Yesterday was June the 6th 2006, which can be written as 6.6.6. The "Book of Revelation", the last part of the Bible, names this sequence of digits as "The Number of the Beast", that means it represents the devil. Some peopole see in this much more than just a number - they think it is a true symbol, i.e. writing down or mentioning it would automatically evoke evil.

First of all: I like legends and symbols, there is usually a lot of inspiration coming from them. Just think of the Greek gods and their adventures. 666 was used in the 20th century on several occasions to provoke the superstitious and conservative parts of society, to indicate the departure of more liberal-minded elements from traditional values.

What happend yesterday? The news were filled with two things: Satanists spilling blood over their body and dancing naked in the woods to celebrate their lord of evil - and Christians praying to avoid the worst and to save the world just once again by kneeling down and folding hands. My thanks and blessings go to both camps. Mankind made it to the next day and nothing has changed - so their efforts were successful. I don't want to know what would have happend if they would not have cared so much for all of us.

In the South-Eastern part of Germany nevertheless they took an extra effort to rescue the last remains of moral and fear of God. Mr. Stoiber, the great leader of the Christian Socialist Union (CSU) and adored prime minister of the Republic of Bavaria invited other great minds - the leaders of religious groups in Germany - to a summit on how to protect religious views and symbols from being laughed at. Two reasons for the summit that were officially mentioned were the Muhammed cartoons and the TV-series Popetown, which both brought up understandable rage among many believers. Stoiber's goal is to change German criminal law in order to put criticism and humour in the right place: behind bars.

The Western World is one of the worst places to live in. Everybody can freely utter their opinion. Women are allowed to vote and some of them have even been seen in parliament. Scientists can research things that make the existence of a higher being less and less necessary. Children grow up without reading the Bible. Some people seem to even have sexual intercourse before they marry. What a misery we have created here.

Therefore I want to also thank those who participated yesterday in Stoiber's summit. I understand now that we have to protect and take special care of people who belive in numerology, Satan and the CSU.

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It is summer time, the sun in Northern Europe can hardly be convinced to disappear anymore, people stay up all night and due to the lack of sleep it seems impossible to concentrate on any written text. So who wants to read blogs during summer? Therefore let me hint you to three visual blogs, which I enjoy all very much:

Katutaso - The Helsinki Street Art Blog collects photographs of graffiti and other street art from all over Helsinki.

Rocektboom, with Amanda Congdon is a English language VideoBlog, that is "aired" every weekday. Amanda discusses interesting news and sites from the Internet in a very funny way.

But sorry Amanda, here is the VideoBlog that is just bit more entertaining and more attractive than Rocketboom: Ehrensenf, the German VideoBlog with Katrin. Also here you get your daily news from the Internet and it is worth a look, even if you do not speak German. Ehrensenf by the way is an anagram of Fernsehen, the German word for TV and means something like honor-mustard.

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Yesterday we took a guided tour on Jewish history in Warsaw. Here are some impressions from the tour.


Tablet at the Jewish Cementary in Warsaw, reminding of the Holocaust.


The only remains of the wall around the Jewish Ghetto can be found in a backyard. The Ghetto was established in October 1940 by the Germans, in order to isolate the Jewish population of Warsaw. At its peak there were 450.000 Jewish people living in the Ghetto. Most of them were brought to the Treblinka extermination camp, where they got killed.


Some of the stones of that wall have been removed and brought to Jewish mueseums and memorial sites all over the world.


The memorial place for the uprise within the Jewish Ghetto of Warsaw - nearly all Jews still living in the Ghetto got killed by the Nazis.


Mila 18 - the place where the leaders of the Ghetto uprise killed themselves, before the Nazis could get hold of them.


Umschlagplatz - from here the trains from Warsaw ran to the Treblinka extermination camp, where nearly 900.000 people got killed.


When German chancellor Willy Brandt came to Warsaw in 1970, he fell on his knees in front of the memorial place for the uprising in the Jewish Ghetto. This gesture became famous as the "Warschauer Kniefall", which opend the door for better relations between Western Germany and Eastern Europe. This memorial site remind of the "Kniefall"

The jewish cementary, which is over 200 years old.

» Further Impressions from the visit to Warsaw (Flickr)
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Lewis wrote a very good article on German architecture, that I recommend you to read. One of the buildings mentioned there is "Der Palast der Republik", which is currently being demolished. The building is located in the Eastern part of Berlin and the so-called Parliament (Volkskammer) of the former German Democratic Republic (GDR or in German: DDR) had its seat there.

It is with no doubt good that the GDR does not exist anymore and that Germany is re-united. But the decision to tear down the Palast der Republic, which was taken by the German Parliament (Deutscher Bundestag), is just a shame. It might be that the building seems ugly to some - we have more ugly buildings in Germany than one can count, so that is not an argument. The major reason is, that this building represents a part of German history, that most Germans are not proud of and some people also don't want to be reminded of it. With this reasoning it is still a violent act to destroy the building - it is the pride of the winning side in a cold-war between two ideologies.

» English Wikipedia: Der Palast der Republik
» Take a stroll through the palace online
» Ideology, Football, and Architecture - posting on German architecture at lewism.org
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