Memories and hints of a travelling IT professional.
Within the Docklands in the East of London you can find the shiny modern city quarter Canary Wharf, named like this because it was once used for trading with the Canary Islands. On the Isle of Dogs surrounded by river Thames you can find some of the highest towers of the United Kingdom. Many banks are now settled here, making the area a rival to the historic financial center at the City of London.
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I hadn’t been to London for over four years and when I headed through the underground of the Heathrow airport towards the Heathrow Express I noticed a major change in public transport: the tracks used by the high-speed train to Paddington are now also used by the new Elizabeth Line colored in purple. The new line was created in a project called Crossrail, because it is a connection from East to West throughout the city – opened in autumn 2022.
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The soccer stadium of Bochum is known as the Ruhrstadion or Stadion an der Castroper Straße and is home to the traditional club VfL Bochum (the VfL stands for ‘Verein für Leibesübungen‘ which translates to ‘association for physical exercise‘). The club was created in 1848, the stadium was opened in 1911 – but it was altered and extended several times since then. The Ruhrstadion is pretty close to the city center of Bochum which is pretty much unusual these days; many German stadiums have been shifted out in the past.
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The art museum of Bochum was created as the Städtische Gemäldegalerie already in 1921. After residing in different locations and having exhibition at various places the museum did a restart at the Villa Marckhoff-Rosenstein (built in 1900 for two influential families) in 1960 and this building was extended with a modern building in 1983. Today the modern part is used to exhibit changing exhibitions of modern art.
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Getting to the Ruhrgebiet is always a good opportunity to learn about mining history in Germany. For hundreds of years coal and ore have been gathered here from the ground, driving industrialization and creating a special culture with its own traditions. If you’re interested in modern mining technologies you should visit the Deutsches Bergbaumuseum at Bochum. It is a combination of a classic museum, a research institution and a demonstration site: by elevator you can go down and explore modern mining machinery within a mine.
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The oldest bathhouse of Karlsruhe can be found close to the congress center and the Zoologischer Stadtgarten in a historic building made of red bricks. It dates back to the year 1873 and was realised with money donated by the banker Heinrich Vierordt. When he died he inherited 60,000 Gulden to the city which were planned to errect a market hall – but the sellers on the market of Karlsruhe protested against.
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At the city quarter Südweststadt of Karlsruhe you can find a vast industrial building that was used as an ammunition factory in the past. Since 1989 it is the home of the ZKM, the Zentrum für Kunst und Medien; a fantastic place that is hard to define: it is a museum, an exhibition hall, a scientific institution, an event location – or an indoor playground for people interested in art and media. It shows contemporary art and it preserves digital art. You can play computer games, discover modern art and explore technology.
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The Turmberg is an only 257 meters high mountain in the city quarter Durlach of Karlsruhe. People get there for hiking, for dining in the restaurant on top or for having a picnic with nice views on the city from the terrace next to the tower. The tower is in fact the last remaining part of the former fortification Burg Hohenberg from the 11th century; it is today used as a viewpoint.
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The city layout of Karlsruhe is special: when looking at a map you can see a giant circle in the city center. In its middle you’ll find the castle with the castle tower. From there 32 streets radiate out giving the city the nickname of the ‘fan city‘, the Fächerstadt. The city was founded in 1715 and in that year also the construction works of the Baroque-style castle started. It served as the seat of margrave Charles III William of Baden-Durlach and was a residence until the year 1918 when the Grand Duchy of Baden was abolished.
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German fascism created an extensive network of concentration camps, extinction camps and forced labor sites. Jewish citizens, political opponents, prisoners of war, homosexuals, disabled persons, Sinti and Romani people suffered and died because of the ideology of the German Nazi party supported by the German people. The three major concentration camps on German soil are Dachau (close to München), Sachsenhausen (close to Berlin) and Buchenwald on the Ettersberg mountain close to Weimar.
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