Intermezzo I    Even though we are still in the midst of our discussion of the Paris and Burgundy trip of September 2017, we've been talking about Haussmann's tearing down numerous buildings in Paris to put new streets through, and tangential topics have been arising like mushrooms on a lawn after a rain. I first considered putting them as add-ons to postings, but the supply of information was growing unwieldy. After two partial rewrites of the material at hand, I said enough is enough, and I've reorganized it all using the device of an intermezzo--or entr'acte, if you prefer. This first one will deal with Bucharest and Berlin, plus two topics growing out of THOSE topics, that is, tangents on a tangent. Series 2 will have Intermezzo II covering New York's expansion grid, plus ITS experience with teardowns. Then Series 3 will finally return to Paris and pick up with the arrival, and then the first day visiting Passy.

Other Teardown Cities    While Haussmann was successful in Paris, and other cities in France and elsewhere apparently followed what he did—I don't know with what success—the impetus to recast a city in a new image has not relented, and not always so successfully. Two areas we visited and discussed when in China keep on appearing in the news: Beijing authorities continue to tear down the urban alley-communities of small-scale lanes called hutongs (2014/6), as Shanghai does the same to its corresponding longtangs (2014/4), replacing them with apartment buildings and roads. These are cultural losses.

But we'll concentrate here on two cities where changes were made, the first being executed horribly, in Bucharest, and the second, mostly just planned and fortunately barely executed, in Berlin—though not too badly. In the following posting, we'll find the teardowns executed sloppily, in New York, in connection with the city's master grid plan, which we'll discuss as well.

Bucharest    I visited Romania when Beverly and I had a joint sabbatical for the academic year 1971-1972, and part of the travels we did at that time included driving extensively through Eastern Europe. This included several Romanian cities, and we reached Bucharest in early October 1971. It's long enough ago that I remember few details, but our travel diary mentions the several sights we visited in Bucharest, including "a number of churches". One restaurant we dined at was in the traditional old Romanian style. I mention all this now, because the teardown "storm" struck Bucharest in 1974, just three years after we were there, so we didn't experience it personally. It lasted until the end of Communism in Romania in 1989.

It all centers around the dictatorial Communist regime of Nicolae Ceauşescu, which existed from 1965 to 1989, obviously including the time of our visit in 1971. (The first syllable is pronounced something like CHYOW, but saying "chow" is close enough. The Romanian letter Ș represents SH, so say chow.SHES.ku for Ceauşescu.)

One of the many things that led to this public fury was Ceauşescu's program to tear down a large, historic section of Bucharest to be replaced by Soviet-style apartment houses. His program of (destructive) urban planning was called sistematizarea, or systematization. It was mainly the demolition and reconstruction, across the country, of existing villages, towns, and cities, in whole or in part, with the goal of developing a socialist society. Using pre-fab technology, high-density, Soviet-style dormitory neighborhoods were built with apartment buildings of 8-10 stories, which destroyed existing cityscapes. Destruction was such that the process was sarcastically nicknamed Ceauşima (chow.SHI.ma), a sarcastic reference to the wartime destruction in Hiroshima.

Ceauşescu, in all his egotism and megalomania, also had monumental, overblown, dull public buildings built. Bucharest, the capital, was hardest hit with these changes. Most obvious was a huge, grandiose government palace called the Centrul Civic ("Civic Center"), considered then the Palace of the People, now renamed the Palace of the Parliament. To build this, much of southern Bucharest beyond the Dâmboviţa River (Ţ-TS) was destroyed, including 18C and 19C neighborhoods with their traditional architecture. The Palace is the world's largest civilian building and most expensive administrative building. It and other structures are built of modern concrete behind neoclassical quasi-fascist marble façades, in a "Socialist realism style".

The bulldozed area was about 5 km (3 mi) long and 1 km (0.6 mi) wide. It was one of the largest peacetime urban destructions in recorded history. About half the area had historical significance, which in turn was about 20-25% of historic Bucharest. Along with other destroyed monuments were 27 Orthodox churches (though including 8 relocated ones), 6 synagogs, 3 Protestant churches, 3 monasteries, 3 hospitals, 2 theaters, and a noted Art Deco sports stadium. Some 30,000 people were evicted and relocated with only a single day's notice, so that about 9,000 residences could be demolished.

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The above picture is of the Calea Văcărești neighborhood, which was demolished. [cale is "way", referring to a street; think Spanish calle; calea is "the street".] I understand it's one of the oldest streets in Bucharest with many buildings classified as historical monuments, and others of high architectural value. Few buildings survived along its 4 km (2.5 mi) length.

Discussing a historic church that was demolished, an engineer said it was replaced by a huge traffic circle leading to the "Palace of the People", and added "It was a tragedy. The priest died of a heart attack. Even the workers didn’t want to demolish it, so Ceaușescu got people from prison to do it."

As to Ceauşescu's rationale for doing this, if it weren't so sad, how it came about would almost be comical. First, during 1971 (the year we were there), Ceauşescu took a trip to Asia and was deeply impressed by the ideological mobilization and massed adulation he saw in Kim Il-sung's North Korea (!!!) and wanted to remodel Bucharest similarly to Pyongyang. This inspired him to begin his own campaign shortly afterwards, work that intensified in the 1980s.

Second, once things got underway, there was a major earthquake in 1977, Bucharest's second worst, with many fatalities, that also destroyed many buildings. But the majority of buildings that collapsed because of the earthquake had been built before WWII. Since structures built during the Communist era held out better because of newer, stricter building codes, it was interpreted by the Ceauşescu government that the Communist regime was superior to prewar democracies. (!!)

Rescuing Historic Structures    While so much was lost, not everything was lost within the doomed area. I've come across an article online in the US Edition of The Guardian from a year ago, 14 December 2016, by one Kit Gillet called The Great Escape: How Bucharest Rolled Entire Churches to Safety. It tells how engineers moved entire buildings to new locations. It was the idea of Eugeniu (G=J) Iordăchescu (yor.da.KES.ku). He was a civil engineer who had the unusual idea to lay railway tracks and then to roll entire buildings away to a new location. Ground was dug out from under the buildings, a concrete support created, and the building was separated from its foundation by hydraulic jacks. Tracks and materials were in short supply, and were reused from site to site.

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The first of 13 churches moved was the above 18C Schitul Maicilor (Nuns' Hermitage). It weighed 745 metric tons (821 US tons) and was moved 245 m (804 ft) from its original site in 1982. It took five months in total, though the actual move lasted only a few days. The Mihai Vodă Monastery, shown here in 1837 beyond the bridge over the Dâmbovița, was one of the oldest buildings in Bucharest. It was built in 1591, surrounded by stone walls, similar to a fortress. It served numerous purposes, including being the residence of Romania's leaders and the site of the National Archives of Romania. It was also an important archeological site, since in its yard was an archeological site dating back to old Roman Dacia, and over 3000 years old.

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The moving team moved the church building on rails (above), in tandem with its freestanding tower, 285 m (935 ft) east and inserted them into their present location (Photo by Madalinfocsa), shown here with its freestanding tower (Photo by Mihai Petre). It was the largest church moved, at 9,000 metric tons (9,921 US tons). The medieval cloisters and ancillary buildings were demolished. Still it wasn't ideal. Many of the moved churches ended up surrounded by, and in the shadows of, huge Soviet-style apartment blocks, sometimes just squeezed in between them.

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In Bucharest and in other cities, a hospital, a bank, even entire apartment buildings were moved, as was the case with this block of apartments in Alba Iulia, in northern Romania. Often the water and gas lines were still attached, and even with the people still inside, as was the case when a move started earlier in the day than announced. Yet all the moved buildings came through undamaged.

Still the perfidy of Ceaușescu took its toll. 22 churches were destroyed, some already having been given permission to be moved, but Ceaușescu would get impatient with things not moving fast enough and have them destroyed anyway. Relocations and destruction of buildings ended with Ceaușescu's encounter with the firing squad in 1989.

It's been a long time since we were there and I have no idea if the "number of churches" we visited that were anonymously mentioned in our travel diary include any of those that are now destroyed, or moved, or otherwise survived. I wonder if that restaurant we dined at in the traditional old Romanian style survived Ceaușescu. Nor do I know what damage was done to other cities we visited—Cluj, Brașov, also Constanţa on the Black Sea come to mind.

We can look at this story also through a more local viewpoint. At the annual Middlebury Holiday Reception this year at Lincoln Center, a young Romanian man named Matei came up to friend Allan and me to chat. He was from Bucharest, recently spent four undergraduate years at Middlebury, seems to be living here, but goes back to Bucharest regularly. I discussed the sad situation with him, and it was interesting to get the sad insights of a local, even though he would have been born after Communism.

