The Kids Are Alright.

First of all, I don´t know what to think of the fact that ManU needed Tevez to bring them a win over QPR. Tevez, a first team regular (not to mention the other first team regs they had). I mean, no offense to QPR and their fans, I am sure it is a fine team, but they play in the Championship and United is the Premier League champion... As for Arsenal, the kids did it again. Young Guns beat Wigan 3-0. And Young Guns did an excellent job from what I hear (didn´t stay up to watch it, I know, I know...) and they had one of the best strikers Amr Zaki against them. Just watched the highlights, absolutely amazing and Fabianski and his saves, wow. (The interviewer asking Wenger: "Was it past his bedtime? cracked me up.) These kids are superb. (I just feel a little dirty because after all I am older than most of these boywonders...) Also, I can´t help but laught at Real Madrid´s struggling. :D

And Tomas Rosicky has undergone a routine surgery in Germany. He should be fine, there should be a slight chance of seeing him some time in the future. Only God (and maybe Wenger) know when. I really want to see Mozart play. Once more with feeling.

And now to the topic I came here to write about. That sweet football part just came along, as always. I finished a book yesterday. Yeah, no biggie if the book hadn´t had such an impact on me that it had. It must be one of the best stories I´ve read this year, at least it is one of those that touched me the most. The book? The Boy In The Striped Pyjamas by John Boyne.

I am not going in depth with the plot, because this is a book you have to read yourself. Absolutely have to. It is about a boy called Bruno, a son of a Nazi officer. He moves to Out-With (Auschwitz) with his family and befriends with a nine-year-old boy called Shmuel. Bruno is naive, thinks only of himself and no one else, and doesn´t understand what his Father does. Neither knows he nothing of the Final Solution and the Holocaust. At the end of the book he agrees to help Shmuel to find his dad. You might guess what happens in the end, but this is as much I am going to tell. And do not check the Wikipedia entry on this book as it reveals the ending. Unfortunately.

I don´t know why the novel affected me so much. Maybe it is because I have visited, not just Auschwitz-Birkenau, but also the Sachsenhausen concentration camp outside Berlin. And those places are really far from fun. While reading the book I couldn´t help but think last summer´s visit to the camp (a nice way to spend the Midsummer fest) and the house of Rudolf Höss that is just outside the wall. The book says it´s all fictional, but of course it has some factual things in it too. The Holocaust was real. I know the author has said the book should be read without knowing the context, meaning the reader should be just like Bruno, who doesn´t understand why he can´t be friends with the boy in the striped pyjamas on the other side of the fence.

These pictures of mine won´t depict the horrors of the camp at all. You need to see the exhibitions to understand how awful and cruel it was. I have just attached them to remind you this place actually exists. Not that any of you should need the reminder... I seriously read the last two chapters of the book with tears in my eyes. It doesn´t take much to make me weep, but I don´t do that often when reading. If you still haven´t read this book, get your hands on it and read it. The last phrases of the book remind us of something that cannot be forgotten. "Of course all this happened a long time ago and nothing like that could ever happen again. Not in this day and age."

The movie is coming, I think it´s already out somewhere. Here we get to see it in January 2009. I don´t know if I would let small children see it or read the book, but teenagers should check it out. And as it was just revealed that the original blue print of the Auschwitz camp have been found and they date back earlier than has been believed, this is very current story to read.

Oh, it´s pouring down again. Well, a typical weather for November I guess. (OMG I think I just saw a reasonably good picture of Rosicky, who never takes a good picture. This is worth mentioning.) And I should be reading my history book, which doesn´t suck as much as I thought it would. It has some interesting parts actually. Now I have to go write a couple of e-mails and do some reading. I´ll be writing some time soon, take care until that.

IWFT