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Christmas Events

Posted in Events organised by Others, Food & Drink, Music, Stammtisch on December 1, 2011| Leave a Comment »

If you still want to join us for our Christmas Stammtisch on Monday, 12 December at the Mansion House, make sure you pay this week and state your preference of the two main courses – either goose with apple red cabbage, potato dumplings/spaetzle or roast loin of pork stuffed with prunes. Cost per person for the 3-course dinner is £20 – simply call the Mansion House on 0191 281 0863.

Other Christmas events taking place in the region are for example:

4 November – 31 December: Christmas at Alnwick Garden

19 November – 2 January: Christmas at Beamish Museum

Saturday, 3 December: Tynemouth Christmas Festival from 12noon till 7pm.

7 to 11 December: Newcastle Christmas Market

7 to 10 December: Winter Festival: Gatehead’s Saltwell Park will turn into Enchanted Parks.

Sunday, 10 December: Advents Celebration from 5pm in the Martin Luther Church in Clarence Street/Copland Terrace in Newcastle.

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Getting ready for Christmas

Posted in Events organised by Others, Food & Drink, Stammtisch, Travel on November 18, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Christmas is only just over a month away and here are some events and activities that you might enjoy in the run up to the festive season:

There is, of course, our own Christmas Stammtisch on Monday, 12 December at the Mansion House in Jesmond. 

Starting at 7pm with a Glühwein reception, our dinner includes Hühnerleberpastete mit Zwiebelmarmelade (chicken liver pate with onion marmalade), Champignoncremesuppe mit Mandeln (mushroom crème soup with almonds), Gebratene Weihnachtsgans mit Apfelrotkraut, Badischen Klössen und Schwäbischen Spätzle (Christmas goose with apple red cabbage, potatoe dumplings and spaetzle) and Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte (blackforest gauteau), Stollen and Pfeffernüssen (biscuits).

For those that are not so much into the birds, we also offer roast loin of pork stuffed with prunes as an alternative.

Please state your preference when booking. As the Mansion House caters specifically for our group, you need to pay by latest 5 December – cost per person £20 – simply call the Mansion House on 0191 281 0836. If you haven’t told me yet that you’re coming, please email me so I can track numbers for this event.

On Saturday, 26 November the German Christmas Basar will be held from 11am to 2pm at St James United Reformed Church in Newcastle (close to City Baths). And two weeks later, an advents celebration will take place on Sunday, 11 December from 5pm in the Martin Luther Church in Clarence Street/Copland Terrace in Newcastle.

This weekend it’s all happening of course in Durham, where you can enjoy Lumiere 2011 until Sunday. As part of the Winter Festival, Gatehead’s Saltwell Park will turn into Enchanted Parks from 7 to 11 December.

But if you want to experience a German Christmas and don’t want to venture off the island, just head north on the train to Edinburgh, where the Traditional German Christmas Market starts already next week on Thursday, 24 November and lasts until 24 December 2011.

Deutsche Bahn (DB) also has a special offer on – from London you can get to your favourite German Christmas market for €49 in 2nd Class one-way. Journey times are around 5 hours and for information, just click here for further details. From Newcastle there are also direct flights to Düsseldorf where you can easily get to many markets in the west of the country. Earlier this month, Lufthansa also announced one way fares of £39 from London, Birmingham and Manchester to Berlin, which is also a good gateway to the historic cities of Leipzig and Dresden in Saxony. And maybe with the launch of the new Berlin-Brandenburg Airport in 2012, the North East eventually gets good transport connections again to middle and eastern parts of Germany?

Also not too far from Berlin is the Harz National Park, which is partly in the states of Saxony Anhalt and Lower Saxony and covers an area of 24,700 ha. Click here for images and information on Christmas events in the region and here for a Deutsche Welle film about the countryside, its towns and villages and legends. 

I hope that has put you in the mood for Christmas and travelling near and far and look forward to seeing many of you at our annual Christmas dinner.

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Tynemouth Village Christmas Festival on 3 December 2011

Posted in Events organised by Others, Film, Food & Drink on November 18, 2011| Leave a Comment »

This year the Tynemouth Business Forum is organising its very first Christmas Festival on Saturday, 3 December from 12noon till 7pm.

There will be Christmas stalls at Tynemouth Village Green (just in front of King’s School), with mulled wine, hog roast, an opportunity to meet Santa & to feed reindeers, late shopping and carol singing.

