Freiburg im Breisgau

On the left and in the center of town is the famous Gothic Cathedral called the Münster. On the right with the green copper roof is the southern gate, Martinstor, one of the remaining Medieval gates. And in the background is the other remaining Medieval gate, Schwabentor.

Martinstor

You can't see it very well, but just to the left of this mighty Medieval tower is written a sign of our own times. Ever since the tower ceased to be a prison for thieves and suspected witches, there has been a restaurant underneath the building to the West of the tower. But that restaurant has changed hands many times. Each time, the owner was allowed to put up a sign naming his restaurant over the arch way that you see here to the left. Now that sign reads "McDondald's". This central part of the city only looks old. Modernity has reared its ugly do-you-want-fries-with-that head. But the tower sure is majestic. Another strange thing to watch was how the triple-axle buses and the electric street cars passed through these narrow openings. These were the only vehicles allowed into the center of town. It was supposed to be a pedestrian zone but you always had to watch that you didn't get run down by a street car. The wires upon which the streetcars depended for power were strung over all the main through ways in the center of town. There were also many other things which made you realize that though these people had very old-fashioned tastes in architecture, art and design, they didn't want to create the illusion that Freiburg was still in the middle ages. It's a modern downtown (meaning that it has all the shops, computers and crowds that American cities have). But it has architecture that makes it worthwhile to go downtown without necessarily wanting to buy something.

Bächle

Here is what really makes Freiburg one of the most charming places I have ever visited. I grant you that I haven't been all that many places in my life yet (at the time of this writing I'm just 22). But all the same, you can't deny the beauty of a place that has running water flowing through it. The sound of the water as it flows through these narrow channels is calming. The light that reflects from the water is bright and cheerful. And the channels run all through the streets of the old city. Some are huge like the one up by the other remaining Medieval gate, Schwabentor. That one is almost three feet deep. Most are just the same size as this one. But some, like the one behind the M¸nster, are only an inch deep and eight inches wide. No one is really sure anymore what the little streams (as they are called in German) were for when they were built, but the theories range from funny to disgustingly realistic. Some people think that they held water for the cattle to drink when they came in from pasture at the end of the day. Remember, the town was much smaller then and the city walls marked the edge of the main settlement. The cows weren't as far away from the center of town as they are now. Others say that the little streams were the fireman's friend. The water in them was for the purpose of fighting fires. But realistically speaking, I have to admit that back when the little streams were first built, plumbing and water pumps were not the technical marvels that they are today. No water ran sweetly through the quiet streets back then. By far the most likely theory is that the little streams were for carrying away waste and garbage. But despite that, there is one thing about the much cleaner streams of today, which lends them a charm unsurpassed. Legend states that if you ever fall unintentionally into the water of the little streams, you will be fated to marry someone from Freiburg.

Münsterplatz

Above is the tower of the cathedral which defines the entire space of the square. On the left you see the marketplace around the famous Münster on a Sunday. This is the only day that the Münsterplatz is empty. On every other day of the week it's just as full as what you see on the right. It was great to go there to get fresh vegetables, cut flowers, flowers in pots, handmade crafts, wooden toys, brushes and brooms, or just about anything you might want! I especially enjoyed getting a fresh Wurst off the grill on a crusty roll with fried onions. Add a little mustard and a fresh Autumn breeze and you had something just this side of heaven! Another story I want to tell is about one rainy day in November I bought a wooden toy here for Dani (my wife) for her birthday. It's one of those birds whose wings and body are all on strings and when you pull on the string hanging from his belly, the wings flap slowly and serenely. I put a red ribbon on it and hung it from the ceiling in our room before she was awake. I had made her breakfast in bed. She named him Archimedes. I had tried to make it a very special day for her. And something of the magic of the market on Münsterplatz had made it possible.

Click here to see more pictures and read more about the Münsterplatz.

The Münster

Isn't this a beautiful picture? They light it up at night like this just because it's pretty. For all a native might say was wrong with the way the town was governed, he'd have to admit that the beauty of this place was being well tended. I loved this church even though I never once went to mass there. Such a shame. I took rolls and rolls of pictures of the gargoyles, the stonework, the view from the tower, the sculpture, the clock, the stain glass windows, the altar...It was all so unlike anything I was accustomed to from where I live in the US. I just loved it. But the joy of this church didn't just come from the sight of it. The bells rang each evening for the Angelus. Of course they rang on the hour. But what I liked was when the bells just all rang at once, chaotically but musically. On Sunday morning it was especially nice because all the people who were out were already in church by the time that I came by on the way to a little Lutheran church on the other side of the old city. So there wasn't anyone around and the sound just rang through the streets. If you closed your eyes you could imagine that you were in a long forgotten time. It was truly sublime.

 

Schwabentor
This gate is just pretty to me. I don't know much about the history of this monument but I do know that seeing it above the roofs of (for instance) Konviktstraþe is something I'll always remember. I especially like the photo above of Schwabentor amidst the old roofs of the Altstadt. You can imagine that this is the view you'd see if there had been helicopters 800 years ago. Schwabentor is in a lovely part of town that is away from the noisy crowds of shoppers and loiterers that fill Kaiser-Joseph Straße on busy days.
There was a shop near there that sold all sorts of exotic foods. Mostly they sold ingredients for Middle Eastern and Asian dishes. From Arabian to Thai, this place had everything that Pennymarkt didn't. So that's where we bought our peanut butter. I don't think we ever made Japanese food, nor even once bought some Basmati rice. It was always the peanut butter. We knew that it was there because in some Thai dishes they used peanuts in rather unexpected ways. But we just ate it on bread with honey or jelly. The man who ran the store always just smiled when he saw us: he knew what we were after...
	There was also a tiny little shop called the 'Tassenladen' (Cup Store) that I never quite had the courage to enter. It was literally the size of a generous closet. It was true to its name: it contained cups. Not very many cups, but it did have them. They looked handmade and kinda artsy. I didn't want to go in because I was afraid that if I went in I'd feel pressured to buy something. I felt that if I was going to show enough interest in a store so small and specialized as this one as to actually walk (or rather, step) in, I should be planning to buy something. But we already had too many breakable things to try and carry back with us on the plane. So I heartlessly shunned the place. Oh, well.

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