21 – 23 December 2006
I spent the first three days of my trip in Cologne not doing a lot. When I found out that I basically had three days to kill, I found out that the hotel I usually stay at in the Mulheim district of the city had vacancies, made the reservation and was happy to be getting of my town earlier than expected.
I had had email contact with four friends living in Cologne and arranged to meet up with them at different time, so that gave me few things to do and people to pass the time with waiting for my flight.
I met up with Mattes on Thursday evening at 20h at a pub called Trash-Chic. When he emailed me the name of the pub and website, I instantly knew that it was the place to go because of the name (sound it out in French and you’ll see what I mean).
The place was funky – mismatched walls that had probably been pained by the owners, a table football game, eclectic furniture, and a very laid back atmosphere. Exactly the kind of place I love.
Mattes and I spent about three hours talking about anything and everything we could think of. Books, music, Germany, the USA and anything else we could come up with. It was a very enjoyable evening and I’m looking forward to repeat it next year.
On Friday afternoon, I met up with Cologne Bound. We had been trying to meet up for a while now but have managed to miss each other several times and decided that that would be the day that we finally did. Granted, it wasn’t the best day for him, so we ended up running errands together – which was fine with me – I was just glad to get to meet him. We spent about 3 ½ hours venturing around Cologne and talking about everything under the sun, ending by doing some wine tasting and then parting ways and wobbling off in different directions.
Friday evening, I met up with Friend of Heather, who will now be called D. D and I met at the Tourist Info office and then headed off in search of dinner and a few beers. We ended up having a quite good dinner and a few drinks at a Koelschhaus and then wandered around Cologne for a while. We strolled through one of the Christmas Markets and saw an ice skating ring and went over to watch. However, we were quite surprised to see that football (without ice skates) was being played and stayed for a while to watch.
From there, we were thirsty again so we set off to find a place for a few more drinks – something that we thought would be no problem in Cologne – easier said than done. We found a place that looked good and decided that it would be out new watering hole, so we entered. D knows that I don’t really care for smoky environments, so we made our way to the back seating area and sat down. The waiter came over and when he found out that we only wanted beer, he told us that we’d have to go to the front area. We walked out there and saw that we’d have to stand, so we decided to leave.
Strike one.
The next place seemed quite posh and the beer was a bit more than other pubs, but it looked like an okay place, so we were escorted to a table. The same thing happened and we ended up leaving due to the fact that there was no place to sit.
Strike two.
The next place didn’t even let us in the door because it was about to close.
Strike three.
We finally found a place that wasn’t smoky or crowded and made it our final port of call. Three beers and lots of great conversation later about darn near everything (the usual topics when I chat with people), we left – I arrived back at my hotel at 1h.
Saturday I spent the morning running a few errands – buying last minute things like razors, etc. I met up with my friend Sol in front of the cathedral and off we went to do a bit of his last minute Christmas shopping - after which we stopped at his one of his favourite watering holes – a ‘sit in kiosk’ for a few hours of beer drinking and good conversation with the two owners of the establishment (he’s a regular there and knows them).
My stop on the way home was at the post office in the Cologne HBF. A post office at 21h? Sounds odd, doesn’t it? However, there was (and usually is) a method to my madness (and the post office is open til 22h on Saturdays).
I was off to Thailand then next day and wouldn’t need my winter jacket, sweater or gloves for the next month, so I did the only logical thing – mailed them to one of our secretaries (€6) so that I wouldn’t have to drag them around with me. It was a bit cold waiting for the train to the Dusseldorf Airport the next day and people looked at me like I was crazy, but I didn’t care.
The Thailand part of my holiday had started.