In addition, I've found online a philatelic Website, http://www.marci-postale.com/, which deals with Romania, its history and art, via its postage stamps. I've not looked at it all, but it does look interesting. (Dracula, anyone?) But to the point is the below short page from that website that speaks to our above discussion of destroyed Bucharest. It shows what was lost, and what replaced it, and is worth at least a quick look.

http://www.marci-postale.com/Bucharest/destroyed.htm

Surviving Sights    However, it's time to leave the negative, accentuate the positive, and see what architecture remains other than the moved churches we just saw. Since Romanian architecture is not all that familiar to many, we'll give some examples here of some beautiful architecture that can still be found in Bucharest—București. Shown specifically will be works by Ion Mincu, a Romanian architect, engineer, professor and politician. He furthered traditional Romanian architecture by integrating its style in his work. In recognition, the Ion Mincu University of Architecture and Urbanism in Bucharest is named for him.

First, we'll show something he restored, a church in Bucharest. It was built in 1724 as part of a larger monastery, but the outbuildings were demolished at the end of the 19C, and the church was damaged by earthquakes. This is a painting of the Stavropoleos Church in 1868; click for details. To repair the damage, it was rebuilt (Photo by Andrei Dan Suciu) between 1904 and 1910 according to the plans of Ion Mincu (click). Compare the two views, which are slightly different, which may indicate Mincu's use of traditional styles, yet adapting and updating them.

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We'll now move to two vernacular buildings Mincu built in what can be considered a national romantic architectural style. The first is the above Casă Lahovari (Lahovari House) of 1886, which is an early significant construction in the neo-Romanian style influenced by Art Nouveau. It combines elements of vernacular architecture with those of Romanian medieval architecture. The façade is symmetrical and decorated with reminders of folk architecture, such as colored and gilded ceramics, wooden columns, and, quite distinctively, the broken arches. The interior continues the general symmetrical layout of a traditional peasant house with a central hall and rooms on both sides.

What gives the stucco-covered brick house a rustic atmosphere, reminiscent of 15C Romanian folk houses, is the porch above the false entrance to the cellar. The porch is something between the traditional raised veranda and a roofed entry with an access ramp. The broad, high eaves with carved brackets also add to the traditional atmosphere. You'll notice a distinct similarity between this house and his next one below.

The next story brings us back to Paris, since it begins there. Paris had had many world's fairs, especially in the 19C, but particularly well remembered was the Exposition Universelle of 1889, meant to mark the centenary of the storming of the Bastille in 1789 and the start of the French Revolution. This fair is perhaps particularly well remembered, since the entrance arch to the fair, and its main symbol, was the newly-built Eiffel Tower.

As I understand it, Ion Mincu designed two Romanian buildings for the Fair (click), a restaurant an a wine tasting pavilion, both reflecting Romanian traditional architecture. The latter was meant to resemble a Romanian peasant house, built of fir trees with a straw roof. The restaurant was more like a house.

Apparently, the restaurant was a success, certainly architecturally, because three years later, in 1892, it was rebuilt according to Mincu's original plans, in Bucharest, on Kiseleff Avenue, itself a showcase for Romanian style. Its name is now Bufetul de la Șosea, though it also can include the name of the street as Bufetul de la Șosea Kiseleff. I'm going to hold off on saying what the name means until we discuss it below, but I'll pose a challenge now to all wordsmiths. See if you can find variations of two French words in Bufetul de la Șosea--and I don't mean the two in the middle! One is more obvious, the other less so. We'll get back to this later. In any case, since 2003, the building has been hosting the luxurious Doina Restaurant.

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Let's now take a look at the Bufetul de la Șosea, which should look familiar. Above is a detail of its main feature, the stunning veranda that's its predominant architectural element. The style again employs Romanian folk architecture, being inspired by the vernacular architecture of mountain inns. Carved wooden columns with folk motifs support the broken arches (click), which feature enameled colored ceramic tiles with traditional floral decoration. Above them is a frieze with the names of famous vineyards, then comes a cornice surmounted by the huge, prominent eaves. Look and the second plaque below the lantern to see the name of the restaurant and the notation that it's a Monument istoric.

This is a view of the entire building (Photo by Cristian-Mihail Miehs). Look just to the right of the veranda to note the monumental exterior staircase, traditional for this style, protected by the sweeping roof whose slope follows the line of the staircase. The asymmetrical wall construction is stuccoed brick.

The Doina restaurant is divided into several spaces: Salonul Ion Mincu (-ul is "the"), the wine cellar Salonul Românesc ("The Romanian Salon"), and the Pavilion Rustic.

Speer's Berlin    One project elsewhere that fortunately hardly ever got off the ground was Hitler's plan to remodel Berlin with huge boulevards and overblown Nazi fascist-style public buildings. The result was to be called Welthauptstadt Germania (World Capital Germania) if the Nazis had won the war. You may recall the name Albert Speer, who was Hitler's architect for the project, and who remained in Spandau prison for many years after the war. While there was some demolition in the planned construction areas, the outbreak of the war stopped all further construction.

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Growth of Berlin    Since we'll be talking quite a bit about Berlin again (see 2017/14), we should watch how Berlin grew in 1920, just as we watched Paris grow in 1860. We'll be using the above map extensively, now, and again at the end of this posting, so hold on to it.

On the map, find coordinates F/G & 4, and you'll see a long island in the Spree. Each end of the island has a different name. The northern (downstream) part of the island is the UNESCO World Heritage Site known as die Museumsinsel (Museum Island), for obvious reasons (Map by Sansculotte). Opposite, on Schlossplatz, the Berliner Schloss (Castle) is finally being reconstructed, due for completion in 2019. The southern (upstream) part of the island beyond Gertraudenstraße has always been called Fischerinsel (Fisherman's Island), since it once housed a fisherman's settlement. Now look to the right, at the historic Nikolaiviertel, and the Rotes Rathaus, Berlin's City Hall of the 1860s.

Now compare all that with a map of Berlin in 1688 showing how Berlin was born as twin towns, Alt-Berlin (Old Berlin) in violet and Cölln (KÖLN) in yellow, plus some other areas. The walls and moats no longer exist. Actually, it was Cölln that was on the island, (its city hall was at "k", its then castle at "a") and Alt-Berlin across the river (its then city hall was at "b"). Cölln merged with Berlin in 1710.

Berlin had been a part of the Provinz Brandenburg (Province of Brandenburg) since 1815 (Map by Qqerim), but was separated from it in 1881. This Polish map shows Brandenburg as of 1905; in greenish tones are the areas under the jurisdiction of Frankfurt an der Oder, and the earth tones are under Potsdam. Click to see how quaintly a still relatively tiny Berlin sits independently from the neighboring towns of Charlottenburg, Schöneberg, Neukölln (you can see where that "new" town's name came from) and Spandau, all of which today are part of Berlin. However, Potsdam to this day remains independent of Berlin—and is the capital of Brandenburg--although Berlin's southwestern border abuts it. Take note of the three large districts of Brandenburg surrounding the Berlin cluster.

The big change in size came when the Groß-Berlin-Gesetz (Greater Berlin Act) was passed by the Prussian government in 1920 to expand Berlin. It added extensively to the city by merging with it the seven towns around it, plus 59 rural communities and 27 estate districts located in a large circle of Brandenburg taken from those three large districts we just saw. That large circle was added to the small circle of Berlin (Map by xyboi). The act made Berlin 13 times larger in area than it had been, and the population almost doubled from about 1.9 million to near 4 million, almost 1.2 million coming just from the seven adjacent towns alone.

This is what Berlin (Map by Maximilian Dörrbecker) looked like after the Act took effect in 1920. Pre-1920 Berlin in the center was divided into six Bezirke (be.TSIR.ka) ("boroughs"). You can see how Berlin-Mitte got its name, being in the middle/center (note the Schloss). Bordered in thicker blue lines are the seven adjacent towns added to Berlin. Closest were Charlottenburg, Wilmersdorf, Schöneberg, Neukölln, Lichtenberg, and a bit farther away, Spandau in the west, and Köpenick in the southeast (pre-1931 spelling Cöpenick). These former towns became one Bezirk each. 7 new Bezirke were created from the remaining added areas, each one named for its largest village at the time. Some names have been altered slightly; for instance, Prenzlauer Tor is now Prenzlauer Berg.

This made a total of 20 Bezirke, which is the same as the 20 arrondissements of Paris. I have no idea if this was done on purpose or by accident. Note the pattern: 1-6 go in a clockwise spiral in the center; the order then swings to the far west, turns, then circles outer Berlin counterclockwise. But that's not the end of the story.

