Election season

I found an article today in the NYT about the elections in Germany, but particularly in NRW (aka Nordrhein Westfalen which is the state I live in). Just find it particularly relevant because it says the NRW is the 'political bellwether' so read when you wish

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/06/world/europe/german-party-partner-to-merkel-faces-electoral-test.html?_r=1&smid=tw-nytimes&seid=auto

Gegen den Nationalsozialismus

Yesterday in Beuel (the town directly across the river from Bonn) there was a planned march/demonstrations for the Neo-Nazis. Being someone who is obviously very interested in German identity, and being that the Nazis casted such an enormous cloud over German history, I was eager to check it out. The first thing that I noticed was that people had come to protest the neo-Nazis and had brought with them their entire family. People of all ages were there to show their support, or dis-support rather. When we got there, it was really hard to see the neo nazis because walls of police on both sides were preventing the two groups from interacting. The Neo Nazis had gotten a permit to protest in Beuel, but then groups appealed their permits, and so the amount of room they were given was only about a 300 meter street. There was apparently around 200 of them there. I would say the amount of police could have easily been quadruple that amount. There was police helicopters everywhere, big police trucks, and the size of the policemen's bullet proof vests made them look like sumo wrestlers. Although it remained peaceful, people really were not there to "spectate" everyone was shouting and yelling at the neo-Nazis, especially when they would come close to the line of protesters. It was a really interesting experience and it almost made me feel like I was in a different decade. Everyone seemed mad to their very core that these people were still around and still believed in Nazism.

I got the following pictures from "General Anzeiger" which is the newspaper in Bonn, because my camera wasnt working so well, but the video I took myself

This is around where we were for the second half of it. A girl who worked for the University, Gizem, told us that they were going to the train station, so we actually were in the very front row to see them get on the trains. Apparently they were from all over the area, but mostly from Dortmund, Essen, Aachen, and Koblenz

The people who were anti-nazis were throwing things over the line of police. I was around this area at the beginning so I saw a lot of people throwing lettuce and eggs

Here is the video, my battery died early on, but you can still see quite a bit: