Dreamy Rowing

Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the stream.
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily,
Life is but a dream.

Litfasssäule

One of the favourite ways of advertising for Germans are those Litfasssäulen.
You can find them everywhere in town, about a few hunded metres apart from each other. Concerts, theatre plays, fairs or markets are advertised with posters.

Beautification

House corners might not always be the nicest things to look at, so some of my neighbors must have had the idea to fight them with German tidyness.
The result was this cute little flowerbed that is taken care of by one of the tenants. To protect it from dogs (and my cat probably) it even got a little fence. Now only the flowers have to grow a bit more.

Aaaah, Romantic!

Hey folks, here's a very early post today... sooo romantic! *dream*
I have to post early, because I'll be in London today to see Patrick Swayze starring in Guys & Dolls.

Biiig Chair

This huge chair was set up on Potato Island.
It was good fun watching the child trying to climb up for several minutes, and being totally happy after succeeding. Congratulations!

How's the view up there?

This little owl must have a perfect view over Saarbrücken... it's downtown, facing the direction of the Saar. Maybe it's facing Hogwarts as well, and it is just waiting for Harry Potter? =)
You see lots of pretty artworks when you look at the rooftops here, so I'll keep my eyes open for you!

Rosehip

I just had a rosehip tea, so I was reminded of this picture I took some days ago at the Saar.
It was a lovely afternoon with bright warm sunshine, a perfect day for going on a walk along the river.

Flower Crest

You can find the nicest version of the crest of Saarbrücken at Staden, where flowers were planted on a little hill in order to represent the crest. It's nicely done and a great tourist picture. =)

Saar-Lion

I've already seen lots of pictures of the funny cow statues all over the world.
Here's what we have: Lions! When Saarbrücken had 1000th birthday in 1999, there were 1000 lions sold to shops or organisations here, who could decorate their lion however they wanted. Some of them can still be found outside or inside the shops. This one is standing in Mainzer Strasse.
Trivia: The Saarland crest has two lions in it, the Saarbrücken one also one big one.

Imperial

35 Bismarck Street has an amazing doorway... I couldn't pass without taking a picture.
This is one of the houses close to the Staden, probably the most expensive area to live in Saarbrücken. When you're lucky, you can get houses with a river view there surrounded by trees and parks... but expect to pay a lot!

Making the... cow?

These straw animals are very very common in Germany around this time of the year.
People use huge rolls of straw to make funny-looking animals. This one got a cow, after the guy went on spraying another ten black spots on the "back". Usually they advertise harvesting festivals or they're just "statues". I don't know what this is for yet...
Do you also have those in your country?

Cobblestones

There are still lots of areas where German cities have cobblestones on the streets (poor cars). I find them fascinating and love walking over them... In the rain today they got a special glow when a car came towards me...

This can happen...

... when you go through Saarbrücken centre.
I found the smile of this lady just striking, and the look of the street artist worth millions.
PS: "She's" the lifesize puppet of a street artist.

Deforestation

Poor trees! Opposite to my work, a big part of the wood was removed to build a parking space for the surrounding institutes. It looks very weird now, the chopped trees have been removed as well and the certainty of it soon being concreted feels awkward.

Veggies

Hmmm, I love vegetables!!!
This is the section of the Edeka supermarket around the corner. Yummy! (Unfortunately, fruits and vegetables got quite expensive since we have the Euro. Also this year, the weather damaged the harvest quite badly, so it's even more expensive.)

Cinema Foyer

Movie time - happy time!
Don't you love the smell of popcorn in the movie theatres? All the people, all the exitement, all the voices trying to figure out what the movie will be like... Well. I took this shot before the masses arrived. =)
It's the UT Kino, one of our "old" city cinemas. For two years or so, we also have a big cinema complex called "CineStar" which can't compare to the charme of the old ones, and is far more expensive.

German Beer Mug

Hi, sorry for the delay, but I had serious problems to access blogger during the last two days. =(

This is an older picture of an exhibition we hosted some time ago.
I was looking over some pictures today, and I was reminded of the good time we had during this exhibition (about "Real and Virtual World in Dialogue - 2000 Years of Ceramics in the Saar Region") and I thought this mug (saying "Emtpy me - but empty me with honour.") was a nice German thing to show you... =)

My Working Place

Hi, sorry for the delay, but I had serious problems to access blogger during the last two days. =(

I wanted to show you my working place today, the Max-Planck-Institut Informatik, where I'm working in the secretary's office of the computer graphics group. If you want to know more about my work here, check my MPI website.

Town Café

Finally it looks like summer again! =)
This little café is right downtown next to Kaufhof, selling coffee, tea, snacks and brilliant burgers. There are several of those little spots in the centre where you can relax under trees and look at the passing shopping addicts...