The East Berlin government had done some subdividing, creating three new Bezirke, making 23 (Map by Arbalete). Therefore, in 2001, there was an administrative reform, combining Bezirke, sometimes to a startling effect, and ending with 12, 7 of which have compound names. This is a more detailed map of the 12 Bezirke with further subdivisions, and here's one that's easier to look at (Both maps by TUBS). You might remember that Paris is also considering consolidating some arrondissements.

As to naming, German uses the pleasant custom of not forgetting local neighborhoods. When we lived in Mainz for that academic year, we were living what had once been the separate village of Gonsenheim and so our address was Mainz-Gonsenheim. In that vein, complete names would now be in the style Berlin-Spandau, although the short form is usually used.

Back to Speer    But during the 1930s, two of Speer's planned projects were indeed completed, one of them very famous, and both remain today. We'll start with the one known to Berliners and visitors familiar with Berlin. It's the Western Arm of the East-West Axis, although no one knows it by that name, since it has since easily blended into the background and become part of the landscape. On our modern map, find Berlin-Mitte at coordinates F & 4 (nearby on the left is the red dashed line where the wall used to be). Now, starting at the Museumsinsel, find Under den Linden, traditionally the main street of Berlin-Mitte. At its west end is Pariser Platz with the Brandenburger Tor (Brandenburg Gate).

But let's first see what we have to the west of that in today's Berlin. Going through Tiergarten Park is the Straße des 17. Juni (Street of the 17th of June), which commemorates the popular uprising in East Germany on 17 June 1953. It's interrupted by a circular plaza called the Großer Stern ("Great Star"; think of the Place de l'Étoile ("Star Square") in Paris), which contains the Siegessäule (Victory Column) from the late 19C.

It then enters Charlottenburg (since 2001, Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf) at the Charlottenburger Tor (Charlottenburg Gate), built in 1907-1908 when Charlottenburg was still independent, as a proud counterpart to the Brandenburg Gate at the eastern end of the street. West of Charlottenburger Tor the street had earlier logically been called Berliner Straße/Berlin Street, since it pointed in that direction out of Charlottenburg. Today, this is all 17. Juni.

The road then ends in the Ernst-Reuter-Platz, named after a Berlin mayor. But in the European tradition, it then continues under a new name (see map) as Bismarckstraße, then Kaiserdamm. After that, as we'll see shortly on another map, it's called Heerstraße until it crosses the city line into Brandenburg. (Heerstraße is "Army Street"; compare that with the Avenue de la Grande Armée leading northwest out of Étoile in Paris).

Of the two projects devised by Hitler and Speer that were actually built, at least in part, this one, less known outside Berlin, was the Ost-West Achse (East-West Axis) paired with a planned Nord-Süd-Achse (North-South Axis). "Axis" should be understood as an "Axial Highway", because the reference is to roads. Go back to the Brandenburg Gate on the map. The N-S Axis was meant to run roughly from where the Hauptbahnhof (Main Station) is today south to beyond the bottom of the map where Südkreuz (South Cross) is indicated off the map, a major rail hub. This N-S project never even got off the map.

As for the E-W Axis, the eastern arm was meant to start at Unter den Linden in Berlin-Mitte and proceed eastward via Frankfurter Allee (the western part of which is now called Karl-Marx-Allee) via Frankfurter Tor (Frankfurt Boulevard and Frankfurt Gate, referring to Frankfurt an der Oder to the east). But Hitler put the eastern arm on hold until the western arm was built, the war intervened, and so it never happened, either.

So of the four arms planned for this proposed project, only the western arm of the East-West Axis got built, to the west of Unter den Linden. What is today the Straße des 17. Juni was in the 1930s still the Charlottenburger Chaussee (Charlottenburg Boulevard), a logical name, since it led to Charlottenburg. Speer had it widened considerably to 85 m (279 ft), which it remains today, also removing the streetcar line to Charlottenburg that had been there since 1865. The street was then officially renamed in 1935 Ost-West-Achse. In 1935, the Siegessäule/Victory Column, which had always stood in front of the Reichstagsgebäude / Reichstag Building, was moved to the Großer Stern. Much more visible here, it's now a centerpiece and symbol of Berlin. The route then continued on to Charlottenburg.

Look again at the Ernst-Reuter-Platz, which has an interesting story. While today we consider the main route, the so-called "axis", to go straight across the square, during the 19C it was important that the royal route led between the Berliner Schloss, just east of Unter den Linden, to this square, and then turned northwest up the Otto-Suhr-Allee to Schloss Charlottenburg (see map). Because the bend in the route occurred at this square, as of 1831 it became known, quite charmingly, as Am Knie (pronounce the K), which could be translated simply as The Knee, or more accurately as At the Knee, since addresses would be located "at" this location. In 1953 it lost its quaint name to become Ernst-Reuter-Platz, after the mayor, who died four days earlier.

The E-W Axis then continued, as it does today, via Bismarckstraße, Kaiserdamm, and Heerstraße to beyond the city line, but connecting the two last streets is one more square (not on the map). It had been the Reichskanzlerplatz/Imperial Chancellor Square, and then, after 1933, the creepy-sounding Adolf-Hitler-Platz. After the war, it resumed its original name, and in 1953 was renamed Theodor-Heuss-Platz after the first president of the Federal Republic of Germany. Locals use the nickname Theo.

One last thing on this western arm of the E-W Axis: the streetlights (Photo by Axel Mauruszat). This is the Charlottenburger Tor mentioned above, and with it, a lamppost designed by Albert Speer. Despite its origin, I find it a pleasant, restful design, perhaps a bit Art Deco, reflecting the period (click). Even today, some 800 of these remain to the left and right along the route from the S-Bahn station Tiergarten (see map coordinates C & 4) all the way out to the Theodor-Heuss-Platz, off this map. They've been refurbished three times, the last time in 2000.

This is another interesting parallel to Haussmann and the lampposts he put up years earlier. In any case, I have seen much in Berlin, and presumably have driven by this gate and may have seen this style of lamppost, but would have been blissfully unaware at the time of the significance of either, so I'm glad I'm learning it now. Live and learn.

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The other project that was completed before the war is much better known outside Berlin, by far. It's the Olympiastadion (Olympic Stadium—try to ignore the gross typo on the map). With this wider-scale map we can now tie the whole picture together. From the Brandenburg gate and the Tiergarten, we can now follow the western arm of the E-W Axis all the way. You can judge where the former "Knie/Knee" was--and Ernst-Reuter-Platz is--by noting how the Otto-Suhr-Allee bends off to Charlottenburg Castle, and also see Heerstraße leading on to the western city limit. You can judge where Theodor-Heuss-Platz is by noting where Reichsstraße takes off of Heerstraße.

You can also see that the Stadium is not far off Heerstraße, and on an S-Bahn line. To see how accessible it really is, click on this stylized S-Bahn map (Map by Arbalete). Follow the S-3 (blue) and S-9 (maroon) from Friedrichstraße via the above-mentioned Tiergarten station to find a stop at Heerstraße, then Olympiastadion. (While doing that, note that the S-Bahn system has successfully been built into its own N-S and E-W axes, not to mention the loop around the center city.)

It's well known that the Stadium was built for the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, whose most famous participant was Jesse Owens. This is a period drawing of the Olympiastadion and areas around it with other venues. Note that the entire area around the Olympiastadion was then called the Reichssportfield (Imperial Sport Field), as was the U-Bahn station to the right and S-Bahn station to the south.

Now check out something interesting down at the bottom. This is the main entrance, leading up to the Südtor (South Gate); it has both the S-Bahn station and the arrow pointing to Heerstraße. Now note on the left the side road to the entrance called Stadion-Allee (Stadium Boulevard). We have a bit of a surprise:

http://www.berliner-stadtplan.com/map/?no=1815,5628

You see on the modern map—both rail stops are now called Olympiastadion—that Stadion-Allee is today Jesse-Owens-Allee. There are many stories one hears about the 1936 Olympics, including where Owens won four gold medals and was the most successful athlete. He was deeply admired in Berlin. Even though he'd been quite popular everywhere before the Olympics, he later claimed that his reception in Berlin was greater than any other he had ever experienced.

Owens' reception by the German public and spectators was warm, though there was a pronunciation problem, as the crowd kept cheering for YE.sa O.vins, or just O.vins. He was a celebrity in Berlin, and was mobbed by autograph seekers to the point that he complained about all the attention.

He died in 1980, and the street near the stadium was renamed Jesse-Owens-Allee in 1984. While I never toured the stadium, I remember Beverly and me standing on Jesse-Owens-Allee and reading the historic plaque saying that the dedication had taken place in the presence of his widow. I have also now read that a secondary school in Berlin-Lichtenberg is now called the Jesse-Owens-Realschule/Oberschule.

