Living in Freiburg

Life in Freiburg is pleasant. But not equally pleasing everywhere. The other day, our local Badische Zeitung (BZ) published an article about the citizens' satisfaction in the various districts.

Quality of life in Freiburg's city districts
"Do you like living in your current neighborhood?" (©BZ)

To make it short, Red Baron, or better, my city district, won the silver medal. The neighborhood where I live, the Mittelwiehre, is only surpassed by the Oberwiehre.

The BZ wrote: All Freiburg city districts are rated positive - but there is a wide spread between the top district Oberwiehre (+90) and Weingarten (+26) at the bottom of the list.

If one compares the result with past years' surveys, it becomes clear that the gap is widening. While the districts in which residents were already satisfied continue to improve, the situation is precisely the opposite for those at the bottom of the table, where satisfaction is falling more and more. Opfingen lost the most (-15), followed by Rieselfeld and Weingarten (-10).

When I moved to Freiburg in 2001, the Herdern district was the nec plus ultra to live in.

That changed over the years. Now the Wiehre is at the top in terms of the satisfaction of its residents. Look at the Herdern ranking now. 

Gallia est omnis divisa in partes tres, and so is the Wiehre: Unterwiehre (lower), Mittelwiehre (middle), and Oberwiehre (upper).

©City of Freiburg

On the map, the Mittelwiehre is the centered dark blue area. Note the train station at the bottom. The Unterwiehre is on the left, and the Oberwiehre is on the right.

©VAG

Public transport is excellent. The Stadtbahn (streetcar) serves the Oberwiehre by the red line 1, the Mittelwiehre by the green line 2, and the Unterwiehre by the orange line 3.

The small advantage of the Oberwiehre over the Mittelwiehre is undoubtedly related to its large shopping center Zentrum Oberwiehre.

In the Mittelwiehre, the stores with the most essential goods for daily needs are within my walking distance, but the sales areas are small, and the shopping experience is diminished by this narrowness.

©Wiehrgefühl

Cafés are plentiful. Kaisers Gute Backstuberuns the Café Wiehrgefühl*, the most pleasant place to sit and sip your coffee.

*Play of words with Wir-Gefühl (feeling of togetherness)

With all these conveniences, I use my car very little. It serves me well on my infrequent trips to France and helps when buying larger quantities of bottles in a distant supermarket.

Mittel- and Oberwiehre are located at the foot of the Black Forest and are popular urban neighborhoods because of their hiking opportunities. The train station Wiehre of the Höllentalbahn (hell valley train) leaving for the Black Forest is within 4 minutes of walking distance from my apartment.

Unfortunately, Red Baron is no longer fit for long walks, but I consistently fulfill my daily 30 minutes of forced walking.

*

Sponge City

The other day I read the German word Schwammstadt. Then I remembered Sponge Bob lives in Bikini Bottom, not Sponge City. Confused, I looked on the Internet:

The term "sponge cities" is used to describe urban areas with abundant natural areas such as trees, lakes, and parks or other good designs intended to absorb rain and prevent flooding.

©frontiers

The building blocks of a sponge city for water management are retention in rain gardens and bioswales, infiltration into the soil, storage in reservoirs, purification in treatment plants, and final discharge into rivers.

Water harvesting (©Love Your Landscape)

The earliest "sponge" Red Baron remembers is the good old rain barrel.

Climate change means, on the one hand, severe droughts like in Germany's northeast and, on the other hand, floods due to intense (local) rainfall.

So water management becomes essential. When it rains, this rain must seep away, not run off. In cities, more open, green spaces are needed - facades and roofs must be greened so that water can be kept on site.

Greened living environments provide less hostile conditions for humans and animals in the impending hot and droughty summers. Sponge cities help us meet the challenges posed by extreme weather.

In a sponge city, spaces are created capable of absorbing large amounts of water and releasing it in a time-delayed manner.

Measures to be implemented are roads that are changed in the angle of inclination so that they can drain water in a targeted manner (stormwater roads). Other roads may be lowered to serve as detention roads. Finally, there are green roads, i.e., landscaped streets where water can percolate into plant beds, tree trenches, and swales next to the road.

Squares and parks are modified or redesigned as retention basins to hold as much water as possible. All these measures will provide better protection against extreme weather events.

