From Dresden with Love

We are pleased to publish these memories of Andrea’s visit to Dresden (and beyond). In this first part of the blog she recalls eating pierogi – Polish dumplings covered in quark – a tour of Zitau, a performance at the Lonesome Lakes Festival, a family arts festival on the German Czech-Polish border, and more besides.  The visit took place 4 – 11 July, 2026 and she wishes to thank everyone involved in funding, planning and supporting my exchange to Dresden, as named at the end of the second part of the blog.

Thursday

Among the stereotypes of Germany fed to people in the UK – ferocious efficiency is the most prominent. Stereotype broken! My first flight was delated by an hour, so when I got to Dusseldorf I had to run across the entire length of the airport. It felt strange having my fingerprints taken on the space-age scanner glowing with blue light. The airport was partly under construction and signs all pointed the wrong way. My flight to Dresden began boarding just as I arrived panting, sweaty and stressed. But I love to fly. I can’t help grinning like an idiot when the plane takes off. We ride the clouds into a fairytale world of forests and turreted castles. I’m in Germany. I’m really in Germany!

Stephan, the organiser of the Lonesome Lakes Festival has arranged for his Dad to pick me up from the airport and drive me to my hotel in Zittau. We need to go to the festival first to collect my room key. My generous driver is friendly and gruff. He speaks no English and Google translate, doesn’t understand his Saxony accent. But he has a great name – Thorsten Leonhardt – Thor Lionhearted. So cool! I am exhausted, glued to the car window. We speed through countryside that reminds me of Tuscany – grass dried gold, dark Cyprus trees. The villages we pass through are full of colour. Low buildings punctuated by a single church towers with distinctive bell-shaped metal rooves that glow through the dusk. When we get to the festival ground I haven’t eaten or drunk anything for hours. I scoff down some pierogi – Polish dumplings covered in quark – the cheese that is also a subatomic particle. I’m charmed. The festival fairy lights shine dimly through the misty forest and a man sings to a rock guitar about lost loves.

I collapse into my comfy hotel room late at night.

Friday

I wake with the worst sore throat I’ve ever had. Today a man I’ve never met is collecting me from my hotel for a tour of Zittau. Fortunately there’s a pharmacist right round the corner. Oliver arrives in a fedora and cream suit looking like a character from a Merchant Ivory film. Very dapper. He points towards the Polish border a hundred metres from the Hotel and we turn the other way, walking past crumbling mansions and socialist landmarks, then over the river, the sound of crickets thick through the wildflowers of the green ring, towards town. 

 The centre of Zittau is lovely, with  its Italianate plazas and architecture. I hear about the coal mine that was never built, the scandals of appropriated industry and infrastructure, the increasing political unrest, I hear  the older history of Zittau – salt, wealth and pride. 

‘They say the Velvet Revolution was too hard

Or perhaps GDR too soft?

Like Quark it slid down the throat of rural Saxony’

(an excerpt from the poem Zittau) 

The council house building is very grand. The arts quarter is surreal and delightful. Oliver is incredibly well informed – an authority on pretty much any subject in this part of the world. I’m very lucky that he agreed to this tour, it’s absolutely fascinating. He talks about himself, too.  Oliver teaches at the college and describes the international relationships that sustain it. It specialises in Ecology, which I studied.  He takes me to visit the college and we say Hi to students in a lab dedicated to fungi. We end up in the plaza, where I slurp a traditional tomato based soup, and I am transported by the taste while wincing at the pain of a sore throat. Heaven and hell!

In the afternoon I take myself on the last steam train to Oybin, where there are buildings carved into the sandstone rocks that jut out of the forest like stalagmites. I amuse the ticket master with my terrible accent and point to my phone screen if there’s anything he doesn’t catch.

Dinner is at the hotel – my first currywurst. It’s accompanied by a glass of sparkling wine and is delicious. I muse over which is less healthy – Currywurst or doner kebab. Not really sure. But what’s certain is that I don’t have the energy to visit the Festival tonight. I text over an apology to Stephan and get an early night’s sleep.

Saturday

I walk into town (Zittau)  following Google Map’s instructions and find the station in plenty of time to meet Colin, who I’ll be performing with later. Together we wait for Stephan to pick us up, and talk about our set. We’ve exchanged ideas, poems and recordings already. Colin plays snippets of the tunes he’s planned.  It’s breezy and, we try to stop our  notes from blowing away. I giggle at a couple who find themselves separated on opposite sides of the road – one managed to cross the road in time and the other was stopped by the red man –  Germans are sticklers for road safety.

“their eyes locked together, like lovers names onto a bridge”

(an excerpt from the poem Romeo and Juliet stand at the Crossroads)

We get to the Festival venue about forty minutes before we are on. The music is great. The place is full of dappled sun and families. Children lounge, wrapped in hammocks like pupating butterflies. There are boats on the lake. Colin knows everybody and introduces me to all his lovely friends. My nerves build as we get closer to performing. When I step up, I notice  a dragonfly on the mike stand. As I settle into the rhythm of performance and Colin’s guitar weaves round my words the dragonfly moves to my forearm. When it flies off I tell it bye byeand the cd laughs. It’s going well, then on the last poem I forget the words and I can’t work out where I am – a missing line break in the printout. Panicking, I pick up the tune and break into song. The audience takes it in their stride, thinking it was planned that way. But afterwards Colin clings to my arm dramatically and laughs hard –  I was not expecting that! Neither was I, I tell him!

Performance over, a couple of women approach me to tell me how much they liked the set and chat. One is a teacher and we compare my husband’s experiences of working in school with her own. The other is a music student in Dresden and fellow festival performer called Vale. Together we go watch the one-man-German version of Romeo and Juliet that has the crowd in stitches. There are many wigs (Capulets) and hats (Montagues). Children take small roles and everyone is captivated. It begins to rain, a light drizzle and (German stereotype 2 revoked) I am the only person with an umbrella.

I make my apologies and say my goodbyes, go back to the hotel to eat and get another early night, feeling happy and exhausted. My throat made it through and the medicine I got took all the pain away. I just sound very gravelly and deep, but I’m still worried whether my voice will last the week.

 Andrea Mbarushimana 

Part two follows underneath this entry or click here.