Given what Ceauşescu did, what might Hitler have willfully done to the urban planning landscape of Berlin? He never really got the chance, since the war he started destroyed much of Berlin so much more than such remodeling would have, anyway. Even today, and even despite Hiroshima, it's become part of the language to compare a location hit by a catastrophic event by saying it "looks like Berlin after the war". To make matters worse, the East German government in the 1960s and 1970s destroyed many historic neighborhoods and buildings, similar to what happened in Bucharest, also replacing them with apartment blocks, including the historic Fischerinsel, discussed earlier. Also well after the war, they dynamited the Berliner Schloss, which is why it's taken so long to be rebuilt.

Romanian    We've been neglecting one language in our discussions, Romanian, while frequently mentioning its sisters. Having just discussed Bucharest and Romania, this would be a good point to go into that subject a bit. Not actually speaking the language is no impediment, since there's a wealth of information online about it. Let's first see what its sister languages are.

We'll start with a reminder of what our language family is, Indo-European (Map by Akhipill), often written IE. Sub-groups that have survived are four large ones, and five small ones.

In Asia are two sub-groups, one large one, Indo-Iranian, here in blue, and one small one, Armenian, here in violet (click). That leaves three large and four small sub-groups in Europe. We can see them here, but let's look at them in closer detail here (Map by Hayden120).

Here's another copy of the IE in Europe map above. The four remaining small sub-groups are Greek in yellow, Albanian in light blue, Baltic (Latvian & Lithuanian) in light green, and Celtic (Scottish, Irish, Welsh, Breton [in Brittany]) in orange.

But now let's get down to the three remaining big sub-groups we frequently talk about:

(1) the Slavic languages in dark green, in Eastern Europe. it's important to note that the major cluster is to the north (Russian, Belorusan, Ukrainian, Polish, Czech, Slovak), while the South Slavs are separated from the rest by a large stretch of terra firma, namely Hungary and Romania. This has historically been a major problem, and after WWI, when borders were shifting, all these South Slavs (except Bulgarians) were grouped together in a single country called Southslavia. Never heard of it? Well, I'm being coy to prove a point. The Russian word for "south", similar in other Slavic languages, is юг (yug); add to that a combining O, then "-slavia" and you get Yug+o+slavia, hence, Southslavia. Obviously, that experiment turned out to be an epic failure in recent decades.

(2) the Germanic languages in red, in Northwestern Europe. While Central Europe and Scandinavia are almost contiguous, the British Isles are apart, yet near, but Iceland is far off. The split is just due to geography. In addition, we've discussed in the past how much English is a hybrid with French due to the Norman Invasions of 1066.

(3) the Latinate languages in dark blue, primarily (aha!) in southwestern Europe. These are also called Italic, or Romance, the latter one being a word I strenuously object to and do not use because of its vague meaning to the general public. If using that word floats your boat, substitute it every time I say "Latinate", which I find superior, since it shows just where these languages came down from.

But our aha! moment came when we found Romanian, not in southwestern Europe with its sisters, but off in the east, once again, separated by a stretch of terra firma consisting of roughly the former Yugoslavia. And that's the story we're about to tell.

Dacia    Romania, with its language and culture, roughly corresponds to the former Roman Empire province of Dacia, on the Black Sea, and not on the Mediterranean, like all its sisters. If you have any doubts that ROMANian is Roman, just look at its name, which is the only major Latinate name that precisely states its heritage.

We should look at a map of the Roman Empire (Map by Aregakn at en.wikipedia) to gain our bearings. Let's use this simplistic example to explain what happened. Suppose a group of relatives built themselves some row houses. From west to east, the houses would be Hispania, Gallia, Italia, Illyricum, Dacia. Then, since the province of Illyricum was dissolved and replaced by two separate provinces, Dalmatia and Pannonia, let's say that house became two-family, but no harm, no foul, all the relatives were still lined up in a row, from the Atlantic to the Black Sea. But then Haussmann puts a road through, and tears down one house, the one containing Dalmatia and Pannonia. All of a sudden, Dacia is isolated from the rest.

Now in reality, this divisive "road that was put through" were the Slavic invasions. The Slavs arrived in the Balkans in the 6C-7C CE. Simply explained, the Bulgarians settled in Moesia (see map), while the ancestors of the other South Slavs (Serbs, Croats, Slovenes, and the others) settled in Dalmatia and Pannonia. To this day, the coastal region of Croatia is called Dalmatia.

We should really show a map that illustrates all the Latinate languages (Map by Servitje) more precisely (click). Actually, this is over-precise for a non-technical discussion, but it does illustrate how "dialects" one hears about actually have sufficient standing on their own. In Iberia, it's enough to remember Portuguese, Spanish (Castillian), and Catalan. In France, remember the north-south divide, with northern French being the standard, and southern French varieties often being grouped together as Provençal. In Switzerland, which people might often visualize as speaking German, French, and Italian, it's worth remembering the fourth official language there, the Latinate Romansh, the smaller one besides Romanian that makes reference to its Roman heritage. Italian has many dialects, most notably Tuscan, on which standard Italian is based, but also Neapolitan, Sicilian, and others. And finally, we move over to Romanian, which is also spoken in most of adjacent Moldova. The gray area shown in central Romania is Transylvania, which has always had a large Hungarian population, though in decline. In 2011, the population of Transylvania was 71% Romanian and 18% Hungarian, plus other ethnicities.

We'll now add a graph (Graph by Danutz) that shows two things. It lists only the important Latinate languages, to bring proper balance to the previous, over-detailed map. But its main purpose is to indicate the proportion of native speakers of each. Yet it's still out of balance in a sense, since it doesn't limit itself to the mother countries, but logically has to include overseas speakers. Thus Spanish and Portuguese show up particularly large because of Latin America, although French does not get too inflated because of North America. But our using the graph here is to show that Romanian nevertheless doesn't actually have too large a slice of the pie.

Now the implication here might seem to be that the Slavs tip-toed around Dacia/Romania for some reason, and that's false. Dacia was invaded along with the rest of the Balkans, yet over the centuries of Slavic influence, the language of the Romans survived, in the form of Romanian. Actually, while Dacia was part of the Roman Empire for less than two centuries, various Slavic tribes crossed, ruled and settled Dacia from the 6C to the 12C. One result was that, in contrast to all the other Latinate countries, where Roman Catholicism prevails, in Romania, it's the Romanian Orthodox Church that prevails in among all the other Orthodox churches of Eastern Europe.

Another thing I first noticed when in some old churches in the north of Romania was another Slavic influence--that for a while Romanian was actually written in the Cyrillic alphabet! Present research shows that the change from the Latin alphabet to Cyrillic started in the 1500s and lasted til the 1860s, when the Latin alphabet was restored. Trying to visualize a Latinate language written in Cyrillic, which is otherwise just used for most (not all) Slavic languages, makes my head spin a bit. Just picture French or Spanish or Italian in Cyrillic!

Alphabet & Special Sounds    This is not a study in Romanian phonology. All we'll do is look superficially at the Latin alphabet as used in Romanian and see what's of interest, then look at some special sounds.

Let's first mention an unusual vowel found in Romanian, and, curiously, in Russian. It's a high central vowel that reminds you of the vowel in "but", but which is higher in the mouth. Russian spells it ы and Romanian spells it either â, as in cârnat or î as in înspre. You can forget about it, or fake it with "but".

One that's a bit more fun, because it's so easy, is ă. It's a schwa, the grunted sound at the beginning of "among" or at the end of "sofa". And the following example is easy. The word for "house" is casă, almost the same as Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Catalan casa, but the latter ends in a clear AH sound (have you been mispronouncing it?), while the Romanian one ends in a grunted UH sound.

The two letters I find most interesting are ș and ț. There are two ways of writing each one. The Romanian Academy standard is to write those two letters with a comma below, as shown. But still widely used are the cedilla varieties ş and ţ. (The cedilla the little hook that French occasionally uses with the letter C as in façade and français; it's also used in Portuguese and Catalan.)

So what are ş and ţ? It's the same situation as with other familiar languages that use the Latin alphabet. Latin didn't have certain sounds that some of today's languages do have, so Latin didn't have any corresponding letters to be borrowed. What are modern languages to do? Make up some way to write those sounds!

The first sound missing from Latin is the SH sound, which is the spelling English has devised. French uses CH (chérie), Italian SC (crescendo, fascist), Polish SZ (Warszawa), German SCH (Schubert), Czech Š (Škoda). In most of these cases, a digraph (two letters) was resorted to, in German a trigraph. But in about 1406, Jan Hus rejected digraphs for Czech and chose to use a single letter for that sound, Š, which spread to other languages, including Slovak, Slovene, Croatian, Bosnian, Latvian, Lithuanian, and more.

