Indian summer in Germany

Perhaps the most beautiful season when the sun is shining and the sky is blue. What a shame that the beauty only lasts for a few weeks each year. On bright autumn days I really enjoy living here in Germany in the region between the "Teutoburger Wald" and the "Wolfhager Land" (the landscape of the famous fairytales by the Grimm brothers). In this area, the beauty of autumn can be enjoyed to the max: the varied and rolling landcape with forests and agricultural land offers superb views of spectacularly coloured trees.

Luckily, I took some pictures this year, during a walk along the Diemel we had with Mylène a few weeks ago. I am sure I will miss that a lot if we move to China. When I think about that, I realize that the landscape one lives in really accounts for a major part of the level of life quality. I sincerely hope that the Chinese agree with me, and start to make way for an ecologically resonsible growth strategy. Perhaps an excursion to the Land of the Grimm brothers in autumn helps. I would happily volunteer as a tour guide. :-)

24h China

On German TV, 3Sat to be precise, there was a special issue about China today. This fact on itself is not so special: there are China specials on German TV almost every day. Special about this special was, that 3Sat had a 24h focus on China, with reports, documentaries and movies from and about China. I would have liked to sit in front of the TV all day, but as most of the reports you can see on TV show the same cliche about the booming economy, the millionaires, the differences between rich and poor, about Shanghai, and about the looming instability, I did not think it would be worth to take a day off for it.

Of course, I did watch some reports after work.
It was remarkable how much attention there was for the issue "the upcoming burst of the Chinese soap bubble".
One fact, reported about in a travel documentary, struck me. Apparantly, 27% of the surface of China is covered by desert, and that this figure is increasing rapidly, because of deforestation. The sand dunes supposedly have come as far as 70 km north of Beijing. The sand, moved forward by continuous winds from the northeast, is so powerful that villages have been abandoned and by now have been partly covered by sand. These ecological developments worry me more than a possible collapse of the Chinese economical and social system.

Will the soap bubble burst? Nobody knows. One thing is for sure: China is still big in Germany. So, I am looking forward to the next TV special ... how about a soap series about the country ....