Red Baron sees a problem in water losses due to evaporation. They increase exponentially with higher temperatures. So if a city "sponges" too much of the incoming rain, the final water discharge into rivers will be diminished.

In addition, cities not so efficient with sponging rain will use water from rivers. Counting in the reduced meltdown of shrinking glaciers will lower the water levels of rivers.

Last summer, we experienced such a situation with the Rhine River hampering navigation considerably. Due to the low water levels, ships transporting fossil fuels or building materials could only be loaded half, increasing transport costs significantly.

Creating sponges for water retention is good but will not compensate for climate change, along with its little rain and high temperatures.

*

A Leopard Is Not a Tiger

©Twitter

Today he stopped "scholzing" crossing a red line. During a parliamentary question time at the German Bundestag (parliament), Chancellor Olaf Scholz announced that Germany would deliver 14 Leopard 2 version A6 tanks to Ukraine. The number corresponds to one company.

 
Finally, the caged Leopards are freed, but German tanks on Ukrainian soil? They were last seen in the Battle of Kursk 80 years ago, in August 1943. A nightmare: German Tiger against Russian T 34, and now Leopard against T 90. 

Until today, the delivery of battle tanks to Ukraine was hanging, a cat-and-mouse game. Our chancellor, internationally derided as a cunctator, procrastinated for a long time. Still, he used his time to forge behind the scene an alliance of Western NATO countries for tank deliveries. Poland had jumped the gun with its announcement to supply a company of Leopard 2 to Ukraine. Now the willing members of the NATO tank coalition (Poland, Finland, the Netherlands, Norway, and Spain) are to provide a total of two battalions, about 90 Leopard 2, to Ukraine. Germany will take over the training of the crews and the logistics of the supply.

At the same time as Olaf Scholz, the Americans announced they would deliver 31 Abrams tanks, while previously, they had hidden behind the argument that this war equipment was too complicated to be usefully deployed in Ukraine.

 

Unloading of Abrams at Gdynia harbor on December 3, 2022 (©tnv24).

Wait a minute. Poland is in the process of receiving 250 M1A2SEPv3 Abrams main battle tanks since the end of 2022. In addition to the battle tanks, the procurement package includes support vehicles, packages for training (including simulators), logistics, and large ammunition stocks. Poland shares a long border with Ukraine, which would facilitate the resupply and repair of Abrams tanks in Ukraine, so the US' initial rejection was probably just a sham.

©ZDF

Olaf Scholz's intention from the beginning was to forge a broad alliance and, above all, to get the Americans, Germany's nuclear protection shield, into the NATO boat.

 
And so it already sounded today from Putin's mouth that the Americans were fomenting the Ukrainian war to bring Russia to its knees. At the same time, he said, "Germans in their American-occupied country are only vicarious agents of the United States." Are we out of Russia's sight, or does Putin want to keep the German door open?

And as was to be expected: after the tank deal was concluded, new demands for heavy warfare equipment, such as F-16 fighter jets and Tornados, immediately came from Ukraine. Chancellor Scholz stated in the Bundestag, "No fighter jets will be delivered to Ukraine, and NATO ground troops are an absolute no-go."

How long will it take before these red lines are crossed as well?

*

Raffelhüschen

Bernd Raffelhüschen is a German economist and, since 1995, has been a Professor of Finance at the Albert Ludwigs University of Freiburg. His primary research focuses on the determinants of life satisfaction in the context of happiness research.

On November 21, 2022, Bernd Raffelhüschen talked at the Museumsgesellschaft about Public debt, inflation, and low interest rates: An explosive charge for the economy and social affairs!

I only received the slides of his talk yesterday. So here are some of the most relevant graphics Professor Raffelhüschen showed during his presentation.

Germany's national debt is 2.381 billion euros compared to the 30.569 billion U$ of the States. The value for Germany corresponds to 72.5% of its gross national product, while in the United States, this figure amounts to 122.1% of the BNP. Subsequently, each German citizen carries a debt of 29.000 euros, whereas, in the US, the number is around 90.400 $ per capita.

To limit expenses and avoid excessive debts, governments take measures. While the US has a debt ceiling*, Germany has a Schuldenbremse (dept brake), i.e., a balanced budget amendment.

*soon to be raised? 

