Author: Cornerman

Dachau and the Black Forest

Today we travel from Munich to the Black Forest. A 4,5 hour drive if all goes well. First we visit Dachau, the concentatration camp near Munich. I have never been to a concentration camp this size.

When we arrived it was already 32 degrees celcius, it was actually very busy. Lot’s of school children which is very important.

The camp itself to me is a daunting place, maybe it was the heat or just being there but I got very sad. Simply because nothing really changed from those days. After WWII we had numerous events where lot’s of people were killed simply for being different. Maybe not on the scale with which it happened in WWII, but on a large scale nevertheless.

Even today. Really really depressing. ‘Never again’ a plaque in the camp says. Well we’re not there yet, not by a long shot.

Still I think it’s very important to visit these historic places. To remember how lucky we are to live in the West, a place on earth where freedom is the norm and being able to express different opinions.

After this stop we went off for the Black forest, a pretty long drive with some slow traffic on the 2 lane roads in the last hour and a half. Beautiful scenery made up for it. We arrived at our Ghasthaus Ratsstuble at around 17:30. Which was good. We had a nice meal and some beers before chilling on our terrace.

it’s going to be very hot tomorrow so we won’t be doing any long hikes just yet. Just walking down to the pool I think.

Munich – Day three

Today our third full and final day in Munich, started out with a nice breakfast at the same place as yesterday, Maria. Very good once again and I got lucky 🙂 , I had the last croissant.

A good start of the day. It was around 30 degrees celcius so we planned a relaxed day walking around and visiting some places we forgot the previous two days.

We visited the Asam Kirche , very cool indeed. Did some shopping, no purchases which is good. We then checked out the surf in Munich, which is pretty cool.

Very skillfull surfers indeed. It’s at the beginning of the English garten and due to some sort of barrier in the river there is a constant single wave.

Lot´s of people watching and very polite surfers. Everybody gets a wave. Awesome. Be sure to check it out when in Munich.

After that it was way past lunch time and we ate at the Goldene bar, which was nice and a terrace in the shade.

Finally we went to see the Keith Haring exhibition. At first I didn’t want to go as it was a bit late in the afternoon but my better half convinced me otherwise. Very good indeed, we had seen an exhibition in the Brooklyn Museum so I was afraid I wouldn’t see anything new. I was wrong. Lot’s of work we hadn’t seen before, which came from private european collectors and lot’s of big pieces. Very happy we did go !

We slowly returned to our hotel and decided to dine in the neighbourhood. Nice meal and a very good bottle of wine.

Munich is a very nice and relaxed place to visit. Especially if you stay away from all the tourist stuff (Basically Altstadt) and like exploring different parts of the city. It’s full of nice parks, restaurants, shops. Lot’s of art and musea as well but we simply didn’t have time. It would take a full month to fully see everything.

Munich is well worth your time. You can easily spent a few days.

Munich – Day two

Second day in Munich, started out with a 5 km run and then pancakes for breakfast, our hotel is situated in Isarvorstadt , a very nice and relaxed neighbourhood with lot’s of cool bars, restaurants and shops.

This was our starting point for the day, we walked around and then crossed the river to Haidhausen, this is a bit further away from the city centre and has zero tourists, it does have a very small town atmosphere.

We stopped for a soup at spoon up then walked around and got a beer at Zum kloster, sat on the terrace for a while reading and slowly made our way back.

We ended out day at the Trachtenvogl were we had a meal and some of the famous chocolate milk.

Our feet were killing us in the mean time so we headed back to our hotel. Relaxing and having a glass of red wine.

Today we encountered lot’s of parks, green zones and squares. There are so many places to just enjoy the nice weather it’s obvious why lot’s of people want to live here.

It’s the perfect city if you enjoy a walk nice restaurants, bars and we haven’t even started with the museum’s yet.

The more time we spend here the more we like it.

Munich – Day one

We are on a short holiday in Germany, starting in Munich. We were there once in 2013 for a Depeche mode concert. Just for a short while. We decided that we should go back for a longer stay.

So here we are. Today we just walked around town, checking out a few neighbourhoods. Mainly Schwabing , Maxvorstadt and a park called Englisher Garten. Which is just big , pretty cool in size but not as well maintained as Central park or Regent park.

Discovered a few very nice bars, a cool breakfast place called Joon.
Also a cemetery which since the early 1930’s functions as a park.

Not a lot of tourists in these places, luckely. Munich is a very green and spacious city. I can see why it’s one of the best places to live. Albeit a bit expensive. Especially housing. That’s pretty much unafordable.

One of the cool things about the city is a lot of people ride bikes. Which is good, the traffic isn’t as busy as you would expect from such a large city.

Tomorrow another day and a few other neighbourhoods.

Portfolio news – June/July additions

My latest additions are Dow chemical and Unilever, both were on the buy list for some time and with the new month coming both were bought. Apart from the obvious dividend payments they both are very well established in their markets. Dow has been paying out dividends for decades now and recently increased a buy back program. In the meantime they went ex dividend so the first dividends should roll in shortly.

Unilever has been on the list for a while now , solid and a bit boring company maybe.

The markets are never boring however and today proved it, lot’s of Greece stuff taking the markets down a notch. But that’s not too bad since you can buy stocks with a bit of a discount. Currently I am working on a nice way to show my portfolio on this site. Maybe I’ll start simple with just an overview. For now have a good day.