The Priory Theatre is also showing some Christmas films – unfortunately Polar Express is already sold out, but there are still some tickets for A Wonderful Life (these can be bought for £5 at Tynemouth shops such as Children of the Revolution, Ruby & Frank’s, Allards’ or Busy Lizzies for the 7pm show.

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Annual Book Sale at the Lit & Phil

Posted in Books, Events organised by Others on November 18, 2011| Leave a Comment »

If you’re still looking for Christmas presents, why not pop along to the Literary & Philosophical Society (Lit & Phil) at Westgate Road.

The largest independent library outside of London holds its annual book sale on Friday 25/Saturday 26 November (10am to 4pm) and Sunday 27 November (12pm to 4pm). Thousands of books will be available on a range of subjects, but also LPs, CDs etc all at reasonable prices.

There will be an entry charge of £1 and all proceeds will go to the Lit & Phil appeal.

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German Christmas at the Mansion House

Posted in Business, Events organised by Others, Food & Drink, Stammtisch, Travel on November 2, 2011| Leave a Comment »

We now have a date for our Christmas Stammtisch. On Monday, 12 December the Mansion House in Jesmond will host our traditional German Christmas Dinner from 7pm.

You can look forward to a Glühwein reception, Hühnerleberpastete mit Zwiebelmarmelade (chicken liver pate with onion marmalade), Champignon-cremesuppe mit Mandeln (mushroom crème soup with almonds), Gebratene Weihnachtsgans mit Apfelrotkraut, Badischen Klössen und Schwäbischen Spätzle (Christmas goose with apple red cabbage, potatoe dumplings and spaetzle) and Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte (blackforest gauteau), Stollen und Pfeffernüssen (biscuits).

The cost per person is £20 and pre-payable to the Mansion House either by debit card or cheque. If you’re planning to join us, please let me know so we get an idea on numbers.

The German Christmas Basar will also again take place on 26 November from 11am to 2pm in St James United Reformed Church in Newcastle (close to City Baths). If you are looking to get involved with a stand or in any other way, please contact Michael Mehl directly, email: germanchurch@gmail.com.

All about Christmas in Germany – visit Discover Germany website for lots of information on the best places to go and information on traditions. And if you want to be spoilt after trailing along Christmas markets, why don’t you relax in one of Germany’s Best Wellness Hotels.

Export capability, engineering & technology and strong medium sized companies contribute to the success of the German economy. In a recent Handelsblatt article, various correspondents compared the German economy with the US, Britain and France to see what has been done differently – click here for their analysis. Guardian correspondent John Kampfner gave his opinion this week on the recent commons debate about Europe – click here to read his comment piece.

Both Germany and Britain have still many historic sites dating back to the Roman frontier days. Hadrian’s Wall Heritage is working with their colleagues from German Limes and if you want to find out more about their work, click here for their newsletter. If you’re interested in this topic, please drop me a line.

And a last piece of information: in the UK we eat frozen desserts like chocolate mousse, strawberry cheese cake and blackforest gateau from Coppenrath & Wiese, while the Germans are on Diet Chef from Scotland to loose weight. Any thoughts?

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Beer Festival Time

Posted in Events organised by Others, Food & Drink, Networking, Restaurants, Stammtisch, Travel on September 16, 2011| Leave a Comment »

We’re currently planning our next few events for autumn/winter time. As it’s been a while since we met, I thought why not just attend one of the local beer events.

Popolo’s in Newcastle (Pilgrim Street) currently have an Oktoberfest Beer Menu, which includes Augustiner, Hacker Pschorr, Hofbräuhaus, Löwenbräu, Paulaner and Spaten. Why don’t you join us on Monday, 26 September at Popolo’s from 6pm for a few beers?

If you want to sample from around 60 UK ales, you need to head to Tynemouth today and/or tomorrow (16/17 September). In its 5th year, the Tynemouth Beer Festival, it is held at the Cricket Club (just behind the Rugby Club) and will feature live bands, plus many other drinks to try out and hot and cold foot. Entry is £5, you get a beer glass, programme and pen or for £10 it includes drinks vouchers.

WEST Brewery are, of course, also holding their own authentic Oktoberfest and this is probably one of the few places in the UK, where you can wear your Dirndl and Lederhosen without getting funny looks. If there’s some interest to go up to Glasgow together, let me know as I’m definitely heading north in the next few weeks!

If you’re heading south, why not call into Stein’s in Richmond-upon-Thames, a traditional Bavarian beer garden right on the river. They serve Schnitzel, Schweinebraten, Käsespätzle, Nürnberger sausages, Leberkäs, Currywurst und Obatzda to be washed down with German beers, wines and Radler. The dessert menu includes Sachertorte, Apfelstrudel, Dampfnudeln etc.