The Schuldenbremse is a constitutional rule requiring that the government cannot spend more money than comes in. The Bundestag (parliament) voted to suspend the debt brake for two years to cope with the extra expenses during the Covid pandemic. 

Still, Germany seems better off in debt than the US, but looking at the demographic pyramid should give us Germans the creeps. Who will pay for the Gesetzliche Rente (statutory pension scheme) in the future?

Today, the contribution to the Altersrente (old age pension) is 9.3% of your income, to which your employer adds another 9.3%. In case of a fixed contribution plan, i.e., the 18.6% are kept, the present pension level of 48% of your last salary will drop to 36% for those retiring in 2070 (green curve LHS).

If, on the other hand, the German government tries to keep the overall pension level at 48%, the contribution to the pension fund must be increased to more than 26% of the income (blue curve RHS).

Another way to finance the Rentenlücke (pension gap) is taxpayers' money. This is already done. In 2020, the federal subsidy to the pension fund already surpassed 100 billion euros annually, with a rising trend in the future.

Another problem in the future will be the Gesetzliche Krankenversicherung (statutory health insurance), which covers 90% of the German population. Currently, the general contribution rate for statutory health insurance is 14.6% of your income. Half, i.e., 7.3%, is contributed by the employee, and the other half by the employer.

In all countries, healthcare services are under cost pressure. Maintaining the status quo will increase the state health insurance contribution to 20% in 2060 while giving in to pressure will increase this number to nearly 28%.

I doubt the American social security system and Obamacare will see those dramatic developments.

What is the best way to care for old age? Raffelhüschen's four recommendations are, "Don't put all your eggs in one basket!"

 

The best long-term investment is stocks, which return 5% after inflation. They are still the best choice compared to bonds or real estate.

Inflation developed strongly after years of zero interest rates and price stability in the eurozone.

Primarily due to energy costs, producer prices for commercial products rose by nearly 46% from January 2021 to September 2022, while consumer prices in the eurozone reached a record increase of 10%. Energy will remain expensive, so high inflation will stay with us in the coming months.

The reasons for the present situation - the Corona pandemic and the war in Ukraine - are apparent, but one factor usually needs to be included: the quantity of money in circulation.

Due to the Corona epidemic, the European Central Bank (ECB) has increased the amount of currency by a factor of two. 


Yesterday, a lady visited Red Baron to ask him about his happiness in life. This poll continued a series of interviews I undergo every second year. I assume the data are also used in Professor Raffelhüschen's study on the happiness of living in a particular region in Germany.

With personal data collected all over Germany, Raffelhüschen publishes a Glücksindex presented on the map above.

The state of Schleswig-Holstein has the happiest people, with an index of happiness of 7.44, while the south of Baden, with Freiburg, stays in the middle range, with a Glücksindex of nearly 7.

May it remain so.

*

Bobblehead or Bobbele?

Yesterday, on January 7, the US commemorated National Bobblehead Day (?). 

Red Baron had to look it up. Bobbleheads* are figurines with a disproportionately large head mounted on a spring so that it bobs up and down, often made as a caricature of famous persons.
*They are known as bobble heads, bobble head dolls, bobbing heads, bobbleheads, moving heads, nodders, nodding heads, and wobblers. In the UK, bobble head dolls are often called nodding dolls.

Present-day bobbleheads originated in Germany, while ancient Japanese and Chinese string dolls are considered precursors to the German style of bobblehead dolls*. They were made of ceramic, and production began in the late 1700s and early 1800s.
*Bobblehead dolls are believed to date back to the Russian writer Nikolai Gogol, who mentioned them in his short story "The Overcoat" in 1842.

Bobbleheads must be distinct from the Freiburg Bobbele. The original narrative is that a real Bobbele must have been born in Freiburg's Elisabeth Hospital and to Freiburg-born parents. 

Bobbele certificate (©BZ)

Peter Kalchthaler, director of the Museum of City History, thinks this is nonsense because the hospital only existed from 1928 to 2002. 

Why was Germany's tennis icon Boris Becker from Leimen in northern Baden dubbed a Bobbele?* Well, in German, a cuddly little child is sometimes called Bobbel or Bobbele.
*Long, long ago

"We don't know where the Freiburg Bobbele comes from," continues Kalchthaler, "my theory is that it goes back to Franz Joseph Bob. Bob was the first principal of the regulated elementary school, which was introduced in Freiburg in 1773."

