Good Friday weather is lovely, so I come to wander around the Frankfurt “Palmengarten” for a while and forget the slight hangover from yesterday night. My plan was to lay on the grass, enjoy the perfumed fragrance
of blossoming flowers, and figure out my parents’ visit to Frankfurt. However, the quietness of the park and the relaxing sound of rushing water coming from the garden’s fountain made me fall asleep and almost screw up the whole plan.

“Don’t make such a big deal out of it” said my buddy yesterday night between a couple of biers. “It can’t be so difficult to show your parents the beauty of Frankfurt with such a nice weather”. I thought he had a point. He has lived here for ages and for quite long has exchanged his Hamburg identity for a Frankfurt one. I, however, have lived here for hardly half a year and
so far haven’t got to know so many places.

My parents live in Hannover and as I moved out I remember my cynical Berlin friends have teased me by saying I was leaving Germany’s third ugliest city to move in the second ugliest one. Once again my parents’ visit came to my mind and I forced myself to stop staring at the blue sky.

All good things must come to an end. Welcome to reality.

The way through the adjacent “Grueneburgpark” calmed me down somewhat and the hope to find a couple of worthy sites to show my parents around sprouted like a crop in spring. I made my way to the center of “Nordend” in a record pace, I took a glance at the skyline through “Reuterweg” which would certainly described quite enthusiastically by my father afterwards, and reached “Oederweg” in a rather good mood. What I have only dimly noticed so far, if not at all, is that there are really, I mean really nice places here in Frankfurt. Lost in such a thought I finally reached my apartment. I quickly turned on some music, so that
the whole tiding up wouldn’t spoil my mood.

Soon after came my parents. Trying to avoid a thoroughly check at my apartment we went right for a short sightseeing tour and ended up with a pleasant walk along the Main river. In direction to “Hauptwache” we passed by the “Eschenheimer Turm”, one of the town’s landmarks.

“It’s amazing how fast one can get into the city” said my mum, “Frankfurt has a comfortable size”. At this point we could hear my father growling how happy he is, it takes a bit longer to walk to next shoe shop in Hanover.

The “Fressgasse” on our way to the “Alte Oper” astonished my father to the extent that we could hardly stop him from stepping into almost each of the delicatessen stores along the street. He could not resist to take a picture with his new digital camera of the opera house “Alte Oper” and its legendary inscription “Dem Wahren, Schönen, Guten” (Dedicated “to the True, the Beautiful and the Good”) that once inspired the Frankfurt poet Adolf Stoltze.

We walked across the old part of the city (with the “Römer” and the old cathedral “Dom”), a half square kilometre surface that leads you directly to the promenade along the Main. “A city with a river, that really makes a difference” said my mum, and for the first time it came down to me, that she was totally right.

Many people wandered along the river, that serves as a natural barrier between the old part of the city and “Sachsenhausen”.
For many kilometres one can pass by a bunch of Museums, beautiful houses and bridges. “Only here along the river there are
as much as 13 museums” I told my parents “and it’s one of the most famous areas in Germany concerning museums”.
Then my father enquired how many of those I’ve already visited and if they were appealing to me even when it was not
“Museumsuferfest” festival.

After pacing up and down the Main we ended up in a ship restaurant. It seemed one could almost cruise along the Main. My father ordered a bier but he was politely told by the service that they only served “Ebbelwoi”. “You only serve what? asked he. “That’s applewine, a sort of cider” I explained. “You can drink it acid or sweet”. “That sounds delicious, we’ll have one” said my mum. Then we calmed my father down a little bit by promising we’ll drink a nice bier in the evening anywhere else.

He emptied his glass and commented on the “Schöne Aussicht” -beautiful view-, that’s the name of the side walk as a matter of fact: “It’s really nice here, this marvellous view of the Cathedral in contrast to the modern building of the Commerzbank”.

He would have gone on like that if I hadn’t pointed out that only the previous week he had told me on the phone he had no idea he could be offered by a city like Frankfurt at all. Meanwhile, my mother was keeping herself busy with the second glass of cider, entirely pleased. I leaned back satisfied and I’d got the feeling to have come a step closer to Frankfurt. The tepid spring wind together with the “Ebbelwoi” made my mum ask my father the venturous question if he could picture themselves moving to Frankfurt.

My father and I looked at each other, certainly with totally different thoughts in our minds…

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