Eiche (oak) is the most German of trees and for many an epitome of German values — steady, trustworthy and not given easily to decay. For some others the oak is a symbol of hyper-German identity and so it is a tree to be sawed off. Last week, an anti fascist group claimed responsibility for chopping down a recently planted oak tree in Rostock. The peace oak tree was planted in a ceremony presided by the German President Joachim Gauck, the ceremony was held in memory of Germany’s worst xenophobic attack since reunification.

Trust the American air carriers to come up with one “innovation” or another to cut corners and shore up their bottom line. Long, long ago, they dispensed with free meals and snacks on domestic flights. They then started charging a not-so-insignificant fee for checked baggage.

On a high horse

Bigfoot in the mouth

Russian summer doldrums were enlivened this year by the high-profile trial of three young women, members of a radical feminist “performance art” collective named Pussy Riot, who were ultimately sentenced to two years in a penal colony for the “hate crime” of performing a “punk prayer” in a priests-only section of Moscow’s premier Orthodox Cathedral that called upon the Virgin Mary to rid Russia of Vladimir Putin.

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Robin Dutt, a former Bayern Leverkusen manager is the new sports director of the German football Federation (DFB). The 47-year-old Dutt, whose father Sabyasachi is from Kolkata and mother a German, is one of the few of Indian origin, who have made it big in the world of football coaching.

A  dead Osama bin Laden is looming large as America gets ready for the polls. It’s not that there is any new threat to the US homeland from a virtually decimated Al-Qaeda. The question simply is that who gets the credit for the daring commando operation that killed the world’s No 1 terrorist. President Barack Obama’s approval ratings soared after the May 1, 2011 operation in Abbottabad, Pakistan. It being election time now, the issue has come under the spotlight for different reasons.

Quite a bite!

A Nepali man who was bitten by a cobra snake bit it back and killed the reptile in a tit-for-tat attack, a newspaper report said last Thursday.