Be it as it may. Both Bobbleheads and Bobbele are cute.

Fictional character Bobbele (©chili-freiburg)

Chocolate Bobbele (©Café Schmidt)

*

Modern Food?

A picture gallery on Facebook with food invented after World War II caught my attention. As German foods, the Currywurst and the Döner Sandwich are mentioned.

Click to enlarge.

Let's see what the ChatGTP Writing Assistant knows about Currywurst:

Currywurst is a beloved German dish that has become a part of the country's cultural identity. The dish is made up of steamed pork sausage, usually served with a generous helping of ketchup, curry powder, and a sprinkle of paprika. It is a simple yet flavorful dish that can be enjoyed as a snack or a meal.

The dish has its origins in post-war Germany when a woman named Herta Heuwer began selling it in her street stall in 1949. She created the recipe by combining curry powder, ketchup, and Worcestershire sauce to make a flavorful sauce to top the sausage. The dish quickly gained popularity and is now a staple of German cuisine.

Currywurst is typically served with French fries or a roll and can be found in almost any German restaurant or street food stall. It is also a popular item to take away and is often consumed on the go.

This is swarm knowledge, possibly from Wikipedia, intelligently and artificially composed. Students no longer have to copy from the Internet but can also have their copied texts composed. I understand why New York City school officials issued the following warning:

"DO NOT USE CHATGPT OR ANY OTHER AUTOMATED WRITING TOOL FOR SCHOOL PAPERS. THIS IS CHEATING AND WILL NOT BE TOLERATED. IF YOU ARE CAUGHT USING CHATGPT OR ANY OTHER AUTOMATED WRITING TOOL FOR SCHOOL PAPERS, THERE WILL BE SERIOUS CONSEQUENCES."

Here are three references to Red Baron's original blogs on Currywurst: The history of the Currywurst, a career built on the seasoned sausage, and its impact on Freiburg.


Let us switch to the Döner Sandwich relying on the "döner kebap," which literally means "rotating roast" in Turkish. 

The origin of the Döner goes far back to the 19th century. The German Wikipedia has the following story: On June 16, 1836, Helmuth von Moltke, military advisor to the Ottoman Empire,  wrote in his diary, "We took our midday meal quite Turkish at the Kiebabtschi. ... Then on a wooden disc appeared the kiebab, or small pieces of mutton, roasted on a spit and wrapped in bread dough, a delicious, tasty dish."

Indeed Döner is a type of kebab that has been popular in Europe for centuries. It is made of thin slices of lamb, beef, chicken, or a combination of the three. The meat is cooked on a vertical rotisserie and thinly sliced off the spit. Döner is usually served with various sauces such as garlic sauce, tahini, and yogurt. It is also often served with vegetables, such as cucumbers, tomatoes, and onions.

What changed was that vendors offered the above dishes in a wrap of pita bread. So in Germany, the Döner Sandwich became the popular choice for take-out and street food.

According to Wikipedia, the modern sandwich variant of döner kebab originated and was popularized in 1970s West Berlin by Turkish immigrants.

Although this was recognized by the Berlin-based Association of Turkish Doner Manufacturers in 2011, there is fierce contestation on the real origin of the Döner Sandwich.


Regarding the other foods, I would like to comment on the Hawaiian pizza with ananas created by Sam Panopoulos, a Greek-born Canadian in Chatham, Ontario, in 1962. Pizza and ananas is a nogo.

The Hawaiian pizza is related to Toast Hawaii, once popular in Germany. It consists of a slice of toast with cooked ham and cheese and a maraschino cherry in the middle of a pineapple slice. The whole is broiled so that the cheese starts to melt. A German TV cook Clemens Wilmenrod "invented" the Hawaiian Toast as early as 1950.

On the other hand, the year when and where Tiramisu was served for the first time is controversial.

Aubert's Tiramisu delicious

The best Tiramisu in Freiburg you enjoy at a small restaurant, "Grüner Baum (Green Tree)," near my apartment.

 
Until now, the restaurant's patron, Richard Aubert, was famous for his Piccata Milanese. The German Wikipedia knows: Piccata Milanese (a cutlet breaded with breadcrumbs and Parmesan cheese and served with spaghetti and tomato sauce) is an invention from the United States (?).

