Depeche in Lodz or " you better learn your lesson well"

I was only 20 hours home between Bologna and Lodz.

I had a great Dinner with my kids in an Indian restaurant, packed my bag and so on.

In the early morning before sunrise I took a flight to Berlin, where I caught my connecting flight to Warsaw.

With the bus from the airport to the Warsaw central station and from there with a very slow train to Lodz Kaliska.

We needed another 20 minutes to walk to our wonderful hotel:

Ambassador.

Lodz is a city in the middle of Poland.

Lodz is spoken " Wudsch".

The city has a University of film, Roman Polanski studied in Lodz!

The city has a kind of " Walk of fame" like the Hollywoodboulevard and was in Poland called " HollyLodz"!

But is a big difference when you was one day in Bologna and the next in Lodz.

Lodz is a city in construction and I'm sure, if you will go to Lodz in 10 years it will be a very modern city, but it needs time!!

After a short walk through the older Lodz we found a polish restaurant.

We enjoyed a rich polish meal. I had a very good mushroom soup and then vegetarian pirogies, it is a kind of dumpling filled with sauerkraut.

In addition one liter of polish beer from the tap.

I love polish beer!!

Was a very good atmosphere in the restaurant and we went in a very good mood to the Atlas Arena to the Depeche Mode concert in Lodz!

The concert was one of the best of the winter tour , it was a " Black Celebration".

I love Poland and the polish fans.

At this song the polish fans let black balloons rise. Looked great.

The polish fans like balloons, in 2009 they let coloured balloons rising to the song " policy of thruth"!

This time at " Policy of truth", as Dave sang:

"you better learn your lesson well",

he pointed a finger secretly to Andy.

I thought, yes, maybe you all, dear Depeche Mode, better learn

your lesson well, because I was annoyed because they didn't cancel the Kiev concert.

I had the words of " New dress" in my mind where they sang:

.........

you may change the world!

I ask myself what I will do, when they won't cancel the Kiev concert and I

decided to cancel the rest of my concerts, ups.

So I did not have the fun as usual from the middle of the concert, because I got very melancholy of this thoughts.

Only at " Just can't get enough" I had to laugh, because Dave said at the end of the song two times 

" 1,2,3,4"!

I thought, yes, I could've been 4 concerts with this...

But as we came back to our hotel I had Wi-fi again and I read on the official site of Depeche Mode of the Kiev cancellation.

Yes, I thought, thank you Depeche Mode, it is the right decision and it shows me, 

that is not all about money.

The next morning was a wonderful sunny day 

and we had a amazing breakfast in our hotel.

What a huge buffet, and tasty, wow!!

Then we walked slowly to the station with some stops here and there.

Two and a half hours later we were back in Warsaw and 

had a view hours time for sightseeing.

We started with the observation deck of the palace of culture and science.

It is a old great skyscraper.

You can take the lift, so don't worry!!

We had a beautiful view over Warsaw!

Then we took a tramway to the old town of Warsaw with a stop in a basilica on the

luxuriousness street "Krakowskie Przedmiesci" where I saw a plate in honor of Vaslav

Nijinsky and his sister.

I couldn't believe this, because I adore him so much and I didn't know something about this although 

I read everything about him.

After another great meal and tasty beers we had to take the bus back to

the airport

and flew over Berlin back to Cologne.

I was so tired as I was home, I need a few days to get awake....

But last but not least,

tomorrow I will start my last part of my Delta Machine tour

and it will be the last part for Depeche Mode, too.

On the one hand, I want that it goes on, because I love the concerts so much and maybe

it will be the last forever:

Nobody could know that.

On the other hand, I'm so exhausted from being far away from home and my kids,

of the travel stress, of my travel mates, of the life out of a suitcase.

It is time to say "Goodbye", so 

" let me take you on a trip

around the world and back"

for the last three concerts.

Cheers!!!

Depeche Mode in Bologna or " Lambrusco" time!

