Flat plains drifter…Germany #22

It’s one of those raincoat & sunglasses type of days with the odd “ fuck me here’s an enormous downpour better jump into a bar” episodes thrown in.The good thing about being in the Altstadt Düsseldorf is there’s never an excuse to get caught out by the rain as there’s bars everywhere…and sometimes something weird might happen like just now a photographer ( Polish fella) came over to ask if he could take a pic of me for his portfolio.I laughed and asked why and he said my face has character( ie an auld fucker) but he insisted I didn’t smile( exude dahlink ! No he didn’t say that) anyway I was chuffed and the pic was good too…gonna check out his instagram page later…

Anyway after 30 seconds of being an unwitting victim of the paparazzi the rain’s coming in again so it looks like I’m stuck here for a wee bit…

I am in a different part of  Düsseldorf than normal.Still relatively close to the Hauptbahnhof but slightly rougher than where I’d usually stay.First thing I noticed was outside the station they’d cleared away a lot of the street people.Turns out they’d moved on to close to where I’m staying.Probably half a dozen little groups of around thirty altogether.They didn’t trouble me at all as I walked through them…this city does seem to have a fair problem with those that have fallen through the cracks for one reason or another.To be fair probably no more or less than many but they’re more visible here…which is especially true as you sit outside one of the bars in the Altstadt…

Something I saw today rankled with me though.As I was walking up a narrow alley there was a church at the end with a funeral taking place.The coffin was just being driven off and the mourners were milling around outside no doubt waiting to follow.I stood back out of respect not wanting to barge through but then I noticed not ten feet away from the mourners two beggars holding cups out towards them.Now if people are genuinely homeless I have sympathy however sometimes it’s not about you and there’s a thing called reading the room.I know many people who would have been justified in twatting the fuckers…

This all sounds like I’m having a pop at Düsseldorf but far from it.This is my fifth or sixth visit over the years so clearly I have a lot of love for the city but neither am I going to paper over the cracks of it‘s evident problems…oddly enough just had to tell someone off who tried to bother me whilst eating.This time though it was a god botherer trying flog me stuff…haha I’m going to hell…

There’s some loud English types in the bar at the moment.Probably starting a crawl that might not extend past this stretch( maybe 40 bars) meanwhile I’m hanging around until my favourite little Düsseldorf shithole opens in about an hour so I can talk football with the English barman.Unfortunately he’s a Chelsea fan but I’m just gonna have to suck that fact up…

It was good to see Gary and be in the Auberge bar again.Luckily we didn’t discuss football much but when he inevitably bought up the subject of Chelsea being world club champions I had to remind him as Trump hijacked the whole ceremony the title really belongs to him…anyway the Auberge bar is like a smaller version of the Giffard in Wolverhampton but with less frills…

That’s it for today my lovelies…see ya.