Sorry for the lapse between posts. Writing a post can be time consuming and I have been pretty busy with school work and other activities lately. Classes are going well though, or at least I think that they are! I guess that will be determined by my grade... 

At any rate, even with our schoolwork and observations, we still go on excursions over the weekends that are organized by Dr. Gommlich. He, so far, has taken as around the State of Saxony which is the area he has lived in for most his life except for the time he spent in Kent. Since he grew up here he knows so much about this area which  makes travelling with him wonderful. And it's awesome that he takes the time to travel with us on the weekends. He doesn't have to do it, but he chooses to and for that I am very grateful.

Last weekend, we traveled to two different towns in Saxony: Görlitz and Bautzen. Görlitz and Bautzen historically belong to a region known as Lusatia which was named after a Slavic tribe that first settled this area. In the 10th century, the Margraviate of  Meißen began to move into the area so areas of land were absorbed into the Margraviate. However, over the next few centuries political ownership of Lusatia changed frequently and at various times this region was under the control of Poland, then the Margraviate of Meißen again, and then finally to Bohemia in the late 12th century. This area remained under Bohemian influence until the 15th century when Lusatia opposed Bohemia in the Hussite Wars.* The Hussite Wars weakened Bohemia's power over Lusatia and for most of the 15th century the area gave homage to Hungary. However, by the beginning of the 16th century they were once again in the political sphere of Bohemia which is where it stayed until the end of the Thirty Years War.

A tower that still remains from the medieval city walls of Görlitz

At the end of the Thirty Years War, Lusatia, and thus Görlitz and Bautzen, were transferred to the Duchy of Saxony (later the Kingdom of Saxony) which is where Jon and I currently live. Only now this area is known as the Federal State of Saxony. While both these areas are today part of the State of Saxony, areas of Lusatia continued to change hands with Görlitz and other areas becoming part of Prussia in the 19th century. Görlitz, and other areas within Lusatia, remained part of Prussia until the end of World War II. Even after the War, the political boundaries of this area continued to shift. 

Before the end of World War II, German political boundaries were different. 

The light blue area on the map was all the territory that belonged to the German Reich as of 1939 (which included Austria and Czechoslovakia). At the end of World War II, Polish borders were moved west as they absorbed territory that was formerly German and lost some Eastern territory to the Russians. The new German-Polish boundary was formed along what is is known as the Oder-Neisse line which are rivers in Central Europe. As a result, Germany lost the following territories: most of Silesia, over half of Pomerania, the eastern portion of Brandenburg, some of Saxony, Danzig, and East Prussia (the warm port of Königsberg went to the USSR). All of these areas had large, native German populations living in them and most of the areas had been historically under German influence since the Late Middle Ages.

This map shows both the Occupation Zones following World War II and the whitish areas show the areas that Germany lost to Poland and to the USSR. As you can imagine, these areas were heavily populated by Germans during World War II and after the war all ethnic Germans and German nationals were forcibly expelled from these areas, as they were from other countries in Europe. Even Germans, ethnic or nationals, who had not been affiliated with or supported the Nazi Party were expelled. These expulsions were often riddled with violence and conditions once the expellees entered Germany were not the best since Germany was devastated, economically and politically, following the war. While the expellees were granted German citizenship, life was not any easier for them once they reached post-war Germany.

Lusatia was also affected by these post-war boundary changes. Portions of this area become Polish, and Görlitz was split into two cities. Görlitz sits on the Neisse river, which was the new boundary line that was agreed upon by the Allies and Poland. As a result, this German town, which was an important city in Lusatia, became two separate towns: Görlitz and Zgorzelec. These were the towns that we visited first on Saturday.

This is a view of the cathedral that sits right next to the Neisse in Görlitz.

Görlitz became an important city to Lusatia during the Middle Ages because it was situated on the Via Regia which were royal highways that connected Europe.

I, for some reason, did not take a picture of Görlitz's position on the Via Regia in this picture, but to the very right of the picture you can see Dresden (which is not on the road). To the right of Dresden lies Görlitz. As you can see from the picture, this road connected central Europe to France and to the modern day Netherlands. Lying on this road benefited towns and Görlitz was one of these towns. 

Since Görlitz was an important town, it was important to the political spheres that it belonged to throughout its history. As result, Görlitz has a variety of architecture styles that you can still see. Görlitz was not damaged during World War II so many of their buildings from the Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque, and Art Nouveau eras still stand and they still show features of the architect of the countries that they were affiliated with at the time. 

The fact that the city remains so much of its pre-war character attracts film makers. Parts of Inglorious Bastards and The Reader were filmed here and more recently The Grand Budapest Hotel was filmed here. If you want to check the last movie out, it is an English language movie and it was filmed in this building:

The building is very large and would not fit into my picture since I was too close. Dr. Gommlich says that the inside of the building is beautiful, but we could not go inside so I will not be able to see it until I watch The Grand Budapest Hotel. 

After leaving Görlitz, we traveled to Bautzen which is also historically part of Lusatia. It is often referred to as the historic capital of Lusatia and is a cultural center of the Sorbs who are a minority Slavic group who live in this area of Germany. 

Since it is the cultural capital of the Sorbs, both Sorbian and German are used in Bautzen. The right side up word of Bautzen is in Sorbian. As this area is part of Lusatia, Bautzen has changed political boundaries throughout history as well. However, I felt that their architecture was more unified than the architecture that we saw in Görlitz.

Like Görlitz, Bautzen was not bombed during the war so portions of their medieval structures, like this tower from the old city wall, still stand. 

This picture shows a portion of an old castle that was built in Bautzen. Bautzen was amazing to see and after we were done touring the sights, we stopped for drinks at a German restaurant before we caught our train. 

 Following the excursion, Jon and I went out with some of the other students in the program to the Neustadt. One of the girls in the program had seen a molecular bar the night before so were looking to have a drink there because it sound interesting. We didn't quite know where it was so it took us a little while to find the bar, but it was a fun bar so I am glad that we didn't give up and go to another bar! Here are they types of drinks that they serve there:

Like I said, they were very interesting!

 If you are all interested in my posts, I will try to be more regular so you can all see what Jon and I are doing here. At any rate, I hope that everyone at home is doing well and we miss you all!

*The Hussites followed the teachings of the reformer Jan Hus (1369-1415). He was an early reformer of the Church  were considered by the Catholic Church to be a heretic as were his followers. Crusades were fought against the Hussites and Lusatia allied with the Holy Roman Emperor against Czech Hussites (some of whom were influential within the Bohemian government).