Rock Werchter 2015

Just got back from Rock Werchter, last year was the first time for me with some of my favourite bands of all time. Among them Metallica. This year the main head liner supposed to be the Foo Fighters until Dave Grohl decided to break a leg. No damage done, not for me at least. The first day started with the Eagles of death metal , just relaxing in the sun and listening. Very nice start of the day. Next up Royal blood. Lot’s of energy especially considering there are just 2 guys rocking. Very good show.

In the barn, Patti smith and her band perform ‘horses’, apparently her breakthrough album. I just know a couple of songs, but this is a rare opportunity to see the old gall rock it. My expectations were topped. If you get the change go see her. Florence and the machine was my absolute for the day. What an energetic show. Very nice sound as well. Enjoyed it a lot.

Faith no more was cool as well, we were standing with a few dedicated fans which was a lot of fun. Only problem was the sound quality , way too much bottom end. Nonetheless enjoyed the show.
Finally the Chemical brothers, which started out with Hey boy hey girl. Excellent start, too bad straight after that the energy took a dive. So after about 40 minutes we called it a day. Bit disappointing but maybe the show got better after we left. Excellent start of the festival. Ow and did I mention the sun.

Day two , went to see Kovacs, Ibeyi, Of monsters and men, Death cab for cutie, the cat empire , Balthazar, Alt-J, Roisin Murphy. Kovacs was very good, although the singer was a bit insecure because her in ear monitoring didn’t seem to work. And this being the first time on such a big stage must have a been a bit unnerving. She shouldn’t have been. Never having listened to the band before I think it was a really good performance.

Iberyi , which means twins in (I forgot what language), was excellent. The two girl really got the crowd going. Alt-J was very cool and very very packed in Klub C. Hot as hell as well. Roisin Murphy, she really is a bit strange. Changing lot’s of outfits. The singing and the music was very very good. Go see her. Sound quality was very good as well. The other bands I watched but didn’t stuck with me as much. One thing I learned is that The cat empire only needs to be on stage and that’s enough for the audience to start partying. Not really my kind of music but fun to watch anyway. Good second day as well, weather very nice again. Only thing is time flies.

After a good nights sleep it was time to relax and enjoy Leuven a bit. We walked around a bit and decided to have a few drinks and lunch and leave a bit later. This evening it’s the Prodigy which will consume some energy. We arrived late , around 6 and started with the war on drugs, relaxing in the sun and listening some good music. After that Noel Gallagher’s high flying birds, which got going when they played don’t look back in anger. Unfortunately it was the last song. Lenny Kravitz up next which was good , not special. A bit of a long intermezzo and it took a lot of time to get the audience going. Bang the Prodigy. Start to finish it was full throttle, very cool and got a lot of people starting little pits all over the place. Made the day. Very nice too see them again.
Only one day to go.

Fourth and final day. After a short night the day started out with a walk around Leuven and checking out some University buildings and wandering around the city trying to find some Geocaches. Always a fun way to see another part of the city. Last day brought The Vaccines, Circa waves, Alabama shakes, Ben harper and the innocent criminals, Kasabian, Maxi Jazz and the e type boys and Muse. Best band of the day Alabama shakes without a doubt, Muse rocked as well. Really liked The Vaccins as well.

Another very good episode of Rock Werchter. Good vibes and great music. What more do you want.

Dividend GE and Greece

Today I checked my portfolio and another little flow of Dividend came my way. General electric went ex dividend. Although it isn’t a huge amount of money. It’s a lot of fun watching it roll in.
Hopefully it will continue and I will be able to buy a lot more dividend paying shares as I go along.

I have been reading up on Greece and personally I don’t think this is going to end well, a lot is at stake but the Greek politicians got elected on the promise to lift the heavy burden of all the debt. The only way for them to get any credit from their voters is too be able to say. Look we postponed as long as we possible could and this is what we got out of it. Causing a lot of aggravation along the way.

Greece is small economically, but if they get away with it, what’s to say others won’t do the same. Given the time frame a solution must be reached. Problem is the damage has already been done. Let’s hope the Greeks get their country back on the road, and quickly. Before all the young people with brains live in western Europe.

McMafia

One thing I am planning to do more is reading, used to do that a lot, but over the past few years less and less. Which isn’t a good thing.

So I picked up a book I started reading a few years ago but never finished. McMafia by Misha Glenny.

McMafia

It covers the rapid rise of global crime after the fall of most of the communist regimes at the end of the eighties. The fast pace in which money started to move around the globe and the connections between the underworld and politicians , banks and other legal entities.

The book is very well written and travels the globe to tell the story from different continents. It’s fascinating in how little time the criminal organizations seized the opportunities presented to them. The outcome however are very sad, people who fall victim of human smugglers is among one of the most saddening.

One of the main sources of income is still the drug trade, money made from it is invested not only in the ‘upper world’ but also in the arms trade , human trafficking and so on. A lot of people are beginning to realize the start to stop a lot of drug related crime is legalizing.

Because the war on drugs cannot be won , whatever you do.
Recommended reading.

Portfolio news – June additions

The first update for the portfolio. This month I added 10 shares from Microsoft and 10 shares General electric.

The reason for both additions is that I think Microsoft is making very good product they pay out a healthy dividend and there is a lot of room to grow.

General Electric might be considered a boring stock but I like boring. The demand for enery will be rising, and they also pay out a nice dividend.

So far so good, I will post an update every month so you guys can see how I am doing, in the meantime I will bore you with other stuff I like to do and share some articles I found on the internet.

If you have any comments please feel free to share them or contact me. Any advise is welcome since I am still learning.