Remembering Regensburg

I seem to remember a pretty little city in the midst of Bavaria. It's unlike Munich, it's nowhere near like Nuremberg, a place unto itself really. 

At first when you get off the train, you think there's nothing much to this pretty city but many places are never quite amazing near their train stations. I think of Utrecht and Den Haag, I think of Trier and Koblenz curiously, cities where you have to travel further to find their beauty.

Regensburg... a city where the rivers Regen and Danube meet. In the ancient world, Radasbona, its Roman name and only upriver from Vindobona (or modern Vienna). 

Regensburg, a kind of a quiet, idyllic gem like Bamberg, places where the tourists don't quite go. Well, they do but mostly German and Austrian. For many foreigners, Germany is Munich and lederhosen, bier gärtenen and maybe Berlin if there's time. Maybe. Germany is oomp-pah-pah, Oktoberfest and Wagner's portly Brunhilde belting out the finale of The Ring with her horned-helmet and spear, her tonsils on display.

But there are other Germanies.

Regensburg belongs in that vast category of other Germanies. There are places like Baden Baden and Würzburg. There is Koblenz and Bonn where Beethoven was born.

But Beethoven left for Vienna (or ancient Vindabona). 

In fact there are so many Germanies one might lose count. And it's better to lose count in Regensburg, the place I seem to remember but I'm too lazy too forget. 

I don't want to forget. If there are places that exemplify Sunday strolls and meandering walks it is medieval Regensburg where every street (once you get beyond the Hauptbahnhof) has its own bewildering and cheerful charm. Looking at the leaning, half-drunken, pastel-coloured buildings, you can't help but think, yes, it only makes sense, the man who wrote the libretto for The Magic Flute must have been born here.

No, you don't think that but I do. Mozart had two librettists, one Bavarian, the other Venetian who provided the words to his most perfect of operas. Operas light and easy unlike Wagner's. On a Sunday in Regensburg one would rather hear Dove Sona instead of the end of the world brought to you by the world's favourite anti-semite, Hitler's beloved composer, Herr Richard. (Of course, I'm not talking Strauss.)

And that's just it, in Regensburg you forget that Germany once had a Nazi past. In cities like Cologne there is little left of the old town, everything new and urban and lined with railroad tracks. Cologne that was once bombed and leveled like Nuremberg and Hamburg and Munich. 

Regensburg got away unscathed. There is no bad conscience really here to be reminded of. Yes, not unlike nearby by Nuremberg where if you take the tram, you can go to Zeppelin Field and see the cement stands where the great and feeble dictator made forecasts for his thousand-year Reich. It must have been a beautiful place to be if you were a proud German, a National Socialist with dreams of lebensraum and new horizons. In a time of hopelessness there was a man named Hitler, half-criminal, half-artist who many historians have said was the director of Germany's greatest political tragedy. A piece of history, Zeppelin Field with its stands now littered with cigarette butts, a derelict relic with everywhere weeds and in the summer, rock concerts. Today, you have the odd idiot who will visit and stand at the podium where Hitler once stood, looking out and imagining himself a megalomaniac. 

But getting back to Regensburg. I think if there was a romantic comedy that ever needed a city it would be here but then it might ruin it. Barcelona is now over-populated with tourists too eager to relive a scene in the famous Woody Allen film. 

No, scratch that, lets pass a law: no films should never be allowed to be filmed in Regensburg. Let it remain sleepy and lovely, perfect and pristine. One should only recommend Regensburg to those who might appreciate it. For one must realize there are travelers and tourists. Tourists are easy to spot with their mildly torn maps and 'let's do everything' looks on their faces, like Vikings out to pillage but instead of swords and axes they have Nikons and Kodaks. 

Travelers are people who don't want to be seen, they want to remain inconspicuous and blend in. The don't carry the heavy cameras and wear panama hats or stand together in groups, following a leader. Tourists ride segues through towns and look quite stupid, as if there were on the way to becoming the chubby humans of Wall-E.

Travelers laugh at segue tourists, laughing alone or in a pair. You wish everyone who ever went everywhere was a traveler. Travelers don't arrive on a bus or place their hands behind their back and show off their portly belly while listening to the tour guide. No, they try to hide their Fodor's and Frommer, sneaking it out in restrooms or parks with no one around. Travelers are tidy and humble and hopefully keep to themselves.

I prefer to be a traveler. I prefer to wander and as I mention, Regensburg is a perfect place to meander. And moving along...

Of course, you must see the Dom, a wonder of French Gothic architecture. It is by far more beautiful and sacred than Cologne's. What makes it especially special is that it began in the 13th century and was completed in the 19th - though the towers had to be replaced in the 1950s. So when you look at the building you see history but more importantly man's ability to procrastinate. But why not take your time with something like this. If it takes 600 years to get it right, well, why not, damn it. Interesting to note it was Mad King Ludwig's father who finished the cathedral by adding the twin towers - Mad King Ludwig who too loved Wagner (always hard to escape Wagner in Bavaria). 

It's an easy to church look at it. It isn't monumental nor heavy like other Germany cathedrals. No, it appears almost light and feathery as if it might fly away.  The towers rise above the Domplatz and Residenzstraße with timeless ease as if the building was taking a deep breath. A building like a moment in Mozart.

Inside too, you get lost looking at the ceiling and sometimes, you might hear the organist tuning up his instrument (that didn't come out right...) so the music is haunting and wave-like, swimming through the vast space. 

What I liked was the statue of the laughing archangel, Gabriel. A gregarious smile, you figure there should be no serious silhouettes in such a space, in such a quaint, quiet, pretty city. No. This should be a place for belly laughs and beer and the angel has its right, let's look to him to set the tone for the rest of the day. 

