Five for Munich: – Munich

For equality

The President of the social association VdK Germany, Verena Bentele, will hold the keynote speech at the annual reception of the Evangelische Akademie Tutzing. According to the academy, 350 guests from politics, business, science, culture, the media and the church are expected to attend the New Year’s reception on Wednesday, March 15, at Tutzing Castle on Lake Starnberg. Among them is the Bavarian Prime Minister Markus Söder. It is said that State Bishop Heinrich Bedford-Strohm will speak the greeting for the Evangelical State Church. The Ukrainian cellist Oleksandr Piriyev will provide the music.

Verena Bentele’s speech is entitled “Inequality is not destiny – how we can become a society based on solidarity”. The 41-year-old blind resident of Munich has been President of the VdK Germany with 2.2 million members since 2018 and is Deputy Chairwoman of the VdK Bavaria. She was the Federal Government Commissioner for the interests of people with disabilities from 2014 to 2018. She gave up her seat for the SPD on the Munich City Council – she was one of the driving forces on the list of Social Democrats and achieved the fourth best result of all candidates – because of this double burden up again after less than a year.

After studying literature, she worked as a coach and speaker. As a member of the national team in cross-country skiing and biathlon, Bentele won, among other things, four world championship titles. She won five gold medals at the Vancouver 2010 Paralympic Winter Games. She also wrote two books, Control is Good, Trust is Better and We Think New.

For the future

As EErnst Dieter Dickmanns talked about self-driving cars, some thought he was crazy. But the professor, who taught at the Bundeswehr University from 1975 to 2001, laid important foundations for autonomous driving. He has now been awarded the Cross of Merit, 1st Class, by the Bavarian Minister of Transport, Christian Bernreiter, for his research. Dickmanns is a wonderful example of creativity and progress. “If nowadays vehicles scan the environment and avoid pedestrians, we also owe it to his lifelong research and work,” said the minister.

For the hope

Some will think: finally. Others: again? The name of the author, who will publish another book on Wednesday, is no longer mentioned on posters in Munich. It just says “tireless encourager – news from the well-known Munich city pastor”. Is meant Rainer Maria Schiessler, who has long since become a kind of pop star in his Catholic parishes of St. Maximilian and Heilig Geist, a real church phenomenon, if you will. The services are long and full, the statements are socially critical and concrete. The man knows how church PR and self-PR work in 2023.

The 62-year-old told the Abendzeitung about his sixth publication, the hope: “Hope is the most important source of strength.” But hope only works if you are not alone. “Meeting people is healing. Proximity gives strength. We just have to allow proximity.” An abundance of such life advice certainly gives hope for a decent book sales.

For jokes and satire

Open detailed view

At this point it should be “Four for Munich”. Because Bayerischer Rundfunk has just announced this year’s winners of the “Bavarian Cabaret Prize”, which it has been awarding since 1999. And it has four categories. On Monday, November 6th, as usual, four artists will demonstrate their outstanding competence in humor and satire in the Lustspielhaus – the whole thing will then be broadcast on Bavarian television on November 9th.

The main prize goes to the studied political scientist and Berliner by choice Till Reiners. Like many of his generation, the 38-year-old came to cabaret through the poetry slams. He is present in many media and formats, most of all in the ZDF programs “Die Anstalt” and “Heute Show”, for example, and covers everything from comedy to sharp political satire, in which he also likes to be the devil’s advocate. The music prize goes to Anne Piechotta from Cochem, who has been shining in the field of comic chansons for years. As a “high-flyer” the Regensburger Theresa Reichl was awarded, which caused a stir with her very feminist and funny debut. The “Creator Prize” is new, which replaces the previous honorary award for life’s work and is intended to take into account “satire forms beyond the cabaret stages”. The Franconian Twitter and Instagram podcaster gets it Sebastian Hotz aka El Hotzo. One or the other might have noticed that this time there is no Munich-based winner among the prize-winners. To compensate, the award ceremony will be moderated by Hannes Ringlstetter. After all, the Lower Bavarian goes through as a Zuagroaster.

For keeping

Open detailed view

Daniel Baumann will be the new head of the Munich City Archives, succeeding Manfred Peter Heimer, who is retiring at the beginning of April. Baumann studied history and political science in Munich and Heidelberg and received his doctorate in medieval history from the University of Augsburg in 2008. From 2009 to 2011 he completed his archival clerkship at the Lower Saxony State Archive and the Marburg Archive School. He then worked as an archivist at the University and the Osnabrück University of Applied Sciences until 2013. In 2013 he moved to the Munich City Archives, where he was primarily responsible for long-term digital archiving.