Monday: Munchen Morning Malta Mittag

I woke up around 5:30 this morning and ran a 5K on the hotel treadmill while watching Russia beat Turkey in volleyball.  I bet BYU would take either one of them remembering the last time I saw them play.

Anyway then I got one a train to Munchen and enjoyed this delightful Apfeltasche at the Hauptbahnhof pastry shop.  Really delicious, nice and flaky outside with the apple struddle middle.

 Typical awesome pastry shop you see in Germany.

Adelholzener = pure holzer water from the alps.  I wonder if we have a rich and famous great uncle Ludwig who owns this water company?

A little good old fashion US football clothes advertisements.  I like the ten real gold helmet border.

Cool guest house in teh middle of Munchen with thousands of traditional red Geraniums.

 Me and the bore made friends after I wrestled him to the ground and made him smile for the camera.

The welcome to Munchen monster jousting pole and corresponding town vocations.  I think one of those is fore awesome BMW car makers.  I pasted in the top from another picture just in case you are wondering what the square blue object is behind the jousting pole.

 Pretty cool how they recognize the import of keeping the city looking nice even when they are in the middle of renovation.  The scaffolding is covered in a clothe with a mural picture of what the building will look like when it is done.  Besides of course the massive picture of an Audi A8.

 Here is a statue of a newspaper man that was contemporary with Opa Holzer.  I wonder if they new each other.  This guy was bronzed for his newspaper work.

Here are a few older manikins with nice looking sharp Bavarian suits on.  Sorry about the window glare.  Most of the manikins around don't have faces, or definitely are not smiling, this must be really old school.  It reminded me of maybe how Opa looked in his nice Bavarian suit.  

This is stadtmitte Munchen, there are 5 old mega churches within a block of where I'm standing:

 
There are many of the blocks that have nice looking buildings that span the entire block, 3 or 4 of them I didn't notice anything in the windows or inside that I could see, I wonder if the city is propping them up and can't find anything useful to do with them.  Or wealthy real estate owners.  Inside one of these blocks we were allowed in and it had some really neat old stone work.  I'm sure all of this was rebuilt since WWII. I'm pretty sure I read that the whole city was more than leveled, even more than Berlin.

of course the pay per potty public toilets, and the dutiful husband standing guard.

Sally, do you want one of these cookbooks?  They have awesome pictures inside and some pretty fun stuff.  I'm thinking the pastry one looks great.  :)

 You can tell a lot about someone by the company they keep, and the books they read.  Here are the 20 best seller books in southern Germany right now:
1. Intestines with Charm, Everything about a undervalued organ (very practical, a good book for anyone)
2. From India back to Sweden and further to rediscover his greatest love (finding yourself, I think in general the German mind in particular needs to have purpose and something get behind and work for)
3. Without Words, what others think about you (Unusually concerned about what others are thinking)
4. Actual Scientific Answers from absurd hypothetical question, What if, what would happen if... (Naturally a curious people)
5. Understanding Russia, The Fight over Ukraine and the Arrogance of the West (crazy leftwing German politics, bending over backwards to rationalize crazy power mongers like Putin)
6. Inside ISIS, 10 days in the Islamic State (wanting to humanize the terrorists, probably some good information)
7. ...
8. The land visit collector (like to travel and feel like they understand the world)
9. Like a hawk (?)
10. The Youth must get some fresh air (a good answer to any health or social malady is always go get some fresh air)
...
20. Star Wars Lego story books (they can't help themselves from liking some overtly US things)

I caught the 12:40 pm flight to Malta after running through the airport from hearing my name announced over the PA that the plane was about to leave me.

Malta is a beautiful moderate low 80's sunny weather.  Mediterranean coastal breezes. Palm trees.

Nice hotel room, small but nice.

The 50 minute bus ride from airport to hotel reminded me a lot of south eastern block europe.  Romania especially.  A lot of plane small disheveled looking cement row houses.  Appearance is a second world country.  Significant amounts of trash around. Of course I just came from germany so the contrast is stark from the sharp edged asphalt walking paths to the rock rubble on the road side, bumpy pothole roads and all/half broken down buildings everywhere.
Out hotel window by day

 out hotel window by night.  Beautiful walking path along the bay.

 Here is the walking path by day.

Walking path by night.

 Luckily the hotel receptionist warned me not to drink the water before I did.  I plan to brush my teeth with this too.

Here is the restaurant where I had dinner.  Creamy salmon pasta.  I'd give it a 4/10 stars.  3.5 of the 4 stars are because I was sitting close to the water and it smelled like ocean.  Otherwise the pasta was a bit dry and the salmon had some bones.  I'll try a different place tomorrow.

These are a couple other lonely middle aged guys probably from Europe.  I wouldn't be surprised if they are going to the same conference as me this week.