact opposite of how it was described in the accompanying guide book, which meant that whenever it told you to look to your right you had to remember to do the opposite. This also applied when it described a landmark as being to the rear of the boat you had to look to the front. There were a total of 104 landmarks in the guide book the only other handicap was that the spoken commentary was in German, which was strange considering over fifty percent of the passengers were English.

The end of the trip coincided with being time for lunch. So we decided to have lunch in the centre of Berlin

and bought tickets on the Ubahn (the Tube to you!) John Mainwood was our guide for the afternoon because he had become quite an expert in travelling on the Underground. Ann and I were in quite a small party consisting of Ted Bartup, The Hendersons and John Mainwood. David Henderson and the ticket machine didn’t get along too well and I’m not saying he had any trouble but we managed to let at least five trains go ahead without us. Eventually, ticket problems were solved and we had a most enjoyable afternoon traipsing round all the familiar landmarks of Berlin. One of the more fascinating places we visited was The Blue Church, so called because the stained glass was completely blue and gave a complete blue aura to the main part of the building. We spent a fascinating hour or so in the Checkpoint Charlie Museum. This particular site was an absolute goldmine of material about life in Berlin during the time of the Berlin Wall, with some amazing stories and pictures of attempts by East Germans to start a new life in the West by jumping over or tunnelling under the Wall.

David’s private war with machines continued, when he attempted to get some cash out of an ATM which didn’t have any money in it. Luckily, he is fluent in German and was able to resolve the problem with a quick telephone call.

The evening saw the party splitting into various groups for dinner. Our particular group, of some fifteen people decided to re-visit the restaurant we had sampled on Monday. We were not disappointed and the service was much better because of the smaller party. After dinner, most people returned to their hotel rooms to re-pack their suitcases ready for the train trip to Dresden the next morning.

-3-

After a leisurely breakfast, during which we commemorated Gordon Cummings’s birthday with the presentation of an enormous birthday cake (all of one inch across!) dwarfed by a single candle, donated by the restaurant that we visited the previous evening, our party booked out of the hotel and boarded the coach which took us Ostbahnof Station for the train journey to Dresden.

We were all very impressed with the efficiency of the German Railway system. There was a chart on each platform, informing you exactly where you needed to stand on the platform ready for embarkation. And it was spot on!!

We arrived in Dresden approximately two hours later and were pleasantly surprised to be greeted by the President Achim von St. Andre-v Arnim and his wife, Bettina, and they had most thoughtfully laid on a fleet of taxis to take us to our hotel. We were all most grateful, because it would have been a problem bearing in mind the size of our party. It was a ten minute taxi journey to the Residenz Alt Dresden, arriving at approximately three o’clock that afternoon. This gave us enough time to settle in and have a short rest before getting ready for a reception at the hotel for all three clubs to meet up for the first time this contact weekend.

This was the time for catching up with old friends and introduced to those members we hadn’t met before.

Our hotel had been taken over by four Rotary Clubs, because not only were the Rotary Clubs of Pforzheim, Evreux and Hove present, but in addition there was a small contingent from the Rotary Club of Zvolen, Czech Republic, led by President Vladimir Balaz.

Both, the Rotary Club’s of Pforzheim and Evreux had travelled to Dresden on coaches, and there was also a spare coach available to transport us on the various trips throughout the weekend.

After a very pleasant hour or so, it was time to embark on our coaches for the trip to "Alte Forstere" in Kleinrohrsdorf, which was on the outskirts of Dresden. This was President Achim’s second home, only recently reclaimed from the state, after being confiscated from his family soon after World War II.

On arriving there, we were supplied with more drinks, including some local beer, which was dispensed from a mobile bar, supplied by the local brewers. This was accompanied by some very tasty titbits. During this time we were entertained by the local youth brass band, and this added greatly to the atmosphere of the evening. It was a very pleasant way to spend an hour or so.

We then moved into a huge marquee in the garden of the property, where we sat down for dinner.

The guest of honour for the evening was Rtn. Stanislaw Tillich, Minister of State in Saxony. And he was here to talk to us about "Saxony’s economic prospects in the enlarged EU"

Each of us were handed an English translation of his speech, but I don’t think he stuck the script because there was quite a bit of laughter from the Pforzheim Rotarian’s at his remarks, but when I looked at the English version there was definitely no funny bits at all!! I’m afraid that some of us were not concentrating on the speech 100%, because this was the night of the play offs at home, with the Seagulls being involved in a very tight and tense match against Swindon Town for the right to go to Cardiff and play off for a place in the First Division. Numerous text messages were flying back and forth between Sandra, my daughter, who was watching the match on television in a local hostelry and me. The final outcome of this match was not known until very late. In fact, we were all back in the hotel before we were aware of the final outcome, which, as you know was a very positive one.