On the other hand, according to a legend, Field Marshal Radetzky brought the recipe from Italy to Vienna in 1857 when Milano belonged to the Austrian Empire. The Cotoletta alla Milanese is a breaded and fried cutlet made of veal. It ought to be the model of the Wiener Schnitzel, which sadly is missing one crucial ingredient, the Parmesan cheese.

*

R.I.P. Benedikt XVI

The Italiens called him Papa Ratzi, his colleagues a giant of faith and of reason. Joseph Ratzinger, aka Pope Benedict XVI, was one of the most brilliant minds. Even the agnostic Peruvian Nobel Prize winner for literature, Mario Vargas Llosa, regards him as "probably the most educated and intelligent pope the church has had in a long time."

Much is written or shown in the news about Benedict's pontificate, so I shall mention two details that impressed me.

When Joseph was elected pope on April 19, 2005, he suddenly became "Bishop of Rome, Successor of the Prince of the Apostles, Vicar of Christ on earth, Supreme Pontiff of the Universal Church, Primate of Italy, Patriarch of the Occident, Sovereign of the Vatican State and Servant of the Servants of God."

As a "simple" worker in the vineyard of the Lord, he felt "hit" but rejected the idea of refusing the election, "If He charges me with it, He must also help me with it." Nevertheless, later he complained, "If normal bishops are to stop at 75, then you can't have the bishop of Rome start at 78."

It struck me like lightning unexpectedly when Benedict XVI retired on February 28, 2013. It was the first resignation of a pontiff since Celestine V in 1294. From now on, Benedict began "as a simple pilgrim the last stage of his journey on this earth," and he confessed, "I am inwardly on the pilgrimage home."

The official reason for Benedict's retirement was his physical and mental decay, although I think he was simply tired of fighting the windmill wings of the Vatican hierarchy and bureaucracy. Had he a lack of knowledge of human nature, and was he a victim of dubious advisors? He admitted that he had repeatedly recognized too late "that there are also lousy fish in Peter's net."

In the end, he was not the renewer of the Church that many had hoped for, but he remained a shy scholar and theology professor all his life.

Nevertheless, his successor Francis praised him, "Benedict XVI was a great pope, great for his outstanding intelligence; great for his significant contribution to theology; great for his love for the Church and for people." And last but not least, "he was great for his virtues and his faith."

It was apparent that when Benedict retired, he was mentally clear. His life's work, a biography of Jesus, he had finished in 2012 still as a pontiff and well before his death. Thus he hastened to say that these books were in no way to be seen as ecclesiastical but were solely the expression of his personal search for the face of the Lord (Psalm 27,8).

Benedict's opus magnum at the Herder publisher

Red Baron bought the three volumes with the intention of studying them before his death. Having read so many works on and about Jesus, will Benedict give me new insights?

The second detail that impressed me is a paragraph Joseph Ratzinger wrote in 1968 about the strive of the agnostic in his book Einführung in das Christentum (Introduction to Christianity):

The believer, as well as the unbeliever, have, each in his own way, a share in doubting and in believing if they do not hide from themselves and from the truth of their being. No one can completely escape doubt, and no one can completely escape faith; for the one, faith becomes present against doubt; for the other, faith becomes present through doubt, i.e., in the form of doubt. It is the basic quality of human destiny to find the finality of one's existence only in this unending rivalry of doubt and faith, of contestation and certainty." 

During his visit to Germany in 2011, he commented in a homily in Freiburg on the idea of 1968. Benedict re-interpreted it in the context of the Church hierarchy, "Agnostics who are driven by the question of God (...) are closer to the kingdom of God than routine people who see in the church only the apparatus without their hearts being touched by faith." What a consolation!

On the same occasion, Benedict reminded the Church in Germany to constantly struggle for the right balance. His demand, "to be as a Church in the world and part of this world, and at the same time give contemporary witness in a reflective, decisive and clear way," shows the dilemma of the proclamation of faith by the Church in today's time.

Devoted personal secretary, Archbishop Georg Gänswein, told the Vatican's official media, "Benedict XVI, with a faint voice but in a very distinct way, said his last words in Italian, 'Lord, I love you.'″

Ora et labora. Benedict, you have fought to the end.

*