A rusty sculpture at this winter’s light display at the Luisenpark in Mannheim.
For more banana mania coloured photos click here.
Tag: Germany
The sign of the times
I don’t know what was better – the individual attention to each garment (for those that could afford it) or our mass produced wares (but available for the masses). In any case, a lot of our fashion of yesterday ends up here:
It is probably the better option compared to simply throwing used clothes and shoes in the garbage although there are issues with this kind of recycling, too. If I can I rather pass on my no longer used fashion items to an organisation where I know they will be worn in Germany and don’t end up destroying indigenous industries in third world countries. Or I wear them until they fall apart and end up as cleaning rags.
This is linked to One Word Sunday: fashion.
Wish you were beer
This unusual view of the part of München called Schwanthalerhöhe is taken from the area which during two weeks in September (sic!) houses the world famous Oktoberfest. The rest of the year most of the Wiesn is a flat, barren expanse packed with gravel. It is situated close to the city centre with buildings on all four sides. A few smaller events use part of the area throughout the year but when nothing is going on it’s just empty space which accentuates the urban surroundings all the more.
For A Photo a Week: urban.
A policeman, a market-woman, were standing …
Smiles all round with these two life-size sculptures in the middle of Koblenz in the Rhine valley. They depict a market-woman and a policeman illustrating an old joke which is written on a plaque in the local dialect (about Norbert’s dog who peed on the leg of the market-woman’s husband).
This is linked to A Photo a Week: smile.
Apricot – field
A field, ploughed and bone dry, in the Odenwald, in Germany.
For more almond coloured photos, click here.
One German corner
I was in Koblenz yesterday and in the cable car up to the Ehrenbreitstein Fortress. In the cabin one has a commanding view of the Deutsches Eck, the German corner, where the river Moselle joins the Rhine. The corner tip was called Deutsches Eck for a long time but was enlarged and a monumental statue of Emperor Wilhelm I on horseback was erected. The statue was destroyed during World War II and until German reunification only the plinth remained – meant to be a reminder of the German separation. A replica of the monument was erected amidst much public discussion in the 1990s.
Public discussion was again fierce when the cable car from the banks of the Rhine up to the fortress was built in 2011. The area where the Moselle flows into the Rhine is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and people were worried that the view was going to be spoilt but personally I think it does not distract from the beauty of the area.
This is linked to One Word Sunday: Aerial.
A man of many talents
“Every day we should hear at least one little song, read one good poem, see one exquisite picture, and, if possible, speak a few sensible words.”
“Man soll alle Tage wenigstens ein kleines Lied hören, ein gutes Gedicht lesen, ein treffliches Gemälde sehen und, wenn es möglich zu machen wäre, einige vernünftige Worte sprechen.”
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
It is impossible to walk through Frankfurt and not see Goethe – he was born there and spoke the dialect of the town (the giveaway are rhymes in some poems which only work as rhymes in this dialect). The silhouette is on the side of a hotel in a part of Frankfurt called Bergen-Enkheim but the sculpture stands in Weimar, where Goethe and the other great German poet, Friedrich Schiller lived and for a while worked together.
In an area of Frankfurt which is a mixture of commercial and industrial buildings this quote by Goethe can be seen on the side of a house. It is the combination of a line taken from “The sorrows of Young Werther”, which Goethe wrote when just 24 years old and which was extremely influential at the time, and the words with which he signed a letter to his wife years later (in English). The quote is a a variation on 1 Corinthians 15; 55: “Death, where is they sting?” Werther (or rather Goethe) continues not: “Grave, where is thy victory?” but “Love, where is thy victory? You are leaving, I’ll remain …”
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe combined many different aspects in his life: he was a highly successful author of poems, plays, and novels, he wrote academic papers, undertook research in various fields and made a few scientific discoveries, he was a trained lawyer, a politician at the court of Sachsen-Weimar, a theatre director, a man who lived for a few years fairly openly with a lover well below his social standing before marrying her. By all accounts, he was also a very worldly man who enjoyed food and drink. So it is only befitting that Frankfurt displays his likeness on a special tram, the so-called Äppelwoi-Express (a tram which can be booked by groups to party and drink Frankfurt style cider while driving through the city).
This is linked to Travel with intent: one little song.
Play it again, Böb!
This mural is at the entrance of the “artists’ quarter” in Böblingen. Pubs and bars crowded together in a small, provincial town.
Linked to Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Hands.
Antique brass – sign
Colour peeling off an old sign in the Rhine harbour of Gernsheim.
For more antique brass coloured photos, click here.
pictures imperfect blog 