You will have all heard of various social networking sites, such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Xing or Twitter. I’ve recently found two new ones in Germany, which I thought might interest you – My Social Petwork (social network for pets) and InterNations (which connects Expats worldwide).

Have a very good weekend and maybe see you soon in Popolo’s.

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Join us to sample German Wines & Beers

Posted in Events organised by Others, Food & Drink, Languages & Communications, Stammtisch on June 1, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Our next Stammtisch is a German Wine Tasting evening on Tuesday, 21 June 2011 at the Mansion House. Stammtisch member Anne Thiele, who grew up on a Mosel winery and local wine merchant Heinz Dennhöfer have organised various wines for us and will guide us through the evening. Gunther has prepared a menu that will include salad, cheese, meats and breads followed by blackforest gateau. The cost for the dinner and wine tasting will be £15 per head and payable in advance at the Mansion House (call 0191 281 0863) – but as usual if you could let me know if you’re coming then we get an idea of numbers to ensure we have enough wine and food available! The evening will start as usual at 6.30pm.

Last year at the London International Wine Fair, German wines won a total of 21 gold medals, which meant that Germany was joint third with Italy behind France and Spain. In particular producers from the Franconian region were extremely successful and picked up 63 medals for their wines, including 14 Gold. To get you in the mood for our wine evening and find out a bit more about Germany’s wine regions and some of its products, check out the 3-Minute Wine School online.

It’s usually beer that Germany is famous for and therefore we thought we organise a small Beer Festival and BBQ before the summer holidays. Hosted again by the Mansion House on Thursday, 7 July we will also have a marquee just in case the Geordie weather doesn’t play ball. The ‘German’ beer will be travelling down from north of the border. The famous WEST restaurant and brewery, which is run by Franconian Petra Wetzel, will introduce their award winning beers to you, which are brewed according to the German purity law.

The Martin Luther Church in Newcastle will again hold an Organ Recital and this time it will feature the renowned organist Paul Ritchie. This will take place on Friday, 3 June 2011 at 7.30pm and Paul will play Albrechtsberger, Bach, Boyce, Bruhns, Buxtehude, Pachelbel, Seeger and Stanley. The Martin Luther Church is situated at Clarence Street/Copeland Terrace in Shieldfield and admission fee is £5, which includes interval drinks.

So what about the polite Brits and the rude Germans? If you’re trying to avoid communication issues, the BBC website might offer a bit of a clue. This week there was an article on direct and indirect communications comparing the Germans and the Brits. Click here for the full article.

And last, but note least here are the answers to the questions raised in our May newsletter: 1) Düsseldorf is the city known as ‘Klein-Tokio am Rhein’. 2) And the over 100 year old Schwebebahn in Wuppertal hit the headlines in 1950 when Circus Althoff did a publicity stunt that went spectacularly wrong. The circus director and head of transport seemed to think it was a good idea to take a 700kg two-year old elephant baby on the train. Tuffi the Elephant, quite understandably, didn’t agree and very quickly got off by jumping into the river Wupper from a height of 12m– luckily she escaped unhurt. The Berliner Zeitung had quite a nice article about this event, if you’re interested.

We hope we will see you soon at one of our next events and hopefully by then summer will have also arrived in Geordieland!!!

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Organ Recital at Martin Luther Church on 25 March

Posted in Events organised by Others, Music on March 8, 2011| Leave a Comment »

On Friday, 25 March 2011 there will also be an Organ Recital at the German speaking Martin Luther Church in Newcastle (Clarence Street/Copland Terrace – close to the Biscuit Factory). This is a rare opportunity to listen to this Rowntree & Brennan organ of 1976 as the church is only used for worships twice a month and meet up with German speaking people at the same time. The evening will start at 6.30pm and Moira Flanagain will play Buxtehude, Bach, Elgar, Grainger, Brahms and others. Admission fee is £5, which includes interval drinks.

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Kindergruppe in Newcastle

Posted in Events organised by Others, Languages & Communications on February 17, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Every Tuesday between 10.30 and 12.30, a German speaking children’s group (Kindergruppe) meets at the Martin-Luther-Kirche in Shieldfield, Newcastle. The German speaking parents and their children (between 0 and 4 years) meet to play, sing, do crafts etc and celebrate together birthdays, carnival, Easter, Christmas and organise trips together.

