Poppies

Yes, it's that time of year again:

Poppies in the fields!

Same old, same old"

All 34  Bishops of Chile  resigned and asked the Pope to 
"judge them individually".
Several of them had protected several clerical Pedophiles for years, shuffling them from one Diocese to another. That's a little like sending a constantly hungry man from one buffet to the next, so he may find more delectable goodies.
... to judge them individually?
what is the matter with those boobs?
Don't they know themselves if they are guilty or innocent of this hideous charge?
The guilty ones should 'fess up, speak the truth, quit the Order and be charged in Criminal Court with "aiding and abetting"!
If they need a little help in deciding their guilt or innocence, I'll be glad to help them:
If you even just suspect, or actually know the perpetrator, or perpetrators of such crimes, and you looked the other way and said nothing, you are guilty!

The innocent ones should give second thoughts to belonging to such an organisation. 

Bertstravels
prefers to write about Harry and Meghan.

Theee Wedding!!!

This surely was the Wedding  of the Year! 
No, it must have been the Wedding of the Decade or the Century, 
or of all- and ever-time..
The Bride was gorgeous, 
The groom was handsome
Every guest was beautiful and elegant
The flower girls were as cute as buttons,
The hats were funny
some of them "very funny" and
The Queen was royal.
The only thing which was kind of dumb,
Was that Meghan Markle
a very pretty second string actress
from Los Angeles
all of a sudden, became:
Her Royal Highness, Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex.
So the Queen decreed.

Bertstravels
was not actually there, because he was not invited
but he grabbed these shots and some more off the TV.

Harry

Meghan

Harry and Meghan.

(make up your own titles.)

Two Holidays in One

Is it Mother's day or is it Bert's Birthday?
Across the street and up a bit is the "Geniesserei"... (translates easily to English "Enjoyery.) 
Every year on this date we have had a Festival there.
So here are some pix of this year's party. Tonc Feinig, the absolute master of the keyboard and Stefan Thaler, a Genius on the Bass. What music they make! 
A 6 course lunch and some excellent wine. 
The Lunch lasted from 11AM to 3PM.
The food was great, the music fabulous...
Wed had the "Lunch to end all Lunches."

Tonc (pronounced: Tontsch) Feinig.

Stefan Thaler

Stefan is normal size, about my size, 

Tonc is a Giant, 6 foot something.

Ustascha vs Partisans

Yesterday, on the 12^th May, an annual meeting was held, in a meadow, just outside the town of Bleiburg. It was attended by about 11,000 visitors from Croatia, to commemorate the murder of many thousands of members of the “Ustascha.”

Who were the so-called “Ustascha?” Even a perfunctory look into the history of this organization reveals this:

“The Ustascha was a Croatian Revolutionary movement, supported by Nazi Germany and by the Roman Catholic Church.

It was, in fact, a fascist, racist, ultra nationalist, terrorist, Nazi supported organization, who ruled in a German-protected area of Croatia.

Between 1939 and 1945 the Ustascha had established a number of Concentration and Extermination camps, the most notorious of which was in/near Jasenovac, an Extermination Camp in which low number estimated 60,000 victims were murdered. They were mostly Serbians, Jews, Roma and anybody else who did not agree with this National Socialist (Nazi) philosophy.

Now, of course, came the 8^th of May 1945, the day in which the end of WWII was documented by the signing of the unconditional surrender of the German Army.

The Tito-friendly so-called “Partisans” now moved to get their revenge, killing as many of the Ustascha as they could.

The Ustascha, men, women and children fled to Austria where, on the 14^th day of May 1945, they reached a field in Loibach, near Bleiburg, where they encountered the British arm of the Allied victorious liberation forces, who, in accordance with International Law returned them to the Jurisdiction of the then Yugoslavia.

This is when the Partisans took over, and commenced with the killing of the Ustaschas right there on the “Loibach Field,” continuing during a forced death march, where those, who, exhausted, could no longer walk, were shot, their bodies littering the side of the road. Men, Women and Children.

The number of victims killed during this “death march” is under dispute and varies widely. It may be believed that tens of thousands were murdered during this episode.

Many of the Ustaschas fled to South America, where they were supported by right wing local Governments and by the Catholic church.

What, finally, have we left?

A pastoral scene of flower strewn meadows, a lovely country side of rolling hills reaching for the mountains and...

….....A History of Killers killing Killers.

Bertstravels 

thought a lot about posting this or not posting it. 

It is, after all, ancient History and should probably be buried and forgotten.

But, since this fascist ideology, saturated with the blood of the innocent and the guilty, is still very much in evidence, Bertstravels thinks that it must be told again and again, so that the deeds of criminals in power should never be forgotten, and, it may be hoped, not be repeated.

Kindergarten Icecream day

On my travels I reached a "Konditorei" (sweet bakery) somewhere in the countryside, invaded by an entire group of beautiful children.
Like all kids, myself included, they simply loved Ice Cream. Vanilla, Strawberry, Raspberry, Chocolate. You make it, we eat it.

Vespa rules the Motor World

at least for today, in Bleiburg.
The "Vespa Meeting" attracted about 200 Vespa owners with their Vespas to Bleiburg.
It was a quiet meeting, with loud music and spinning of tires.
Altogether peaceful.

Just a small part of the total number of Vespas in Bleiburg today.

Yes, it's that day again

It is the 8th day of May 2018.
73 years ago, on this day, World War 2 officially came to an end by the signing of some documents.
With this affixing of names on a piece of paper, Germans and Austrians were allowed to forget over 72 Million victims.
We were allowed to speak of an Occupation of our land by the Allied Forces and it took, it is almost unbelievable, fully 40 years before the then German Federal President, Richard von Weizsäcker, in 1985 for the very first time spoke of "the day of Liberation from the inhuman yoke of the brutal dictatorship of  the National Socialist  Party."
Can you imagine this?  For fully 40 years no leading Government official spoke of a "Liberation."
It seems they all were quite happy to live under a regime which murdered in excess of 17 Million people in various ways, not including in military combat.

What, you do not believe this number? Let me repeat here a previously listed summary:

People murdered by the Nazis:
Gypsies:                                        220,000
Jehovah's Witnesses                            2,000
Institutionalized disabled              250,000
Serbian Civilians                           312,000
Polish Civilians ( non Jewish)    1,800,000
Soviet Prisoners of War              3,000,000
Soviet Civilians, (non Jewish)    5,700,000
Jews                                            5,900,000
Total                                         17,184,000
===============================

By all means, let us celebrate this 8th day of May, as the day on which Europe, all of Europe, was officially liberated from the yoke of Nazi Germany.

Bertstravels.

A Frog is a Frog is a Frog

There isn't more to say!

Talk about being stubborn

Yes, talk about being stubborn.

This takes the cake.

There is this little Violet, (I think it's a "Dog-Violet")

It's got the whole lawn of our garden in which to spread its roots,

and grow as tall as it wants.

But Noooo, 

It grows in between the stone blocks of the little walkway.

I'd swear that there isn't even a speck of decent soil 

in which a self-respecting little flower could grow.

Well, welcome to you, little flower!

You will be protected here

like the rarest ot Orchids.