Münich is the capital city of Bavaria, Germany. It is located on the River Isar north of the Bavarian Alps. Münich is the third largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Hamburg. There are about 1.35 million people living within city limits, while the Münich Metropolitan Area (including the urban areas of Augsburg, Ingolstadt, Rosenheim and Landshut) is home to over 5 million people.
The city´s motto is “München mag Dich” (“Münich Loves You” in the English version). Before 2006, it was “Welstadt mit Herz” (cosmopolitan city with a heart). Its native name, München, is derived from the Old German word for Mönche, which means “Monks” in English.
Munich lies on the elevated plains of Upper Bavaria, about 50 km north of the northern edge of the Alps, at an altitude of about 520 m ASL (above sea level).
Munich competes with Hamburg about to be the strongest economy of any German city. The city is also the economic centre of southern Germany. Munich is also considered a global city and holds headquarters of Siemens AG, BMW, MAN AG, Linde (gases), Allianz (insurance) and Munich Re (re-insurance), Rohde & Schwarz (electronics).
Münich is the place for ExpoReal (www.exporeal.net), which starts every year right after the famous Oktoberfest, one of the Munich´s most famous attractions. For two weeks, the Oktoberfest attracts millions of people visiting its beer tents (“Bierzelte”) and fairground attractions. The Oktoberfest was first held on 12 October 1810 in honour of the marriage of crown prince Ludwig to Princess Therese von Sachsen-Hildburghausen. Despite its name, most of Oktoberfest occurs in September. It always finishes on the first Sunday in October unless the German national holiday on 3 October (“Tag der deutschen Einheit” – Day of German Unity) is a Monday or Tuesday – then the Oktoberfest remains open for these days.
I left with my wife Finland on Monday 3rd of October, the same day when ExpoReal 2009 started. After the check-in at Helsinki-Vantaa airport we met my old friend, who is now on a pension, and was in past the Managing Director of the Finnish Federation of Property Owners, with her wife. They were going to fly in the same plane with us to Munich, and continue to Marseille in France, while they have had their second home in Provence already for more than 10 years. Sometimes we can feel “small world”.
Just before boarding we received information that there had started not before informed strike by Lufthansa airport ground services in Helsinki-Vantaa, and all luggage on board from Münich would fly back to Münich, and all luggage already checked-in for Münich would stay in Helsinki and sent afterwards to Münich.
While having jeans on and a jacket, knowing that on Tuesday 4th of October I would be a panelist at ExpoReal, my feeling was not the best one. Of course for women (my wife) the situation was also a bad one, because ladies need more different kind of liquids in their daily life than men. But one has to live what he or she has and admit the realities of life!
And so the boarding started. We landed about 20 minutes late after 3:00 pm in Munich. After formalities with the claims for our luggage at the Munich airport we took a train with CEPI´s (www.cepi.eu) Managing Director, who had been waiting for us at the airport, arriving from Brussels. From the train I had to call to my Hungarian collegues that unfortunately I will be late from our meeting, and we agreed to cancel our agreed meeting. They were already present at the agreed place.
Registration at the hotel Europäischer Hof (www.heh.de) near the Hauptbahnhof (central railway station), quick shopping (needed liquids for my wife, three shirts for me and one tie) we were back at our hotel. Lufthansa had given to us also two bags of most important personal items starting from tootbrush, tootpaste etc.
19:45 we met at the hotel lobby our two German collegues (President of IVG and Managing Director of IVG) with other before agreed representatives of CEPI (CEAB EPAG Presidents, CEPI Past President and CEPI Managing Director) heading for a dinner and to negotiate for the program of the next two days. Place for that was restaurant “Dukatz in the Schäfflerhof Munchen” (www.dukatz.de). That eveningmeeting was important as we later on good notice. It was about 24:00 while we were back at hotel. We had agreed that 08:30 on the next morning we would already leave our hotel by U-Bahn for ExpoReal.
