When I got off the train in Frankfurt I saw a strange sight walking down the quay in front of me: a purposeful young man in a silver-buttoned vest, black suit, black bowler hat, silver-tipped cane, and what looked like all his belongings wrapped in a colorful kerchief slung across his back. I knew immediately what he was, although I hadn't seen one for years—a journeyman or Geselle wandering from place to place for work for three years. During that time, they must not come within fifty kilometers of home. It's a medieval tradition that Germany has kept alive, along with kissing a top-hatted chimneysweep 
for good luck and hanging a wreath above the doors of apple-wine restaurants (this last is a Frankfurt specialty).
Just afterwards I saw another quaint German sight, a traditionally dressed train conductor with a red hat and a huge handlebar mustache, smiling as he flirted with a pretty girl. I smelled the Brezen (large salt pretzels) and sausages and saw a big billboard for the Munich Oktoberfest: "O'zapft is!" which means "The beer is on tap" in Bavarian dialect. Sometimes I love Germany.
Comments