One of the things the international tourist can appreciate
about Germany (and Europe in general) is the number of cities that are just jaw
dropping in their variety and beauty. For Germany, there are the usual
suspects—Berlin, Munich, Hamburg, Frankfurt—and the towns people certainly
might have heard of, such as Cologne,
Nürnberg, Stuttgart, or Heidelberg, among many others. Stuttgart is one of
those towns, and I'm still surprised it took me this long to take my family
there for a visit.
Having been born in Stuttgart, I have a special relationship
to the city. As a kid, my mother would take me to Stuttgart on each birthday,
and we would spend the day walking through the gardens of the Schloßplatz,
taking in an expedition at the Staatsgalerie, visiting the Stiftskirche, or
simply strolling down the long Königsstraße in the heart of the city.
Stuttgart itself is an economic powerhouse not just in
Germany, but in all of Europe. With corporate giants like Mercedes-Benz,
Porsche, or Bosch calling Stuttgart their home, it's hard to ignore Stuttgart
in the grander scheme of things. It seems that Bad Cannstatt, one of the more
prominent parts of the city on the other side of the Neckar river, is almost
exclusively owned by Mercedes Benz.
Stuttgart is an unusual city in its makeup. Although bigger Stuttgart
has almost three million people, you wouldn't guess by the overall greenness of
the city. Entering Stuttgart from the south, we drive over a few mountains and
wide strips of forest before descending into the valley, where the city itself
is located.
On our first day, we decide to walk a little before
catching a train into downtown. This decision is met with sneers by the kids,
although they quickly pick up their little legs once they understand we won't
be taking our customary wheels or even rail for the journey. We catch a train
into town from the Wilhelmina Zoo and get off at the Hauptbahnhof in the heart of the city. The first thing we notice is an assembly of citizens protesting the construction of Stuttgart 21, also
known as the underground train station (not to be confused with the subway or
U-Bahn in any way). Turns out, this is what they do every day. Stuttgart 21 was approved in 1994, in 2010 the first
construction work was started. In 2016, the project is still nowhere near to
being completed.
Leaving the protesters aside, we decide to pay a visit to
the Schloßgarten and walk along the Königsstraße. The kids' favorite places?
Toy stores. Not hard to guess, really. Liebi marvels at the Königsstraße, its
hundreds of stores, and the fact we do not encounter one vehicle in the entire pedestrian zone. Cops? Plenty of them,
some accompanied by dogs. I still don't ever see them in action, people seem to be on their best behavior. We take a train back into Bad Cannstatt, where we
stay next to the stadium named aptly 'Mercedes Benz Arena'. Did you honestly
think Mercedes-Benz was going to let anybody else name the stadium in their
backyard?
Germany, of course, has those long summer days that confuse the kids. When we tell the kids itias past their bedtime at nine p.m., they
shake their hands, wondering, 'Why is it still light outside?' This is when you
need to cover up the windows, at least until ten, when it actually gets dark.
I take a late evening stroll along the Neckar, looking out
at the TV tower in the hills. I spot a few kids along the river swigging
from their beer bottles and grin. That was me about thirty years ago, I am thinking, just some little punk along the Main River. On my way back to the
hotel, I pass what would be the main item on the agenda for the next day, the
Mercedes-Benz Museum.
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