In 1825, a book was published suggesting that Romanian also adopt a new single letter, though a slightly different one, Ș. (The same book also proposed Ț.) So, for examples, we have the Romanian cities of Brașov, Timișoara, Ploiești, and București (Bucharest). In the earlier discussion, we mentioned the Bucharest street Calea Văcărești. (We'll discuss in a moment the quirk about words like these three above that end in -ești.)

As for the ţ, Latin totally lacked affricates, which many modern languages have developed. An affricate is the combination of two sounds, a stop and a continuant, into what is considered one single "Siamese twin" sound. There are two in English:
T+SH yields CH ("cheese") but also appears in the spelling TCH ("watch"), where the T half of the affricate is actually written out.
D+ZH yields J ("joy"), but also appears in the spelling DG ("bridge"), where the D half of the affricate is actually written out.

There are many other affricates, but not in English (or French, or Spanish). But one of them we need to mention is T+S. When that occurs in English ("cats", "Patsy"), it's just considered two separate sounds. This is true in English even in borrowed words where the original language considered it one sound: tse-tse; tsunami; waltz, where it's spelled TZ.

Languages that do have the T+S affricate spell it either with a Z or C. Several Slavic languages use C, such as Polish co TSO ("what"). You may remember reading about the Kosovo city whose Serbian name is Mitrovica (mi.TRO.vi.tsa).
Z is used very frequently in German for the T+S affricate: zwei TSVAI "two"; zwanzig TSVAN.tsik "twenty"; the cities of Salzburg ZALTS.burk, Graz GRATS, Konstanz KON.shtants, Leipzig LAIP.tsik. But there is an alternate spelling, TZ, where, as in the English cases, the T half of the affricate is actually part of the spelling: Platz PLATS; setzen ZE.tsen "to set".

But getting to the Latinate languages, only Italian and Romanian have the T+S affricate. Italian uses Z, and also ZZ—no one will forget how to pronounce "pizza", or even "piazza". The cities of Vicenza, La Spezia, and Firenze (Florence) all include the T+S affricate.

And so we get to the nitty-gritty, and we finally see what Romanian uses its special letter Ț for! In our earlier discussion, we said that Bucharest was on the Dâmboviţa River, so say it with a TS. Some cities, just selected off the map, all with the affricate TS, are: Galați, Bistrița, Toplița; Reșița is particularly fun to figure out (re.SHI.tsa).
The word for commerce, trade, is comerț. Compare that with German Kommerz, both with TS.
On the Black Sea coast, we visited the beautiful resort city of Constanța. Compare that with the above-mentioned German city of Konstanz on the Bodensee/Lake Constance. Both similarly-named cities have the affricate TS.
We all know what an Italian piazza is, mentioned above. Romanian has exactly the same word, but spelled piața.
A very illustrative international word is the word for "Gypsy". In German it's Zigeuner, with a Z. In Hungarian, it's cigány with a C. In Romanian, it's țigan, with a Ț. Each one of these spellings is indicating the TS affricate.

While we've finished with the special letters in the alphabet, we haven't finished with the affricates. As it turns out, Italian and Romanian are the two Latinate languages that, by chance, also include the T+SH and D+ZH affricates that English has.

The letter C was the Latin equivalent of Greek K, so words in English like "candy, cone, cub", that are pronounced with K, do not only have the pronunciation that's older, but is the original one. However, the "other" C, that appears before E, I, Y in "cent, city, cycle", moved to an S pronunciation, and has nothing to do with an affricate. It's the same in French, with "Cannes" vs "cité".

Both Italian and Romanian have the original K sound in casa and casă, respectively, so let's put that aside. It's C before E and I that changed, and in these two languages, C moved to the affricate pronunciation T+SH. In Italian, it's spelled C or CC, as in these Italian words used in English: cello, concerto, la dolce vita, Versace, Liberace, bocce, all before E. C before I appears in Sicilia (Sicily), and the word for "city", città (chit.TA).

In Romanian, we've seen the name of the dictator, Ceauşescu (CHYOW.shes.ku). An online word list I found included: felicita (congratulate), cercetare (search--think French chercher), cinema, (cinema), cita (cite, quote). All these Romanian words have the T+SH affricate (CH in English).

It's exactly the same story with the affricate D+ZH in both Italian and Romanian. The simple G sound as in "go" is the older and original G, going back to what the letter G was meant to represent in Latin. It appears in "gondola" in Italian, also in gamba (leg). By now, you shouldn't be surprised that the Romanian word for "leg" is also gambă. So again, let's put both of those aside. It's G before E and I that changed, and in these two languages, G moved to the affricate pronunciation D+ZH. In Italian, we have G with E in gelato (ice cream), and the city of Genova (Genoa); and G with I in gita (trip), pagina (page).

The same thing occurs in Romanian: gelos (jealous), generos (generous), pagină (page), all have the D+ZH affricate (J in English).

The last spelling point we'll make will be familiar if you remember the Romanian gymnast Nadia Comăneci and how her name was pronounced. Among the Latinate languages it's a quirk unique to Romanian, palatalization at the end of a word. Palatalization simply means "giving a Y-flavor" to another sound. It's one of many "gifts" Romanian got from being surrounded by Slavic languages. If you remember discussions of Russian in the past, this might ring a bell.

In Russian and other Slavic languages, palatalization is common, and can happen anywhere in a word. In Romanian, it can happen only at the end of a word. Russian has two ways to show palatalization, but we'll zone in on one. When the so-called "soft-sign", ь, is written after a consonant, that consonant is palatalized: М is pronounced M, but Мь is pronounced M^y, that is, with a bit of a Y-flavor. The soft sign is transliterated as an apostrophe, so M' refers back to Мь in Cyrillic.

If you follow that, then what Romanian does is a cinch. Since palatalization in Romanian can only happen at the end of a word, and since I as a genuine vowel wouldn't occur anyway at the end of a word, the I is used as ь is used in Russian. Compare these examples:

"Arab/Arabs" is arab/arabi in Romanian. The singular is (a.RAB), but the plural is pronounced (a.RAB^y). "Schools" is școli (SHKOL^y). An interesting parallel is again between Italian and Romanian: "wolf/wolves" is lupo/lupi in Italian, and pronounced as expected, but in Romanian, it's lup/lupi, with the plural being (LUP^y).

It then becomes understandable why (Nadia) Comăneci is (ko.ma.NECH^y). However, when this palatalization takes place at the end of a word, there are three consonants that change. The one of importance to us is when T affricates to T+S in this position. That is to say, the spelling –ti is pronounced -ts^y. Therefore, București (Bucharest), is pronounced (bu.ku.RESHTS^y), Ploiești is (plo.YESHTS^y), and that street, Calea Văcărești, is (va.ka.RESHTS^y).

Structure    Just a point or two about basic structures. Romanian is the only Latinate language that has retained some of the cases of Latin for nouns and adjectives, a combined nominative/accusative, a combined dative/genitive, and, rarely, a vocative. Pronouns have no vocative, and keep the other four separate.

Nouns group themselves into three genders, masculine, feminine, and neuter. This next point intrigues me: neuters behave like the masculine in the singular and feminine in the plural.

Nouns ending in a consonant or –u, are usually masculine or neuter. If they end in either –ă or –a, they are usually feminine.

As for the definite article ("the"), reflect back to the other Latinate languages.
In French, Italian, Spanish, and Italian, the feminine article is la. Keep that in mind, particularly the A.

As for the masculine definite article:
French has le; Italian has il; Spanish and Catalan have el. While the Spanish el can't change, all the others can shorten to l', in other words, just the L.
The common theme here is L. Keep that in mind.

Some years ago, when in Sweden, we discussed the fact that the Swedish definite article gets attached to the end of the word: "girl" is flicka, while "the girl" is flickan. This is typical of the Scandinavian languages. Now let's make use of that, because Romanian does the same thing.

In Romanian, think in terms of L for the masculine definite article, and A for the feminine. And then attach it to the end.

Masculine & neuter nouns ending in –u (very common) take just the –l we've been talking about: teatru/teatrul (theater/the theater), codru/codrul (forest/the forest). But in some cases, a vowel is needed with the L. If it ends in a consonant it takes –ul: pom/pomul (tree/the tree), lac/lacul (lake/the lake—think French lac), loc/locul (place/the place--think "location"). And if it ends in an –e, it takes –le: frate/fratele (brother/the brother).

Feminine nouns usually take –a, which we've been referring to: cale/calea (way/the way), floare/floarea (flower/the flower); şose/şosea (road/the road)—this is French "chaussée" "roadway", also used in German.

