Saig, for what is was worth.

I was in Saig this weekend with my Grandfather, his sister, and Stefan. It was supposed to be from Thursday until Sunday but Ingrid, my grandfather's sister had pain in her arm so we came back today, Saturday, a day early, which really pissed me off. However, this trip wasn't for me, it was for my Grandfather, and mostly I am sorry for him because he is 83 and has pretty much decided that this was his last trip to Saig. His family vacationed in Saig when he was a kid, and during/after the WWII he lived and work there. It was supposedly a safe place for him to go because then he'd be away from the war, although he told gruesome stories of French fighter planes coming down so low to the ground and shooting the people who were outside, farming, walking, driving, whatever. And just to do it, for no particular reason or another. Grandpa simply said, "Everyone had a different point of view. The guy in the plane had a different view on the situation than the people in the cars. You can't blame anyone now."

We went to the farmhouse of Fritz Klimsch, who is a German sculptor. Google him, he's a cool guy. he made this sculpture of my great aunt Gisela, my grandfather's elder sister in 1942



This house was a rich place of antiques and artworks and it is beautiful. The house is hundreds of years old, and some of the rooms are still in the original conditions. It is very well taken care of and now Reinholt and his wife live there. They were very nice and took me through a tour of the house. I was almost crying the whole time, and I pretended not to understand some things they were saying because my german isn't good enough, but to tell the truth I didn't want to cry in front of them. The rooms in this house were so filled with a History I cannot even begin to know or understand, but you can feel it when you walk up the crooked stairs, when you feel the worn but beautiful rugs beneath your feet, when you see the photographs and sculptures, flowers, and curtains. I felt the memories of hundreds of years around me, the pain and joys of knowing one place for that long. I don't know if I have actually started to process it, but I know I have to go back at least once. I photographed the house some, and I think it will be a nice edition to the photographs of my grandfather that I have already taken so many. I have some new ideas about the project and for that I am very thankful to have had this trip. I kept thinking, these were the stairs that my Grandfather climbed. This was the porch where my Grandfather sat, looking at the same trees, the same stream, the same stars. I laid on the hill at night with Stefan and thought, my Grandfather has been here so many times to stare at the same stars, from the same point of view. And although we were both in Saig together at this time, my experience alone, and his experience alone, could not be from more opposite angles. I wish I could have stayed there longer. I wish I could stay there for 10 years with my Grandfather. Sometimes he really seems old to me, but I'm thankful that he is 83 and walks around where he wants to and makes these 5 hour roadtrips without a whisper of a complaint. He is really easy to be with and I hope when I'm so old as my Grandfather now, someone my age is able to get along with me like I can with him.

Now I'm back in Bavarian City Life, for whatever that is worth, and I needed to get some of these words away from my head. I found a MA that I really like the sound of so far from what I have read and seen, and I hope when I go to Berlin that I can visit the school and find out a little bit more. Next weekend I'm going to a Music Festival, the next weekend to Berlin, the next weekend Lubica will come, the next weekend a camping trip with my friends here, and then the next weekend I'm going to fall over. I'm looking forward to every moment, I hope they all can be as rich in experience as the past two days were for me.

for what it's worth,
-hkh