… the afternoon in Gestapo headquarters in Koln. And all that I can say is that these 17.4 million racist xenophobes who voted to kick out the foreigners from their country ought to go along and visit it too.
We’ve seen the Biffers and UKRAP and Nigel Garbage doing things like refusing to shop in places run by Muslems, boycotting shops selling halal food, defacing mosques and the like, and no-one bats an eyelid.
You only have to compare what’s going on in the Fascist Paradise that is the UK today and compare it with what happened in Germany 1933-1945 to see some alarming similarities.
Everyone stood by and watched back then, and we had stupid, naive politicians waving pieces of paper about. And look how it all ended up because of this inaction. It’s getting to the stage where the ordinary citizens need to rise up and take matters into their own hands otherwise we’ll all be back here again.
Who will ever forget Martin Niemoller’s famous words?
First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out— because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
Last night I had, for a change, a reasonably good sleep last night. From about 22:45 to the alarm at 06:00 with a brief awakening at 03:45.
I’d been on my travels too, with a couple of people making their debuts. What we were doing was cutting up an onion into very fine particles whilesomeone else was preparing hot dogs or hamburgers. We had to remove all of the skin and everything else from the onion and that wasn’t easy although mine seemed to disappear quite quickly. And then wait.And I noticed that my onion was starting to congeal so I pointed this out to one of the women who was there. The conversation moved on and some guy joined in the discussion. He was a guy with whom I’d played guitar a couple of times in the Auvergne but with blond hair and this chat developed into some kind of problematic discussion about how he was going to join the Good Ship Ve… errr … Ocean Endeavour somewhere out between the Faroe islands and Iceland given the really poor weather. he then started to talk about his period in the Swedish Army which might explain his blond hair and strange accent. Mantime someone came down the corridor between the office desks shouting for someone – someone I knew on the Wirral. A girl piped up that “he sits here next to me, but he’s not at his desk right now. You can tell that it’s his desk because of the stuff on it.”.
There was the usual medication and breakfast and then I headed off to the station. Alison was already there so we headed off together to our platform for the train.
It was the 08:28 to Eupen, but we were only going as far as Liège.
There at Liège Guillemins railway station we alighted and waited for the German Inter-City Express to come in from Brussels.
And we made a slight miscalculation in that the train was a lot shorted than the one from which we had alighted.
We had to run (and you’ve no idea how difficult it is for me to run these days, but at least I managed it) half-way down the platform to leap aboard it.
We were 10 minutes late arriving in Köln, so I imagine that there’s a few more railway employees sent off to the Ostfront. But it didn’t really matter because the train was just so comfortable – even compared to the best of the TGVs.
Alison and I went for a coffee and then walked round the cathedral to check on the Roman paving that I had seen last time that I was here. We then continued up to the Hohenzollernbrucke.
By now the rain had stopped so we stood on the bridge to admire the barges passing by underneath.
And then up-river on the eastern bank to see a few things that I had noticed last time.
Back across the river on the Deutzerbrucke, stopping to take a few more photos of a few more barges, then Alison went for a wander around a few shops while I disappeared into the bowels of the Heumarkt metro station to look at the church tower that I saw last time.
While I was down there I stumbled over the ruins of a Roman temple from round about 100BC. This was uncovered during the construction of the Metro here
Unfortunately they haven’t been able to discover to which god the temple was dedicated
A couple more shops and then back to the Hauptbahnhof to meet Jackie.
We ended up at Mama’s Trattoria, an Italian restaurant that I had found on the internet. It advertised vegan and gluten-free meals. And what an inspired choice it was because there was plenty of choice and my penne al arrabiata was totally delicious.
From there, round to the Gestapo museum, and what a frightful place that was. It’s hard to imagine a series of prison cells about 1.5 metres by 3 metres and 30 people at a time crammed in each one there for a couple of weeks on end.
The only time they would ever be allowed out would be for a good round of torture and, eventually, being hanged or beheaded in the courtyard.
As I said, the idea that 17.4 million people have voted for a return to those unspeakable times is something that fills me full of dread.
A nice walk, another coffee and a few more shops saw us back at the railway station in time for another drink and then our trains home.
We had to change trains at Liège Guillemins station again for our train back to Leuven.
There was a 10-minute wait for our train and so that gave me plenty of opportunity to have a look round and take a few photographs.
The station is certainly out-of-the-ordinary and looks even better at night when it’s all illiminated.
Back finally at leuven Alison caught the bus home and I grabbed a falafel durum to eat on the way home.
167% of my daily activity and it feels like it too. So I’m off to bed where I intend to sleep until I wake up.