SR Tower

This is the SR tower. The Saarländischer Rundfunk is one of the biggest radio stations here, that you can also listen to online.
This is not the sender's tower though, they are doing their radio shows from Halberg, in the East of Saarbrücken. I guess in this tower downtown there are some administrative offices.

Creepy Field

Vird, micanopy, necrotech and I have been to a field lately, to watch some fireworks close to here (That wasn't there, but that's a different story... =). It was totally dark there, so when I used the flash of my camera that was the result... It looked quite spooky, the "leftovers" on the field were approximately 30 cm long and dried.

Overgrown House

This is a building at university. Kate asked to see the whole of this house.
Unfortunately, I couldn't get back there yet, but I found another nice example of such a "green house" at the university campus. Looks almost like a stuffed toy, as fluffy as this one is. =)

My Future Window

... well, I wish it would be!
This flat is opposite to the town hall, and has the coolest window I've seen for a while. The perfect red stone of the building, and even the perfect little bonsai balls. So cute! Feels like home (As soon as I'm rich...)! =)

Steam Carousel

When I was walking past Karstadt today, there was this beautiful vintage carousel.It's a steam carousel, at least that's what it said, not that you could see any steam coming out of it. =)
You can even rent it, there's a phone number on the little sign on its side. Would be great for my sister's birthday!

Couple in Concrete Jungle

Well, to be fair, not a total Concrete Jungle, but this bridge and its surroundings (with the miserable trees that look like being trapped in a tiny prison) don't look too green. =)
Still the couple were enjoying themselves on the way downtown and managed to ignore the car noises. I liked the looong shadows the afternoon sun was producing.

PS: I just realised a funny thing... a concrete jungle in German would actually be translated to a concrete desert (Betonwüste). Strange differences between the languages sometimes. =)

Lonely Canoeist

This one is for Kala! This lonely canoeist was going along the Saar, while I was standing on top of Wilhelm-Heinrich-Brücke. It's not really the same like the lovely Hawai'ian pics, is it? =)
You can see several canoes, kayaks or small boats on the river, since the number of big ships going along the Saar is basically zero. When the weather is nice, you can rent small paddle boats at Staden to try it out yourselves.

West and East

The internationality of Saarbrücken even shows in the choice of our traffic lights.
There are two pedestrian crossings in Bahnhofstrasse that have the West German version of the traffic lights and the East German one.
You didn't know they have two different ones? Yes, it's true, East Germany has the cute little Ampelmännchen that is even a cult object now (Ampelmann Shop), West Germany the more realistic version of a walking and standing man. Which one do you like better?
I enlarged the two versions for walking and standing on top of the image for you.

Fence Detail

I came across this overgrown fence near Rotenbühl. Only the spiky endings of the old metal fence looked out of the green. It fitted the house that had ivy all over it as well.
Don't you think those houses look like right out of a fairytale?

Church at Sunset

The silhouette of the church St. Jakob against the sky at sunset was definitely worth a Saarbrücken picture, I thought - you know how much I like sky pics... =).

Theme Day: Doorways

Whoopee, the Daily Photo Bloggers have another Theme Day!
People voted for the theme "doorways", so I chose to show you this cute decorated door that belongs to a one-family house. I came across it yesterday, and thought that this is a house that looks already so comfy from the outside that I could almost imagine living there.

Check out other doorways around the world:
Albuquerque, NM (USA), Alexandria, VA (USA), Aliso Viejo, CA (USA), Antigua (Guatemala), Berlin (Germany), Brussels (Belgium), Chattanooga, TN (USA), Copenhagen (Denmark), Cottage Grove, MN (USA), Delta, CO (USA), Edinburgh (Scotland), Greenville, SC (USA), Guadalajara (Mexico), Hong Kong (HK), Hyde (UK), Jakarta (Indonesia), Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia), London (UK), Manila (Philippines), Melbourne (Australia), Newcastle (UK), Oulu (Finland), Paris (France), Porto (Portugal), Portsmouth (UK), Rheingau (Germany), Rotterdam (Netherlands), Ryde (UK), Sainte Maxime (France), San Diego, CA (USA) [Felicia], Seattle, WA (USA) [Kim], Seattle, WA (USA) [Susan], Sharon, CT (USA), Singapore, Stavanger (Norway), Sydney (Australia), Szentes (Hungary), Trier (Germany), Trondheim (Norway), Trujillo (Peru), Vallauris (France), Vantaa (Finland), Washington, DC (USA) [Passante], Washington, DC (USA) [Jenni], Wiesbaden (Germany), Willamette Valley, OR (USA)