And beer is necessary, of course, because you are in Bavaria. It would be unjust and uncivilized and woefully wrong to drink anything but. So there it is...

You leave the cathedral and look for a place that is just right. And that's part of being a traveler, you don't want to sit with other tourists and pose with them, with their wrinkled maps and over-sized cameras that look like they came from a movie set. No, you have to go and look further afield and seek a sanctified nook or uncover a hushed away cafe. You cross the bridge, the Steinerne Brücke and try to remember what your guidebook said. You remember something about it being built in the twelfth century and something else to that effect. And you pause to appreciate everything. You look back, there's the Dom always dominating the cityscape and landscape but despite your aesthetic appetite, the beautiful sunny day your stomach turns and yearns for something more substantial, i.e. food. 

For me, I found a place across the bridge called Alte Linde (Old Lindens) and the schnitzel was quite good along with the potatoes but I almost felt like a tourist, drinking the Paulaner bier, such a typical standby when one is in Bavaria. (And yes, there was the man with the large cannon-like camera snapping away at the scenery as if firing a salvo...)

You can't help but feel in need of something more personal, far away from the fanny-pack crowds that embarrass themselves. 

Still you can't help it. You wanted to take a picture of everything. An eager, eternal itch when you visit Regenburg. I know I couldn't resist walking back to the old city, seeing the beautiful Dom framed by the trees, near the river, the bridge in the foreground. You have to take a picture. It would be like turning away from the Mona Lisa just because it was too-famous. 

Thankfully one's camera eventually runs out of batteries and you're left to wander without framing every second, trying to capture what is always fleeting. 

Travelers look for perfect moments. I myself could have gone to Valhalla up the river to visit the busts of famous Germans in the kitsch-like temple built (once again) by Ludwig I. But that riverside ride in Regensburg would have cost me 23 euros (and would have made me a tourist). I'd rather have another beer. Maybe another two and still have enough for a snack later when I got back to Nuremberg. Or maybe something special before I left Regensburg.

And so I went looking but not looking because the perfect place eventually finds you. Sure enough...just after strolling past the Altes Rathaus, leaving the Kohlenmark, making my way up a small street (or 'gasse' auf Deutsche) I had strong feeling that I should stay. I ignored it at first, passing by the uncrowded café, seeing the empty chairs along the front window. I then turned around and thought, here's where I have to be for the next little while.

An assertive thought, but calmly confident. I like those instances in which you make a decision and right away you feel good about them, there's no turning back. And I was happy because I think if I had gone another further I would have regretted everything. 

So I took a seat, at first at the end of the second row but then thinking, it might rain, so I moved one table over to make sure I was fully under the awning. There was a mother and teenage daughter having a drink in the front row, one table over, the former smoking, the latter with her ice cream treat. The mother finished her smoke and wine and they left. I nursed my beer, a Thurn und Taxis brew made locally. Soon enough a young couple sat near me and chatted and she took her pictures and he put his arm lovingly over her shoulder. When they got up to leave after their quick drink, I pushed my table over just a little so they could get by and she thanked me. 

Then another mother and daughter came by, this one younger. This mother had shorter black hair unlike the other's who had been longer and this daughter was more restless wearing kiddie jean overalls, riding her red, pedal-less tiny bike. The mother ordered some mineral water and the daughter had milk. She then ordered a bowl of tomato soup and the little girl went off to play with the plastic flowers at the ceramic store display just further up the street. Their meal arrived and despite this, the mother still had to keep getting up to get her daughter. 

And of course everyone smiled. The people pulling up in taxis to stay at the hotel, with their rolling suitcases, wheels clicking on the cobbled stone smiled. The ice-cream-cone-eating-people passing by smiled, all the blonde and brunette families out for the day in Regensburg chuckled and glanced down at the curious little girl who also liked swatting the plastic triangle flags of the display.

And yes, it finally began to rain. And I thought, it should rain (Regen) at least once while one is visiting Regensburg. The drops tapped on the stone street, on the front tables with their white table cloths so the mother daughter duo came to sit in the place once occupied by the couple. I moved over one seat so we weren't cramped close and could breathe in our ever-sacred privacy. The mother thanked me, placing the little bike at her side.

The drops pattered on the awning and for a moment I felt like I was getting away with being part of everything, not being a traveler, that I faded a little behind the curtain of the rain, no one to see me. Lingering there at my table, taking my time, my second beer now, the scent of wet dust and stone, I thought of how the rest of my day was going to be out there, at the end of the street, far away and back towards the Hauptbahnhof.

And that's why I stayed for over an hour. It wasn't a matter of procrastinating, waiting out the rain, putting off the return but embracing the unfixed flow of a day. At the end of the street there was tomorrow and by sitting here, I put it off as long as I could, almost hoping to be left behind. (If only I had 600 years.)

The light of the sky went from dark grey to gold as the sun broke through the now-emptied embankments of clouds. And it's like dusk, you want that time of day to linger on; no one really wants the colours to change or the sky to darken, even if the stars are pretty and the moon might be full.

But there is a leave-taking in everything, a goodbye hint here and there. The mother and daughter beside me left after the former paid the bill and the latter scurried off to check on her favourite red and yellow plastic flowers, the wet street dimpled with tiny puddles. The mother, of course had to carry the tiny bike. When you are three years old there are more important matters to attend to and things are ineluctably left behind. 

For me, I talked a little to the server and she found out English was my mother tongue. Too bad, I thought I almost blended in. Almost. 

After that there isn't much left of Regensburg worth remembering. I know I saw the Dom again and stopped at a delicatessen to guy some wine. I had the exact change.