If you would like further information, please contact Angela Rau-Pokorny directly: Tel. 07769 731 259 or email angelarau@hotmail.com.

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New Year Greetings

Posted in Books, Business, Events organised by Others, Film, Food & Drink, Languages & Communications, Restaurants, Stammtisch on January 19, 2011| Leave a Comment »

Dear Stammtisch Friends

I hope you all had a great start to the snow free New Year and are enjoying the slightly warmer temperatures. We have now got another date for the Stammtisch at the Mansion House, which will be held on Monday, 21 March, starting at 6.30pm. Gunther will prepare a warming Linseneintopf mit Bockwurst (lentil stew) at a cost of £7.95 per person and the leader of Newcastle City Council, David Faulkner will also join us for a talk about the Ruhr Capital of Culture (Gelsenkirchen, Newcastle’s twin city in Germany was part of the celebrations last year). As usual, just let me know if you’re coming and payment will be again at the door.

We are also currently planning a German wine tasting evening later in the year, but more as soon as we’ve got this organised. If you have suggestions for future events/themes, please let me know – it would be great to get your ideas!

The Stammtisch also received an invitation from Newcastle City Council to the Holocaust Memorial Commemorative Event “Untold Stories”, which takes place on Sunday, 30 January from 3pm at the Journal Tyne Theatre at Westgate Road. There will be a commemorative performance, including keynote speeches from; Youk Chang, Professor Roberta Greene and Peter Kurer and a celebration of ‘The Galloping Stone’ an anthology of writing by clients, staff and volunteers from the Medical Foundation for the Care of the Victims of Torture, by Gillian Allnut and others from New Writing North. The programme will also feature classical and contemporary musical performances from Katie Doherty as well as a solo performance from Bradley Creswick leader of the Northern Sinfonia and a performance by Hotspur Children’s Choir. For further information about the event and to order your ticket – please visit: http://www.hmd.org.uk/events/find/north-east/11733newcastle-holocaust-memorial-commemorative-event-untold-stories.

The Lit & Phil also holds some events to commemorate the Holocaust and if you don’t know this landmark building next to the Central Station, go and check it out. It’s open to non-members and you will be impressed by this little oasis in bustling Newcastle. The Literary & Philosophical Society dates back to 1793 and some of the North East’s leading thinkers, inventors and business people have been amongst its members. The current building was opened in 1825 and today houses over 150,000 books and an extensive music library. To find out more about the society, the library and forthcoming events, visit www.litandphil.org.uk.

That a dog is for life and not just for Christmas, we all know. But last year the shelters were full of unwanted four-legged companions and many unfortunately had to be put down. If one of your new year resolutions is to keep fit, why not check out some of the local animal shelters (such as Brysons – www.brysons.org.uk) to get a suitable partner. And if you’re worried if you can take your dog to a pub for a well-deserved pint, there’s a great website that tells you where you both can go to – www.doggiepubs.org.uk.

And if you’re New Year resolution is to learn a new language – another Stammtisch member sent me this link to this free award-winning online language learning community: http://www.busuu.com/. If anybody has been on it and has some feedback, please post this here on our blog.

And if you’re a fluent German speaker, you might even want to head over there – apparently the German economy is doing rather well – with a 2010 growth of 3.6%. And the Handelsblatt recently reported that there are even 40,000 open ‘Hilfsarbeiter’ (un-/lower skilled labour) positions, which is surprising as we still have almost 3 million people unemployed. If you want to know what are Germany’s top 10 most sought after positions – Stern carried Adecco’s Stellenindex 2010. Click here for further details.

And if you want to know what Germans find entertaining – then just get ‘Hummeldumm’ – this is the title of one of Germany’s top selling books in 2010. I picked it up while on holiday last year and had a few giggles If anybody wants to borrow it, let me know. The author Tommy Jaud (a fellow Franconian) had already previous bestsellers with Vollidiot, Resturlaub and Millionaer. My personal favourite Resturlaub is currently being made into a movie – as I’ve just seen on Tommy Jaud’s homepage – http://www.tommyjaud.de/tommyjaud/home. Maybe when it’s out, we can persuade the Tyneside Cinema to do a special viewing for us.

Anyway, that’s it from me for today – if you can’t wait till 21 March for our next Stammtisch – let me know and I’ll ask the pub over the road here in Tynemouth if they’ll do us a very nice Schnitzel with Pommes.
Have a very enjoyable and successful 2011!

Warm regards

Manuela

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