Chapter 3 Who Am I?

As Waldemar's present life, from the memory of Prince Waldemar, he was simply an outlier in the court of the Second German Empire.

First of all, the old emperor of the empire was very fond of this young grandson, and the little one's pet crocodiles lived in the pond in the palace in Charlottenburg, and to everyone's surprise, the old emperor actually raised them on behalf of his grandson.

The second is the Empress of the Empire, who likes to cook Thuringian delicacies to entertain this young grandson, and the fact that the Empress can cook by herself has not even enjoyed the fact that the Emperor of the Empire, who has been married to her for 50 years, has never enjoyed.

And the crown prince's favorite thing is to take the little one to work with the royal museum in Berlin, even the afternoon coffee break, because the little one loves to eat the Black Forest cake in the café next to the museum, so he also spends it with the little one in the café.

Not to mention the crown princess as a mother, she was even saddened that little Waldemar had left her to go to school. Even his grumpy eldest brother would often bring gifts to his dear younger brother, his second brother often took him out hunting, and his two older sisters were even more proud of this younger brother, and his two younger sisters were simply his little henchmen.

From the point of view of ordinary people, a little Waldmar who is pampered in a thousand ways will be a spoiled bad-tempered bear child, but in fact, the little guy shows a more intelligent and polite, independent and youthful nature in the court, which is praised by everyone in the court, not only is there not a shadow of a bear child, but also is recognized as a model of a good child.

The Reich Chancellor, Bismarck, was amazed by the astonishing intelligence and precociousness of the little one, and even had the private idea that if little Waldemar had received a real Prussian education and completed his university studies, it seemed that perhaps Prince Waldemar would have achieved more in adulthood than his second brother.

After all, the old prime minister still cares for Prince William, the heir to the throne that he has personally cultivated, and even encourages his eldest son Herbert to work hard to establish a personal friendship with Prince William and become close friends. As for Prince Heinrich, who did not receive a full secondary education and gave up his studies at the age of 15 to join the navy, the old prime minister never faced it squarely. Of course, the old prime minister never mentioned the idea to anyone this year.

A bright and old child can just hide his adult thinking, and his vigorous energy and intellectual curiosity can also hide his knowledge beyond that era, and there is no more suitable identity than this child. Although Joey thanked the goddess of fate for her new identity, she soon found that when she woke up, she would face the first question after the time travel: where to go to school? Or rather, it's a question of who to listen to and what to learn.

As the mother of the younger Valdemar, who has just completed four years of primary education and is now faced with the choice of whether to pursue a private home education or continue his education in a certain type of secondary school, the crown princess hopes that her youngest son, whom she loves the most, will continue his education in a private home education.

The grandfather, Emperor Wilhelm I, strongly demanded that little Waldemar enter secondary school, whether it was a liberal arts or science, a practical subject or even a complete secondary school, the only requirement was to study in a school under the imperial education system. Little Waldemar's grandmother, the Empress of the Empire, even had a heated quarrel with her daughter-in-law, the Crown Princess, over this matter.

On the surface, the crown princess hoped that her children would be educated in an elite private home, while His Majesty the Emperor hoped that his grandson would follow the educational philosophy of Wilhelm von Humboldt, the founder of modern education in Prussia, and let Waldemar Jr. continue his studies in secondary schools within the imperial education system in accordance with the provisions of the Compulsory Education Act of the Second German Reich.

But in reality, this incident is only a microcosm of the long-term struggle at court, to be more precise, between civil liberalism and conservatism in the court, or, to a lesser extent, the hostility of the pro-Russian party in the court to the crown princess from England.

As the eldest daughter of Queen Victoria, the crown princess was deeply influenced by British liberalism from an early age, and for 22 years since she married Prince Frederick at the age of 16, she was an important donor to the educational, cultural and scientific circles of the Second German Reich, she had a strong influence in intellectual circles, and she was even regarded by the Social Democrats of the South as a staunch ally in the German royal family.

During the Prussian-Danish, Austro-Prussian and Franco-Prussian Wars, the Crown Princess not only opened a large number of field hospitals and actively participated in the care of the wounded, but also invested heavily in the establishment of a social fund to provide relief for disabled and dead soldiers after the war, which also made the Crown Princess accumulate considerable prestige in the Prussian army.

The prestige of a liberal in the Second German Reich was something that the conservatives in the court did not want.

Initially, the conservatives in the court hoped to weaken the influence of the crown princess by controlling the financial resources of Crown Prince Frederick. But the subtlety is that the crown princess herself has a large number of fiefs and fiefdoms from England, so it can be said that she is a completely independent crown princess economically, which eventually led to Frederick's refusal to increase his fiefdom from the German court since he became the crown prince of Prussia, despite his great achievements in the Prussian, Austro-Prussian and Franco-Prussian wars.

It was also because Crown Prince Frederick firmly supported his wife that he was constantly threatened with the removal of the status of the crown prince. It can be said that every finnig spent by Crown Prince Frederick and his family members is now a private dowry from the crown princess.

A crown princess with great influence and financial independence, and her mother standing behind her was the greatest monarch of the nineteenth century (there was no one), and the mother of Waldemar Jr. naturally became the target of many people.

Immediately following the question of where to go to school, Joy discovered an even bigger problem, and now Crown Prince Frederick's family was getting poorer and poorer. The original move from the Berlin Imperial Palace to the Potsdam Imperial Palace was of course intended to avoid opponents in the German court on the one hand, and to reduce household expenses on the other. The huge expenses incurred in order to maintain the dignity of the crown prince's family and the donations of the crown princess to various funds and people are about to empty the crown princess's dowry, and this time in order to save little Waldemar, the crown princess spent a lot of money, and now the crown prince and the crown princess of the Second German Reich are almost out of gold marks.

The tense relationship between father and son, the relationship between mother-in-law and daughter-in-law, the confrontation between conservative and liberal forces in the court, and the financial problems of the terrible imperial palace are all in front of Joey. History has not yet been changed by Joey, but the reality of court life has to change Joey first. In any case, pressure is always the source of change for oneself, and changing oneself is also a small step for oneself to change history.

"Jojo, Jojo (note 1), are you awake, do you want to have some breakfast first?" A familiar voice rings in his ears, and Joey knows that it is Joachim's mother (and of course his own) calling to him.

Sleep cannot solve any problems, only to wake up from sleep, let yourself bravely face your own responsibilities, calmly face your fate, not only for yourself, but also for the creation of a different Germany.

In the early morning of March 30, 1879, Joey Otto Thomas woke up in the womb of the Potsdam.

Note 1: In Victoria's letter to her mother, Queen Victoria, she used to call her youngest son Joe, and I used to call her younger son Joe.