Now we can look back at the earlier discussion and understand some things better. The big building that displaced neighborhoods in Bucharest was the Centrul Civic/The Civic Center. Blending it with English means you're saying "the" twice. One of the special rooms in that restaurant was the Salonul Ion Mincu. And the restaurant was called the Bufetul de la Șosea, or, with the road name, Bufetul de la Șosea Kiseleff, so it's literally The Buffet by the Roadside, or The Buffet on the side of Kiseleff Road. But by far the best translation is to change the order to The (Kiseleff) Road(side) Buffet.

Vocabulary    We've been noting that there are a lot of Romanian words that are similar to one or more of the other Latinate languages, and I find the closest resemblance by far is to Italian. I've put together a totally random list of more words, with related words in other Latinate languages. If the connection exists to several languages, I'll usually choose Italian as the example.

Good evening: Bună seară (IT Buona sera)
Danger: pericol (IT pericolo)
One way: sens unic (FR sens unique)
Obstacle: obstacol (SP obstáculo)
Warm: cald (IT caldo)
Human/man: om (FR homme [OM])
Humans/men: oameni (IT sg uomo, pl uomini)
Occupied: occupat (IT occupato)
Free: liber (IT libero; SP libre; FR libre)
Three: trei (IT tre)
Five: cinci [CHINCH^y] (IT cinque [CHING.kwé])
Sunday: duminecă (IT domenica)
Monday: luni (FR lundi)
Tuesday: marți [marts^y] (SP martes)
Ticket: bilet (FR billet; IT biglietto; SP billete; PO bilhete)
What's it called?: Cum se chiamă? (IT Come si chiama?) (both KYAMA)
How's it pronounced?: Cum se pronunță? (IT Come si pronuncia?)
Gas/petrol: benzină (IT benzina)
After: după (IT: dopo)
Plane: avian (SP: avión)
Arm: braț (SP brazo)
Machine: mașină (FR machine)
Bookstore: librăria (IT libraria)
Brown: brun (FR brun)
Dead: mort (IT morto)
Mail: poșta (IT posta)
Many: mulți (MULTS^y) (IT molti)
Red: roșu (IT rosso)
Sea: marea (IT mare)
Ticket window: ghișeu [gi.SHÉ.U] (FR guichet [gi.SHÉ])
We: noi (IT noi)
Meat: carne (IT, SP, PO carne)

Now consider these related concepts, one showing heavy Slavic influence:
stradă street (IT strada)
uliţă street (Bulgarian, Serbian, Russian улица/ulitsa
cale way, road (SP calle "street")
şose road (FR chausée)

CHALLENGE (answer below*): WHAT MIGHT THIS MEAN? cale ferată

-escu    Many Romanian surnames end in –escu, which signifies "son of" or "child of". I've now learned that this suffix is related to French (and English) –esque, as when saying a figure is Rubensesque. I've also learned that this usage is the result of a family name reform from the mid-19C, when such a patronym (from father's first name) was required, or matronym if the father was dead or unknown. Thus, Alexandrescu was "Alexandru's child" and Petrescu was "Petre's child". Similar are Antonescu, Constantinescu, Grigorescu, Nicolescu.

Of course, while this is very common, there are many other names, as with Nadia Comăneci or tennis player Ilie Năstase (Ilie is i.LI.é and means Elias). But probably best known is the French-Romanian playwright ("Rhinoceros, The Bald Soprano") Eugen Ionescu, who moved to France, wrote mostly in French, altered his name, and is much better known as Eugène Ionesco. However, Ion, pronounced YON means John, so a little playing around with his name yields Gene Johnson!

Answer    Figuring out the meaning of cale ferată involves going back to our discussion pointing out that English is one of the few languages that names rail transportation based on those very rails/tracks it runs on, yielding "railroad" or "railway". (So does Dutch: spoorweg.) Most other languages uniformly call it an Iron Road: FR chemin de fer, GE Eisenbahn, SW järnveg, SP ferrocarril; IT ferrovia; RU железная дорога / zheleznaya doroga. Portuguese goes all out with the Iron Road theme and uses ferrovia, estrada de ferro, caminho de ferro, via férrea. And so with Romanian, we see that cale is "way, road" and perhaps picture a word like ferrous to make us think of iron and cale ferată should tend to clarify itself.

Teens    A last point is meant to show again the strong influence the surrounding Slavic languages have had on Romanian. (It's estimated that about 14% of Romanian is of Slavic origin.) One influence has been on the "teens".

Consider the single digits 0 to 9, followed by 10 to 19, and so on in groups of ten. I think people rarely realize how highly irregular names for the numbers in this second group of ten are, which we'll call the "teens" in English. In Germanic and Latinate languages, the teens have two naming devices, and we'll use English as an example. After "ten" introduces the series, we split the remaining nine into groups of 2+7, that is one kind of name for the pair 11-12, then the other kind for the remaining seven, 13 to 19. The names used for the second group, "thirteen" to "nineteen" fit the larger of the two patterns, but the smaller pattern, "eleven" and "twelve" do not, since we don't say "*oneteen" or "*twoteen".

Actually, eleven and twelve are formulated to imitate the single digits, so that when counting, the names we use give the impression that zero to twelve is one oversized group, while thirteen to nineteen is a short-changed group. Young people consider they become teenagers when they reach thirteen, not realizing they've actually been "teenagers" for two years already.

The other Germanic languages are in the same 2+7 pattern. Spanish does 5+4 (starting at once, 11, and dieciséis, 16); French does a 6+3 (starting at onze, 11, and dix-sept, 17); Italian does the same 6+3 (starting at undici, 11, and diciassette, 17).

But move to the East, and there's a world of difference here. I learned it first in Russian, where all the teens are totally uniform. Eleven is одиннадцать / odinnadtsat' (notice the soft sign, ь, at the end), which looks formidable, but breaks down to odin+nad+tsat', which is one-above-ten. That system carries right through to девятнадцать / devyatnadtsat', or devyat+nad+tsat' or nine-above-ten. I've checked, and this is the system for neighboring Bulgarian and Serbian, and the other Slavic languages. Bulgarian eleven is единадесет (edinadeset). This breaks down to един+над+десет, or edin+nad+deset, although н (n) and д (d) are written just once each.

So how could Romanian resist this Slavic influence? It couldn't. Romanian follows the (very sensible) Slavic pattern, so that eleven is unsprezece, running through to nineteen as nouăsprezece. As in Slavic, there are three components: un+spre+zece (one-above-ten) to nouă+spre+zece (nine-above-ten). The model is clearly an imitation of the Slavic pattern, though all the elements are Latinate. Compare the two numbers: un[u], nouă with IT uno, nove and SP uno, nueve. Most fun of all is when I found out that that preposition spre derives from Latin super "above".

Wurst    Our Intermezzo I ends now on a lighter note. While the Romanian language piece was meant to be an outgrowth of the discussion of Bucharest teardowns, it's hard to tie a discussion of Wurst to teardowns. But Currywurst does connect with postwar Berlin, quite intimately, actually, and with Charlottenburg in particular.

This piece is really an outgrowth of something I wrote for guests I invited to an Oktoberfest I had last fall. The theme was German food, and I had a restaurant near Grand Central cater it. I was surprised to see that one of the things they offered was Currywurst. I'd had it many times in Berlin, but had never seen it outside Germany, let alone in the US, so I ordered a small sampling for guests to taste, and prepared some notes and pictures to explain what the Currywurst craze is all about. This is an expansion of those notes, preceded by a general discussion of German and Austrian Wurst.

Let's see what we know about the subject. The word Wurst (VU.ast), plural Würste (VÜ.a.ste) came into English as part of bratwurst and liverwurst. (Actually, that word is only a half-translation of the original Leberwurst, although some people do translate the whole thing and call it liver sausage.) Of course, English speakers love to pronounce Wurst like the English word "worst", making it a source of humor. The diminutive Würstchen "little sausage(s)" also will be coming up.

German and Austrian cuisines offer a large selection of Würste. When not eaten at home or in a restaurant, they are a common street food, which is how we're discussing them here. Imbiss is "snack" (although it's not at all uncommon to see the English word used as well), and is related to beißen (beissen) "to bite". I see the same imagery for Imbiss as when in English, you go out for "a bite" to eat.

But Imbiss is extended to Imbissstand, a snack stand. This one is a Bratwurststand (Photo by ©Jared Preston/CC BY-SA 3.0) at the Katharinenkirche (St Catherine's Church) in Frankfurt am Main. The stand-up tables (click) are very typical. Names often vary between Germany and Austria, where it's called instead a Würstelstand, such as this one in the Schwarzenbergplatz in Wien (Vienna) (Photo by Clemens Pfeiffer), which happens to have an outdoor counter to stand at.

