Potsdam

On Saturday, I went to Potsdam with Dagmar, one of the teachers I've been working with at school. She's a great tour guide, not only because she has a car, but because she knows both the standard tour guide history stuff and some things they don't always tell you.
This is me (because Dagmar got tired of my boring pictures with no one in them) in front of Cecilienhof, which was a wedding present to Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm (the last crown prince of the Kaiserreich) where the Potsdam Conference was held after WWII. Kind of bizarre to stand at the table where Europe was divided and see what Stalin saw when he wasn't listening. The star behind me is usually planted in red flowers, which was first planted before the Conference for Stalin, and when the Communists decided not to tear down this relic of nobility, they kept it up.

Potsdam was the seat of the Kaiserreich under a bunch of Friedrich Wilhelms. The castle Sans Souci, the yellow roccoco one in the middle, was where Friedrich Wilhelm the Great (the second?) went to be alone with his dogs. These are his dogs' gravestones, right by the "backyard," which is the third picture above.

After reunification, the German government had Friedrich Wilhelm's remains moved to this castle, next to the dogs.

Apparently Friedrich the Great was great for a number of reasons, mostly war-related, but also for introducing Germans (or at least Prussians) to the potato. If you look closely, you will notice that some people pay homage to Old Fritz (they really call him that) by laying potatoes on his grave. The other detail about him that everyone should know about Fritz - at least judging by the number of times it is mentioned in guidebooks, by Germans, and on signs around the palace - is that he died in 1786 in a chair in the palace. This chair has been immortalized in several paintings and can be viewed in person at Sans Souci for a small price and a long wait. What does it tell you that so many people want to see the death chair in person?