I try to tell the story now in a new kind, because since I was in Italy the time is running so fast.

I still had to write the Bologna and the Lodz Blog and in two days I will be on the road again for the last three shows, so I have to save time.


After a good breakfast we left Milan and in a good mood we drove to Bologna:

Our hotel was a little bit outside the center but we took a bus into the city.

Bologna, capital city of the region Emilia Romagna, a high-producing region of Italy.

Bologna is called the Red ( red buildings), the Fat ( very good food) and the Academic ( the big University) .

We made a wonderful walk through Bologna, you can walk 38 kilometers ( 23 miles)

under a covered footpath .

With the arcades new living space was built for the growing city.

We found a beautiful restaurant and I tasted tortellini filled with Ricotta and sage.

Tortellini is one of the specialities of Bologna, they say, the form of the tortellini looks like the belly button of the roman goddess Venus!

Another typical Bolognese special was the wine Lambrusco.

This is a sparkling wine and they drink it cold.

Believe, we drank a lot of it. Great taste and it do something special with you. 

It is not the same intoxication you can have with beer....

After an amazing breakfast in our hotel we were ready for more sightseeing in Bologna:

Piazza Maggore with the fontaine of Neptune

Cherry blossoms in February

Bologna: home of the Tortellini, the Mortadella, the Bolognese ragout, the Tagliatelle

The two leaning towers of Bologna:

Torre Garisenda and Torre degli Arinelli.

I had the crazy idea to go up the second higher tower. It is 94 meters high.

First there was a spiral stair and everything was fine, but then came free stairs from which you could look downstairs. If I went up, it was no problem, because I looked up to my frontman, but to come down I had to look at the stairs and ...

it was terrible to come down, my vertigo was so strong.

I was sweaty, I went weak at the knees and I was trembling.

But after half a liter of Lambrusco I felt better.

It was time to go back to the hotel.

On the way home we passed the hotel of Depeche Mode by luck.

We recognized it because there stood a lot of fans in front of it and the there were Carabinieris ( italian traffic police)waiting. But we didn't wait on the band, from this age I grown out!

Concert time: we went by car to the Unipol Arena, because it was so far away from the center.
It was a emotional evening, because for two friends of us, it was the last concert of their tour and they was very sad. And unfortunately the boys had seating places again and we had standing places.
I had sworn, I will never help friends or other people to get better places after the Milan debacle, but the boys sent a message, they had bad places and the mood was not the best at the seating area.
It was true. Mr. Gahan was in the same mood like in Milan but the Bolognese are maybe more red, fat and academic ( sorry) than the Milanese. And because it was the last concert for two of us I gave my best to get the boys in. It was hard work because standing and seating was totally different areas, but I reached the goal as Martin sang his two songs!
Game, set and win! Now we had a unbelievable good mood and it was a stormy affair, because the temperature in the arena was so hot, we took our tops of. At the last five songs we jumped the queue and stand in front of Dave. He smiled to us, haha, happy moment, so nobody could weep at this concert, because we had so much fun.
The Italians in the front rows crested me with a hair ribbon in Minnie Mouse style, lol.
It was a crowning of our Italy tour!!! Amore!!!

The last hours in Italy we spent on a hill outside of Bologna where we visited 

Santano della Madonna di San Luca, a red stone church.

We went by car on the hill but if you like you can walk the longest covered footpath in the world up to the church ( about 4 kilometers/2,5 miles).

The view over the area was so beautiful and the weather was sunny.

What more can you ask for?

Maybe a last Lambrusco?

Sooner said than done!

And then it was time to say Goodbye.

The boys drove us to the Bologna airport before they going back to Milan, from where they flew back to Germany.

The end of the tour is near. I saw many concert with Sylvia and Thomas and we had lot of fun together, but now the tour is over for both.

For me, four concerts left!

Ciao Italia, best country in the world.

I wished the whole tour could ending in Italy because here I had the best times with Depeche Mode in my life!

Arrivederci!!