Duisburg

This is a walkable rollercoaster! Its only purpose is as an art installation for city beautification. The track is a walkway with stairs, but the loop is off limits.

Next door is a nuclear plant though. Makes me a little nervous after watching that HBO show about Chernobyl.

Arnhem

Now we’re back in the Netherlands, in the city of Arnhem. During Operation Market Garden in World War II, the western Allies attempted invading Germany through the Netherlands. Allied soldiers (mostly British) attempted to secure key bridges throughout the country; one of which was in Arnhem. The operation ended in disaster, and the Allies failed to advance in to Germany.

The John Frost bridge was constructed on the same location as the old bridge that was destroyed by bombings after Operation Market Garden. John Frost was the leader of the group of British paratroopers that actually arrived at the bridge during the battle. The Airborne Museum in Arnhem is dedicated to the Battle of Arnhem, but it was closed for renovations (out of all the war related museums we went to on this trip so far, most of them ended up being closed…). The city centre itself has the same vibes as other cities in the Netherlands.

Our day was shorter because of our flight, but our next destination gets even more exciting: Israel, Palestine and Jordan.

• Duisburg
• Arnhem

Cologne (Köln)

Last time I went to Cologne, I celebrated the Carnival and didn’t really see or do anything else. This time, I spent a half day checking out the chocolate museum and have a few beers.

The museum chronicles the history of chocolate, from the cultivation of the cocoa bean, to the industrial machines that produce the chocolate. Visitors can even order their own custom chocolate bar! They pick the kind of chocolate (white, dark, etc.) and can choose a multitude of condiments too.

I honestly was more impressed with the industrial chocolate making machinery more than the chocolate itself. As a graduate of mechatronics engineering, I can certainly appreciate the engineering behind these machines. The movements of each component is precisely controlled to perfectly pick up and drop pieces of chocolate or to pour liquid chocolate into molds, and the subsequently release them.

Afterward, we met up with a friend of mine who decided to move to Germany from America. He was so interested in Germany that he earned his C1 level in the Goethe Insitut examinations (it’s one level below native speaker), and when talking to him, I could always tell his future was in Germany. He found a job working at Deloitte and his German is so good that he doesn’t even speak English at work! Even I can’t do that with my German.

Next up: the bar. You can’t go to Cologne and not try the local brew, Kölsch. Germans outside of Cologne assert that Kölsch shouldn’t be considered a real beer, and honestly, I find it to be just okay. It’s not great and not terrible. A unique part of the Cologne pub culture is that if the waiter sees you with an empty glass, he will automatically serve you another one, regardless of whether you want one or not. The sign that you’re done is to put a coaster over the glass.

We walked around town a bit and went to probably the biggest landmark in town: the Cologne Cathedral. This Cathedral is the second tallest church in Europe (the first is in Ulm, also in Germany), with a height of 157m. It’s hard to imagine the size, but most of the buildings in Cologne aren’t very tall so this building appears to tower over the skyline.

Düsseldorf

Next, we drove to Düsseldorf. All we did there was walk a bit around town, but the streets just kind of look like other cities nearby, like Cologne, except Cologne has a giant cathedral to look at. We did come across a small celebration in the street though. I’m not completely sure, but I think it’s for the massive Carnival celebration that was gonna happen in late February.

The fun started later that night though. We were looking to get some dinner and went to a local pub. It was Friday night and the place was packed – so you can be pretty sure this place is good. Normally, you’d just walk in and sit at any free table – there’s nobody to show you to your seat like in America. There was nothing free anywhere.

A group of Germans signaled to us that we could join them and they’d make space for us. I politely told them that it was okay and we could wait, but they started shifting over so we ended up joining them. We chatted with them over drinks and they turned out to be super fun people!

A older couple were having beers with their son in law and his friend until we joined (they were drunk already when we showed up). They were so happy to chat with us and kept telling us how awesome we were for visiting Düsseldorf. One guy kept telling us in his German accent how “North Rhine-Westphalia is the most open-minded place in all of Germany”, how he grew up in Bavaria near Allgäu, but can never go back there because Düsseldorf is just so amazing, and that we should live here permanently.

Germans when they’re drunk, really like speaking English. One of them kept getting stuck on words and he’d ask their friends what the word was in English. I’d translate the words for him each time and eventually one of their friends literally just told him, “don’t ask us, ask him! He knows all the words!” They were super impressed by my German and it’s a pretty great feeling to know that my German is good enough to have these conversations with locals.

My friend on the other hand, could more or less understand what was being said, even though he couldn’t speak the words. In fact, he had a bit of trouble with his pronunciation, to the point that not a single server in any pub we visited in Germany understood him when he tried to order a Radler. This bar was no exception either, and I couldn’t help myself but laugh at his misfortune

As we left, we jokingly said we’d meet again at the same place and same time to have beers together again. I gotta say that most Germans I’ve met have been pretty cool.

That’s all for now!

