´Castle

The seemingly amusing title for this article is stirred by my current visit to one of the modern old castles in Bavarian Germany, about 1 hr drive from Munich. Ringberg castle as it is called, is located at the foothills of of Bavarian alps, mountain peaks covered in snow, akin to icing on the cake, on the northern end and a beautiful lake on the southern end, much similar to experience of cold winter evening in Srinagar, Kashmir, the Dal lake. The only thing missing though were those beutiful kashmiri damsels in their canoe, selling flowers and kashmiri kishmish.

The setting at the castle is amazingly romantic. Though the history of castle is quite amazing. It is a monument commemorating the idiosyncrasy, originality, and remarkable single-mindedness of two men: Duke Luitpold in Bavaria and his friend, the alround artist, architect and interior decorator, Friedrich Attenhuber. This castle dominated the lives of thsese 2 people to a point that it became an obsession for both. Surprisingly, none of the most popular reason like love of dearest or say, defence of territory, were the reasons for building up this castle.

In the twilight years of his life, the duke decided to donate the castle to scientific community of Max Plank institute, which supposedly had enough money to accept this grand gift as one can easily imagine the cost of maintaining the castle in this modern world. However as it turns out, I think this is one of the few best things that academics has to offer. Max Plank society in Germany now owns this castle and it is used for the purpose of retreat by many Max Plank labs all over Germany. It is in this context that I had this wonderful oppurtunity to experience the life of castle.

Amazingly the castle is extremely modernised to the point that it has a central heating unit, wireless lan, music room filled with all the hightech gadetry, excellent conference room for holding lectures, amazing library and all the facilities that a scientist in modern era need to work.

I wonder how many places in the world such as this exist in the world, wherein the modern is so well integrated with the old and in a sense, resulting in a unique ambience, one can only describe by being part of it.