All in all, it was an excellent way to start the contact visit with some 75 or so Rotarians and their wives getting together in a wonderful setting and with such a great atmosphere.
President Achim greeting the village band. Sheila Hinton wrapped up, on what was a chilly evening. President Achim and the Minister of State.

-4-

On arrival back at the hotel, many people stayed up quite late, reluctant to allow a very pleasant evening to finish. Many of the Hove Rotarians were also celebrating the fact that the Seagulls had been triumphant.

Up bright and early this morning, because coaches had been laid on for a 0845 departure for a tour of Dresden city centre. This was a comprehensive tour of the many places of interest in Dresden, all of us marvelling how most of the city centre had been reconstructed, bearing in mind the pictures all of us had seen of the destruction caused towards the end of World War II. with a very knowledgable, and at times, a very humorous guide. The whole place is dotted with palaces and places of worship.

  The whole of our party (except Hillary, who was taking the picture) in the courtyard of the Zwinger Palace

In contrast to the historical feel of the place, it seems out of place that they should also have one of the most modern tram systems in Europe, with yellow trams silently plying their way throughthe city and its suburbs.

Following on from our coach tour, we were treated to a boat trip, with lunch, to Pillnitz Castle. This beautiful castle is about six miles outside Dresden, and the home of the Saxony rulers since the eighteenth century.

Unfortunately, as the boat trip progressed, so did the weather deteriorate and by the time we arrived at our destination it was chucking it down. This altered plans for the afternoon, and it was decided that we should return to Dresden by coach, taking a circuitous route, going through various towns and villages of interest.

We arrived back at our hotel late in the afternoon, which gave everyone a reasonable amount of time to get ready for an early evening light meal before setting off to The Semper Opera House to view a performance of "Ariadne and Nexus" an opera by Richard Strauss.

Unfortunately, I cannot give you a description of this, because, along with Ted Bartup, the other philistine of the party, I decided to give it a miss. Speaking to those who did go, it seems that it was a worthwhile experience. I think also that they were very pleasantly surprised that there was not an interlude which enabled them to have time afterwards to explore Dresden at night before returning to the hotel, where many Rotarians of all clubs mingled for an hour or two.

-5-

The whole of today had been set aside for everybody to please themselves what they wanted to do. The majority of the Hove Club returned to Dresden to explore the city even further. There were so many places of interest that we could have done with a few more days to see them all. Just to roam round the Zwinger Palace with its many Old Masters and numerous pieces of armoury, some of which were the very earliest examples of such equipment. Quite a few people also took the bus out to Meissen to see if they could pick out any bargains at the porcelain outlets. I’m told there are no such things as bargains, as far as porcelain is concerned, in Meissen.

The evening saw the high point of the trip, with the final get together, complete with dinner, at "Italienisches Dorfchen", a most wonderful venue, which was only spoilt by the fact that it was split into two rooms, meaning that one half of the gathering couldn’t see what the other half was doing. This was also a bit of a handicap when it came to listening to the speeches at various times during the evening.

All of the speeches were of the normal type, hoping that the friendship between the clubs would continue, and welcoming the Zwolen Club into our fold for this year. There was some talk of making the contact visits on a four year rotation with the addition of visits to Zwolen in future years, but nothing has been decided yet.

One oddity during the speeches was that the Evreux President’s speech was given in English, despite Hove members being given an English translation beforehand. This meant that some of the members of Evreux didn’t know what their President’s message was.

SUNDAY.

Sunday is easily summed up, because it consisted, after an impromptu piano concert from Gordon Cummings, in the lobby of the hotel, of a sad farewell to all our friends from Pforzheim, Evreux and Zwolen before making our way to Dresden Railway Station for the first leg of our trip back to the UK. Everything went very smoothly, with President Achim, together with his lovely wife, Bettina, making sure that we caught the right carriage on the right train for Berlin.

After a slight delay at Berlin Tegel, an airport with not too many facilities to help pass the time, caused by the late arrival of the incoming flight, we landed at Heathrow at about 9.30, arriving back in Brighton at about 11.30pm.

A thoroughly enjoyable seven days or so, brilliantly helped along by the wonderful organisation of Hillary Ball, aided by Adrian.

There was also invaluable help from Ted Bartup, who was the official "body counter" (someone cruelly said that he was accustomed to counting bodies!)

I would also like to say, on behalf of all of us, that I/C (at the time) Ken Jones, handled his responsibilities very well as the official leader of our party.

The Contact Weekend next year will be held in Evreux, and the Incoming President of that Club intimated on Saturday evening that the weekend will be exceptional, bearing in mind that we will be celebrating the Centenary of Rotary, so do you best to try to attend, and give President Ken your best support.

It’s not so far to Evreux as it is to Dresden after all!

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Last modified: 02/01/05