• Cologne
• Düsseldorf
  

Bastogne

The Battle of the Bulge (known in German as the Unternehmen Wacht am Rhein – Operation Watch on the Rhine) was the last major German offensive in the western front during World War II. The Germans attempted to use this offensive to break the Allied offensive on that front and force the western allies to negotiate a peace treaty. The territory taken by the Germans during the offensive resembled a “bulge” on the map, hence its name.

During the battle, Bastogne was surrounded by German forces, and when the Germans asked the Americans in Bastogne to surrender, Brigadier General McAuliffe famously answered “nuts!” to the German request.

We stayed overnight in the same farmhouse which served as the former field headquarters of the legendary American 101st Airborne Division during the battle. The staff there mentioned that the same family still owns the farmhouse to this day and that some of them had perished in concentration camps during the course of the war.

They even decorated in the interior with old helmets and ammo boxes.

I wouldn’t consider the place in the middle of nowhere, but maybe trying to find it at night isn’t the best idea.

Just look for the tank turret out front I guess!

We tried going to the Bastogne Museum, but little did we know that the Bastogne War Museum was closed between 20. January 2020 to 19. February 2020. I knew it was low season, but I didn’t think it was so not busy that the entire museum would be closed for a whole month! The only exhibit we got to see was the East Germany open air exhibit outside showing off art painted on the tank, slabs of the Berlin Wall on old Trabants.

Nearby the museum was the Mardasson Memorial, a monument dedicated to the American soldiers who fought the Battle of the Bulge. Inside the memorial, carved panels tell the story of the battle.

The weather really cooperated with us today! We had clear blue skies all day, and got to see the the thin layers of morning frost over the vast farm fields.

Liège

The weather didn’t cooperate for long though because it became like this on our way to Liège…

The thing that surprised me about Liège was how seedy it was. We were hanging out around Place St Lambert, and it felt like people were subtlely eyeing us from the side of the street. In once instance, the moment we turned corner, a man glanced at us and immediately started walking in our direction. I glanced at him some more and eventually he went away. Yeah, we didn’t stay long in Liège.

I think one way to explain why it was so seedy was that Wallonia was no longer Belgium’s center of industry like it was in the late 19th and early 20th century. As the industry went to neighbouring Flanders, the local economy suffered.

Drielandenpunt

Next up, Drielandenpunt, the triple point between Germany, Netherlands, and Belgium. It’s also simultaneously the highest point in the entire Netherlands, a miniscule 322.5m above sea level.

Aachen

Not far away from the Drielandenpunt, was the westernmost city in Germany, Aachen. This is where 31 Holy Roman Emperors were crowned. Charlemagne (his bust pictured below) himself had his imperial medieval residence here.

The Aachen Cathedral shown below was the burial location of Charlemagne. The chapel shown in the middle is the location of the coronation of the Holy Roman Emperors. Despite the name, the Holy Romans Empire was neither holy nor Roman, nor an empire.

As a “holy” empire they weren’t exactly unified by religion. It wasn’t solely catholic and had a significant population of Protestants.

It wasn’t really Roman since for most of its history it didn’t rule over what the Roman Empire ruled over (although it did for a time) and its centre of power was ultimately in Germany. Arguably, the Byzantines or the Eastern Roman Empire was the true successor to the Roman Empire. They were a part of the Roman Empire when it fell and it continued the empire in the east until it fell in the 15th century to the Ottoman Turks.

Technically, it was an empire (at least officially) for a time, until their defeat in the Thirty Years War (1618 – 1648), which resulted in the kingdoms within the empire effectively receiving independence from the empire.

For lunch, I finally got the chance to eat Eisbein (bottom dish), a pork knuckle! It’s simmered for several hours in broth and served with sauerkraut and mashed potatoes! If you like meat, this is the dish for you. The above dish is a schnitzel – thin slice of meat (thinned via pounding) that’s breaded and fried.

Bonn

From Aachen, we drove to Bonn to meet up with a friend, who moved to Bonn from Taiwan to pursue a PhD in chemical engineering. We were so full from lunch, we only had a small snack for dinner at a local pub.

Since it was a Bavarian pub, it sold Bavarian specialities like weisswurst (shown on bottom – literally white sausage). It’s a sausage made from veal! The bread in the basket is a very delicious German pretzel. It’s got a nice cripsy outside flavoured with salt with a soft inside.

After dinner, we explored the city a little bit and visited the birthplace of Ludwig van Beethoven. The house is one of the few remaining middle-class homes of the era.

Bonn is also the world headquarters of an amazing brand of gummy bears – Haribo! It was founded by Hans Riegel in Bonn, hence the name Haribo. People who hear about Haribo for the first time usually think it comes from Japan, and are almost always surprised to find out it’s German! The outlet store not far from Bonn city centre has a MASSIVE selection of all sorts of Haribo variants! It’s got gummy bears, sour worms, licorice, and more! I definitely recommend the gummy bears (of course), the frogs, coca colas, and the Phantasia pack!

That concludes our 7th day. The next day we’d travel to more German cities – Cologne and Düsseldorf.

Photos:

• Bastogne
• Liège
• Drielandenpunt
• Aachen
• Bonn