Newsprint Nonpareil—Questions of the Present (and Past)

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On this date in Round and Square History
2 May 2013—China's Lunar Calendar 2013 05-02
2 May 2013—New Religion: Thinking in Fives
2 May 2012—Seinfeld Ethnography: George's Swoosh
2 May 2011—Beginnings: George Sand's Indiana

Fragt mich jetzt!—Ask Me Now!...with various interpretive strains (such as, to my mind, "now you ask me").

But the conversation is a challenging one, and the exclamation mark seems strangely misplaced, given the subject this week (you'll see). 

There is no letting up from Die Zeit, even though nothing is open today, and I won't be able to buy my actual copy until tomorrow (it is the May First, and that is a very big deal here and in many parts of the world).

[b] Endless chill RF

The cover story begins with a little bit of a provocation—think you already no everything there is to know about the Holocaust? Well, you don't, they say. Here is one of the last survivors of Auschwitz, and Renate Lasker-Harpprecht has a story to tell.

The discussion follows, and I can't wait until stores open tomorrow, despite the sobering topic.

Let me just say that this is such an important, and ongoing, part of German life that I sometimes wonder what would happen if even a tenth of it happened in Japan. I love Japan, but the unwillingness to confront the war is problematic to the very core of the social fabric. My opinion...and the topic of an excellent editorial in the International New York Times a few weeks ago.

Jochen Bittner: What Germany Can Teach Japan"

[c] Memory matters RF