Getting back to the large selection of Würste available, while the selection might vary by region, the variety is lengthy. Not counting the ones that are sliced to make Schnittwurst (cold cuts, aka luncheon meat), but limiting ourselves to those that are eaten whole, we can mention just a selected few of many, starting with the very popular Bratwurst (Photo by Hannes Endreß). It would seem that the name was derived from braten ("to roast"), but there's also a word Brät (rhymes with "late") that means finely chopped meat meant for sausage-making. It's thought both words might have influenced the name.

Actually, the term Bratwurst describes several similar types of sausage, all meant for grilling, as shown in this typical Bratwurststand (Photo by Gerbis) in Nürnberg/Nuremberg. Holzhausen. a village in Thüringen/Thuringia west of Berlin, is the home of the Deutsches Bratwurstmuseum. I've not been there, but I've found some online pictures: this is a giant, walk-through Bratwurst (Photo by Uckermaerker); this is a reconstruction of what it is believed the medieval Bratwurst kitchen in the 1404 Amstadt Monastery looked like (Photo by Gdelhey); and this is, on the eastern entrance to town, the Bratwurstkreisel, or Bratwurst Traffic Circle/Roundabout (Photo by Mazbln).

Also quite popular is Bockwurst (Photo by Tinoelf at German Wikipedia), first mentioned in Bavaria in 1827, which looks like a fat hot dog. The name derives from the fact that it was originally intended to be eaten with bock beer. But this picture is one of several we have that show what to expect when ordering at a Wurststand. Unless you're ordering an American-style hot dog, forget buns. My experience is that, as in this picture, you get served a cardboard plate a "naked" Wurst, mustard, and a typical oval Brötchen (bread roll) or similar piece of bread. This is why you see those stand-up tables or counters at the stands. You either tear or bite off a piece of bread, pick up the sausage—this is literally "finger-food"—dip it in the mustard, and eat it and the bread using two hands.

Just a few more random mentions. This is Weißwurst (Weisswurst) (Photo by Rainer Z), a Bavarian specialty, shown here with sweet mustard and a Brezel (pretzel). For obvious reasons, it means "white sausage". Another one is Mettwurst (Photo by Tamorlan), shown here topped with mustard, along with sauerkraut and potatoes. Mett is a Low German word that more or less means "chopped meat". There are many, more.

We've seen above other serving styles, but let's end this section by showing other serving possibilities. This, in Weimar, is a Thüringer Rostbratwurst ("Thuringian roasted bratwurst") that IS being served on a Brötchen, though not a bun (Photo by Dr. Bernd Gross). It's one of many regional variants (to me, using both Rost and Brat in the same word seems redundant, but so be it.) This, in Hamburg, is a Knackwurst (Photo by GeoTrinity)--pronounce the initial K, based on knacken "to crackle, to snap", onomatopoeic for the supposed sound it makes when bitten into. It's also called a Knacker. In North America, it's known as "knockwurst"—silent initial K—which I see as an example of folk etymology. "Knack" seems meaningless when talking about food--"maybe I've been actually hearing "knock"—and so the first part of the word changes (not the second, which is recognizable). It's really quite humorous, since this Wurst has nothing to do with knocking. This is a Wurststand in Berlin (Photo by User:Fb78), appropriately named Wurstland. Click to read the Wurst varieties available.

Cultural Exports    Three German-speaking cities have lent their names to fast food abroad, two of them being sausages. The one that isn't is the hamburger, whose origin is unclear, other than that it originated in Hamburg. It certainly seems to me that hamburgers could have some connection with the smaller, flattened meatballs of Danish and German cuisine known in Denmark as frikadeller and in Germany as Frikadellen (Photo by Kenneth Jorgensen). They are not served on a bun or with bread, however. There are several stories of meat patties served in bread. Most compelling I think is when, in the early 20C, a ground meat patty called a Hamburg steak was served between two pieces of bread on ships of the Hamburg Amerika Line (2012/11) crossing the Atlantic, which might also explain the name. Do consider how odd it really is that in English, the word can be shortened to simply "burger" and modified to things like "cheeseburger", masking the origin of the word in Hamburg.

Now get ready for your head to start to spin as we approach the confusing subject of the two sausages that also crossed the Atlantic, the frankfurter and the wiener. Let's first consider their home outside of Germany and Austria. In English, most people probably recognize the city of Frankfurt (am Main) in the first word, fewer probably see Wien (Vienna) in the second. The term "frankfurters" is often shortened to franks, making the city (as with burgers) less recognizable. Or, they've lost that name entirely to be known as hot dogs, which are usually served in a bun, and probably most often with mustard. There are varieties with all sorts of toppings, such as chili dogs (served with chili sauce). In New York, they are usually served with sauerkraut—and mustard. More unusual is the bunless corn dog (Photo by Jonathunder) where a stick is inserted into the frank, it's dipped in corn batter, and deep-fat fried, to be eaten like a popsicle.

The confusion starts to hit here, since frankfurters are often called wieners, sometimes varied to weenies as in a "weenie roast", so the two cities of origin become confused. Also, while what can be called a wiener is usually full-sized, a short version has become more common called a cocktail sausage or a Vienna sausage (Photo by Changlc). This is the kind that, in the US and other countries, can be wrapped in dough almost completely and served as a tiny appetizer called a pig in a blanket (Photo by stef yau). [As it turns out, there's also a German version called a Würstchen im Schlafrock (Photo by AlphaLeonis), literally "sausage in a dressing gown". I'm sure the sausage and dough vary, but most obviously, the sausage is entirely encased here.]

Back to Germany and Austria. Frankfurter Würstchen (Photo by WordRidden/Jessica Spengler), similar to hot dogs, and made from pork, have been made in Frankfurt since the 13C. Since 1860, the name has been geographically protected within Germany and since 1929, to use the name, the product must come from the Frankfurt area. Outside Germany, the name is not protected.

In 1805, a Frankfurt butcher moved to Wien/Vienna and began making and selling there a variation of the product that added beef to the pork. He also shortened the name to Frankfurter, which also appears as Frankfurter Würstel, the latter word being the Austrian variation of Würstchen.

So it would seem at first that two variations on a theme are named for Frankfurt, and nothing for Vienna. But in Germany, hot-dog-type sausages are called Wiener [Würstchen] (Photo by Frank C. Müller)--in Switzerland, Wienerli-- to differ from the original pork-only mixture from Frankfurt. In Austria, they're called Frankfurter [Würstel]. So Germany points to Austria, and Austria points to Germany. And abroad, we don't make any major distinction between frankfurters and wieners. And it should be added that hot dogs, by that name, are also found throughout Europe.

Currywurst    All the above is actually meant as an introduction to the subject of Currywurst, the most famous Wurst you've probably never heard of. My sense is that outside the German area, few people have an inkling of what a phenomenon it has become. It's NOT a different kind of Wurst. It's usually just a Bratwurst (or a Bockwurst—see VW below). But HOW a Currywurst (KÖ.ri.vu.ast) is served is what makes it different.

Beverly and I visited Berlin quite a number of times, and from early on, we discovered Currywurst, and got to enjoy that type of street food. Its preparation is quite simple, especially considering its great popularity. Grill a Bratwurst (or Bockwurst), and serve it either whole, scored diagonally or cut it into pieces. Slather it with ketchup (a spicy ketchup is available), and then generously sprinkle curry powder (Photo by Whitebox) on top, and there you have it.

Let's take a look at what we've been talking about. This is a typical picture of Currywurst, served sliced (Photo by Bubutine). Note how much curry powder there is, which is normal. Shown also is a typical, two-pronged, wooden Currywurst-Gabel (Currywurst fork), which also goes by other names. This is a Currywurst, served whole (Photo by Tinoelf). When served whole, it can also be scored diagonally, ready to be broken into slices. A common accompaniment is French fries (Brit: chips).

I have now learned origin of Currywurst, which might reflect the sort of thing that's happened to everyone at some time or another. Picture wanting a midnight snack and the cupboard is bare. The best you can do is find some mustard and some bread, and so you manage a midnight snack of a mustard sandwich. That type of desperation is like the origin of the Currywurst. Why else would anyone put curry powder on a Wurst?

In divided and bombed-out postwar Berlin in 1949, Herta Heuwer was in Charlottenburg, which was at that time in the British sector to the west of Berlin-Mitte (Map by Stefan-Xp). She'd had several different jobs before the war, but after the war, in 1946, she was one of many women who became a Trümmerfrau, in her case, in Charlottenburg, to help start the reconstruction process. She also volunteered in soup kitchens.

It was a time of severe shortages—the Berlin Blockade and Airlift would start the very next year--and she had to make do with foodstuffs that she could manage to get. She wanted to start a small Imbissstand in Charlottenburg and needed supplies for her Bratwürste. This being the British sector, she encountered some British soldiers, and bartered some spirits for some ketchup and curry powder. She'd just have to make do. So she grilled some Bratwürste and applied the only two ingredients she had.

