. . . last week at the invitation of Frank Müller to commemorate the opening of the German Watch Museum on May 22nd and the attendant SAECULUM Glashütte Original Music Festival Award ceremony on the 23rd. Remember Brando's great line from 'The Godfather'? "Make them an offer they can't refuse." Well, there was no way I could turn down this invitation, so I marched into my boss's office and asked him for permission to take two weeks off during our busiest season, which he promptly (and surprisingly) granted.

After purchasing a suit and a compact camera for the occasion, I departed Los Angeles last Tuesday for Dresden via Frankfurt, and was driven to the Hotel Taschenbergpalais located in the very center of the city. I've been a guest at a few nice establishments before, but the Hotel Taschenberpalais is a first class hotel in every sense of the term, and I would recommend it to anyone staying in Dresden. To illustrate how long it's been since I've visited Germany, it took me three minutes to figure out how the bathroom plumbing operates, and I had to call the concierge because I couldn't turn on the lights (which required the insertion of the door key in a slot next to the entrance). The first order of business was locating a pharmacy to replace the mouthwash and hydrogen peroxide that Homeland Security tossed out of my luggage for exceeding the volume limits allowed for fluids carried aboard, and after finally getting back to my room, I freshened up for the welcome party in the hotel bar.

The first bar I entered was not the right venue, so I wandered around until I found the bar reserved for the party at the other end of the hotel. I was a bit early, but Steffi Schuh recognized me in my casual attire and welcomed me as the first guest to the party. Not long after, Dr Frank Müller entered the bar, and we had a necessarily brief conversation as others were entering the room. I spent most of the evening talking to Walter and Stephen from ETA and Omega, discussing technical issues at first, and then the cultural differences between different parts of America, and for good measure the different parts of Germany as well. According to Walter, people on the west coast of America are easy-going, and so are the people in eastern Germany . . . I certainly felt at home, and was amazed at the unfailing politeness of everyone I met; I'll never forget the curtsy performed by the hotel maid as I opened the door for her ;-).

I awakened Thursday morning after less than four hours rest, and wandered into the hotel restaurant for a leisurely breakfast with the American newspaper; after leaving, I ran into G O collector extraordinaire Zhiming Xu in the hallway. I recognized him, of course, from the interview in Momentum magazine, but he had no idea who I was until I mentioned The Purists and our G O forum . . . suffice it to say that many of the photographs in this report were generously donated by Zhiming, and his friendship for and attachment to The Purists / PuristSPro is warmly appreciated. We parted briefly and then met up again by chance at a nearby second-hand watch store that carried a few interesting watches, including a 2001 vintage 1845 Karree up-and-down and a similar vintage Karree Navigator chronograph, as well as a Meißen dial 1845 equipped with a cal 49 hand-winding movement with an engraved balance cock.

We returned to the hotel to pick up our transportation to Glashütte for the opening of the Museum. Our first destination was the Glashütte Original Manufactory, where the current collection was on display . . .