Tag Archives: Germany

Reflections of My Life

I was listening to the 1969 Marmalades’ hit Reflections of my Life on Spotify.

It’s a forgotten classic by a band from Glasgow, however as I listened to it this time around, it was with quite different ears to those of the 12 year old who bought it in 1970 as a 45. I don’t think it was just being forty plus years older that gave the song a different feel.

It is a very melancholy song. For me, as with so many others, a couple of lines stood out,

The world is a bad place, a bad place
A terrible place to live, oh but I don’t wanna die
.

Given the song was written at the height of the Vietnam War its anti-war sentiment is easy to understand as is the reference to the world as a bad and terrible place. This time around though, it was not the Vietnam War that I was thinking about when I listened to the song, but a photo I had seen on our recent trip. I could neither get the photograph or the lines out of my head.

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The photo is on display at the Topography of Terror in Berlin,

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Less than Two Weeks to go

With less than two weeks until we get on the plane, I finally have some time to think about what we’ll do while we are away.

With my last assignment for this semester completed and my article for The Adelaide Review submitted its only a week or so more in the office and then on the plane.

I am slightly nervous about how the flight will go – a 2.10am flight out of Melbourne will make for a long night. Actually it will make that a very long night! Still we used frequent flyer points and booked late, so it’s not that surprising that our flight time isn’t the most convenient.

Our itinerary

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Planning our trip to Europe

I love planning holidays as it adds to the excitement and anticipation.

Sorting out the airfares, planning the places to visit, reading hotel reviews, buying travel books, finding places where we might eat, sights to see, buying new luggage and so on!

We decided a couple of weeks ago that we would take three to four weeks in late June through July and go somewhere. It’s peak season in Europe and not really our preferred time for travel, but it’s also University semester break and the quietest time at work in my year.

Where should we go?

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