On our map of modern Berlin, find coordinates A & 5 and zone in on Charlottenburg, to the intersection of Kantstraße and Kaiser-Friedrich-Straße, southeast corner. There's a plaque there that I have not personally seen, but which we'll see a picture of shortly. This is the corner where she set up her Imbissstand on 4 September 1949, where it became popular with contruction workers rebuilding Berlin. She called her product a "Spezial Curry-Bratwurst", which by the mid- 1950s became simply a Currywurst. Interest spread rapidly. At its height, her stand was selling 10,000 servings a week. She later replaced her stand with an Imbissstube ("snack bar") at the same location, and later still, opened an Imbisshalle ("small restaurant") that employed up to 19 waitresses, which lasted until 1974. She also patented her sauce under the name "Chillup".

The Currywurst, which retains its connection with Berlin, has spread throughout the German-speaking world, and beyond, at least in Europe. It's estimated that some 800 million are eaten in Germany every year, with 70 million in Berlin alone. This is a Currywurst stand (Photo by Frank Vincentz) clear across Germany in the Ruhr area. It pays due homage to Berlin. The name Curry-Flitzer can be loosely translated a Currywurst on Wheels. Their motto 'ne Currywurst geht immer, also loosely translated, is "a Currywurst is always the right thing". I was both surprised and amused to find this picture of a Currywurst being served on board an InterCityExpress in Switzerland (Photo by NAC).

Let's take a look within Berlin itself. Here's a stand on Savignyplatz (Photo by Fridolin freudenfett) that also claims originality (click). It's in Charlottenburg, map coordinates B/C & 5. Here's another one on wheels, in the form of a food truck (Photo by Arild Vågen) in the Holzmarktstraße on the Spree (map coordinates H & 4). In the name, lekka is a "cute" respelling of lecker, a German word of North German origin meaning "tasty" (cf Dutch lekker, Swedish läcker.

There are two particularly well-known purveyors of Currywurst, though I've never visited either, since I've always just picked up a Currywurst on the fly whenever the notion struck. One of them, dating in its present form from 1980, is Curry 36 (Photo by Er nun wieder), which has two locations, this being its principal one on Mehringdamm 36, whose address provides part of its name. On the map, find it in Kreuzberg at coordinates F & 6, corner of Yorckstraße, marked #4, which is a reference to the inset at the lower left of the map, which tells about it. Its other location is at the Hardenbergplatz at the Zoologischer Garten Station in Charlottenburg, map coordinates C & 5.

The other famous purveyor is Konnopke's Imbiss (Photo by Fridolin freudenfett). Click to see that the first three items listed are Currywurst, Bratwurst, and Bockwurst, in that order. The Imbiss dates from 1930, but started selling Currywurst in 1960 as the first Imbissstand in East Berlin to do so. Particularly for that reason, find, in Prenzlauer Berg at coordinates G & 2, Schönhauser Allee 44B, which is located southeast of Eberswalder Straße and its U-Bahn station on the U2 line (the picture shows the U-Bahn viaduct above the Imbissstand).

Once you've found it, you'll see that the location is just east of the former Berlin wall, shown by the red dashed line just a couple of blocks west on Eberswalder Straße. But don't get confused by the dates. While the border itself dates from the post-war period and was there in 1960, no physical barrier prevented movement across it, so the love of Currywurst was easily able to cross into the East. The physical wall wasn't built until 13 August 1961.

Finally, there are a number of things, some surprising, that illustrate the popularity of Currywurst:

(1) Every mayoral candidate in Berlin (who really would like to be elected—and stay elected) feels compelled to have a photo op while eating at a Currywurst stand; that's how closely Currywurst is associated with the city.

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The current Mayor is Michael Müller. The first picture above shows him at Konnopke's Imbiss (sign in rear). The second is a detail showing it's really a Currywurst he's eating.

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The previous mayor was Klaus Wowereit. The first picture shows him at Curry 36. And while we're at it, the second shows Chancellor Angela Merkel at an event, eating a Currywurst.

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(2) You will recall that Herta Heuwer opened her first Currywurststand on 4 September 1949, so I'm sure you won't be too surprised to find out that every year, 4 September is celebrated as Der Tag der Currywurst (also Currywurst-Tag), or Currywurst Day. The below notice in 2014 celebrated 65 Years of Currywurst.

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(3) The Berliner Morgenpost of 10 October 2016 (above) reported on Tom Hanks's visit to Berlin, where he said he might like to live and work part time. Next to his picture at the top it says "Tom Hanks schwärmt von Berlin" (Tom Hanks is crazy about Berlin). It also mentions something about Currywurst that's too small to read. But inside the paper, it reported (with my translation) that, with a wink of his eye, Hanks said that he:

(4) You may be familiar with the Google Doodle, the modification of Google's logo that it temporarily uses for special commemorations. I'd read that on Sunday, 30 June 2013, Herta Heuwer's 100th birthday was celebrated with a Google Doodle. I accepted that, but was still dubious—a Google Doodle for Currywurst? Really? So I went online to discover that there's such a thing as the Google Doodle Archive. I found it, and here it is:

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(5) The Volkswagen plant at Wolfsburg runs its own Wurst kitchens producing 3.5 million Currywürste per year, serving 1.6 million to Volkswagen employees, the rest being sold commercially. We said earlier that not all Currywurst is Bratwurst, and here is one major example of that. VW uses Bockwurst, and therefore uses the name variation Currybockwurst.

The Volkswagenwerk dates from 1937/1938. When it restarted postwar production, since it owned its own local farms, it began serving its own foodstuffs in company cafeterias. As early as the 1950s it employed butchers to make different kinds of Wurst for its employees. In 1973, it started making its own Currywurst, as shown here in 1973 (Photo from the Bundesarchiv, B 145 Bild-F038807-0021 / Schaack, Lothar / CC-BY-SA 3.0).

The Currywurst is served primarily in the company cafeterias, as early as 8 AM. Back in 1973, no other distribution was considered until expansion started after it was offered to trade visitors from auto shows and to the press. In 2016 VW die retail Currywurst sales nationally and internationally in eleven countries. In 2015, VW sold 7.2 million Currywürste, up a million over the year before. That surpassed the number of VW cars sold in the same period, which was 5.82 million. Of course, a car is bigger than a Wurst!

For retail sale, here is some packaged VW Currywurst, in two sizes, at a supermarket in Braunschweig. You can clearly read "Volkswagen Service Factory" in English. On the packaging itself it says "Volkswagen Originalteil". Since Teil is "part", I assume this is an attempt at humor, assuring that you're getting "VW original parts". That was a detail of this picture, since on the same shelf, VW is selling its own Gewürz Ketchup (again, Gewürz is "spice"). Click to zoom in to see that the bottle is also labeled in English "Volkswagen Service Factory" (Both photos by Monstourz).

(6) We said earlier that a plaque (Photo by Malud & Rainer Zenz) was posthumously installed at the site of her original stand, on the day before what would have been Herta Heuwer's 90th birthday in 2003. Here's my translation:

(7) On our Berlin map, find coordinates F & 5, which will lead you to Mitte. Start at Checkpoint Charlie, and walk two blocks north on Friedrichstraße, crossing the former site of the Wall. Turn right (east) at Schützenstraße and walk ½ block to No 70. Look left (north), and, believe it or not, you'll be facing the Deutsches Currywurst Museum (Photo by Orderinchaos). Though I haven't been there, I suppose that's supposed to be curry in the window.

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As shown above, there may even be a familiar face there to greet you! The museum was opened in 2009 and has approximately 350,000 visitors annually. Apparently you can step into a replica of an Imbissbude and get the point of view of the salesperson inside. In another room, the ingredients of curry powder are displayed. This is an interior view. If you click, you'll see a case on the left showing Lieblingswürste ("Favorite Sausages"), and on the right, a picture of Herta. These are "ketchup phones" (Both photos by Charlotte S H Jensen). I understand that when you put them to your ear, different artists sing the praise of Currywurst. In the background is a map of Berlin detailing the locations of well-known Currywurst stands. The museum has a video and showcase discussing the VW variation. The entrance fee for the tiny museum is €11, but on entering, you get an included Currywurst-Snack.

So that's the story of the famous Wurst you probably never heard of before. You can see why, when it turned out that the caterer offered Currywurst as one of its appetizers, I jumped at the opportunity to serve it.

And so to quote the end of the first paragraph of this posting: Series 2 will have Intermezzo II covering New York's expansion grid, plus ITS experience with teardowns. Then Series 3 will finally return to Paris and pick up with the arrival, and then the first day visiting Passy.