My Unusual Rome Vacation

End of March saw us go on a much needed holiday. We visited Italy for the first time, flew directly to Venice, spent two days there, and took the train to Florence, two nights there, then train to Rome…

My rakhi brother lives in Rome and I had not seen him for over 7 years. I had been corresponding with him ever since we decided that we were going to visit Italy. He is in the travel business and gave us sound advice. He suggested our itinerary and told us what we should not miss seeing etc., He also arranged our train reservations, and booked our advance museum passes. He had asked us to let us know our train arrival time in Rome as he wanted to send us a car and driver.

I was a bit taken aback, thinking that it was not safe to take a taxi in Rome, as we had been doing in the other cities. He said – No it was perfectly safe to take a taxi, but I need not worry about it, as the person he was going to send was just a private taxi service.

So we got off at the main railway station in Rome and there was a man in a suit standing at the head of the platform holding a placard with our name on it. Once we identified ourselves to him, he took our luggage and led us to a beautiful Mercedes van. Anand had really gone overboard and booked us into the Waldorf Astoria in Rome and the driver brought us to our hotel in style.

We rang my brother after checking into our beautiful hotel room - it was a huge room with a separate sitting and working area and a balcony outside with seating which looked out over the city of Rome, as the hotel was on one of the seven hills of the city…

Next day again on the advice of my brother, we got up early, breakfasted and then took a taxi to the Vatican Museum and reached there before it opened. We only had a 15 mt wait and were able to enter the Museum.




The Museum is so large that we followed the advice in the Frommer’s guide to Italy which said to concentrate on exhibits that appealed to us. Since we had got there first thing in the morning, it was a little less crowded and had a wonderful time seeing all our preferred exhibits.




The Sistine Chapel containing Michelangelo’s most famous fresco painting on the ceiling was of course breath taking but it was almost claustrophobic with a large number of people including tour groups all crowded together in such a small space.



After the Museum, my brother had suggested visiting St. Peter’s and then the Dome to see the view of the city. We walked to St. Peter’s and found that the queue of people waiting to enter the church, was all around the circular piazza and queuing down the centre of the piazza. It looked like a 2 – 3 hr waiting time to enter the church.

I called my brother and he said that he would come and meet us at the piazza and we could go to lunch and then visit St. Peter’s in the afternoon. So he came and met us and took us to his office nearby. We met his assistant and then we went out to lunch at a nearby trattoria. We caught up with each others news for over two hours over lunch…

After the long leisurely lunch we walked back to St. Peter’s Piazza and found that the queue was 1/4th the size that we had seen before lunch and we were able to enter the Basilica quite quickly. Of course the interior of St. Peter’s is awesome. The very first thing you notice as you enter the Basilica is of course Michelangelo’s Pieta – the sculpture is so lifelike that it is difficult to imagine that it is carved out of marble. These days it is behind a bullet-proof acrylic panel after someone attacked it with a hammer in 1972.



We wandered down to the famous Bernini’s Baldachin or bronze canopy over the main altar.


It is amazing to see such a huge structure made out of bronze above the altar, but in St. Peter’s it does not seem to be out of place, due to the sheer size of the Basilica…In fact we felt dwarfed inside the Basilica and were not overwhelmed by the sheer number of chapels, marble sculptures, reliefs and paintings. No wonder it is the largest of any Christian church in the world and can accommodate 60,000 + people.

After we visited the Basilica, we rushed to join the queue to climb the Dome (which was Michelangelo’s design as well), before it closed for the day and were lucky enough to be admitted. We took the elevator as far as it went and then climbed the remaining steps to the top. At one point you could enter a gallery inside the Basilica high above the altar and I was pleasantly surprised by my first view of the Pope. He was celebrating Holy Thursday Mass with a small congregation in the chancel at the back of the main altar of the church.

We continued our walk to the top and had a magnificent view of the beautiful St. Peter’s Square or Piazza outside the Basilica, the Papal residence and gardens inside the Vatican and of course the city of Rome all spread out in front of you.


We then walked down Via della Conciliazone the main street in front of St. Peter’s Piazza towards the Castel d’Santangelo which held the remains of many Roman emperors. We walked along the Tiber River and tried to reach Piazza Barberini - the hotel shuttle pick up point. As we were tired after being out the entire day, we stopped and ate dinner at a restaurant on the way before taking a cab back to the hotel.


Next day my brother sent us a car and driver to show us all the important sights in Rome. Christian our driver first took us to Piazza Navona which has two well known fountains. The most famous one is Bernini’s Fountain of the Four Rivers which has four God like figures representing the major rivers of the world known at that time – namely the Nile, Danube, Ganges and Plate topped by an Obelisk. In the same Piazza is also the Fountain of Neptune which is a carving of Neptune struggling with an Octopus in the centre of the fountain with walruses and cupids in the basin.



He then took us to the Pantheon, which is one of the best preserved of all the Roman buildings. The piazza around the Pantheon is pedestrian, so Christian took us to an alley at the side of the Pantheon. At his recommendation we first tried a small espresso at what he called the best coffee house in Rome – the traditional way, no milk in a tiny cup. Definitely gives you a double shot of energy for the rest of the day. It was in this bakery that we first saw the brightly wrapped Uova di Pasqua – chocolate Easter eggs. Most of them are made of milk chocolate and usually contained a surprise. They ranged in size from 10 gms to 8 kgs.

We then walked through the short alley and turned left and there was the Pantheon beside us. It was astonishing that other structures have been built so close to these old buildings that we almost stumbled upon it before we realized that it was the Pantheon.

It is amazing to see that such an awesome structure was built so many hundreds of years ago and with such perfect symmetry. The dome of the Pantheon (said to be the inspiration for St. Peter’s Dome) is open to the sky and the floor has been laid with an angle towards the centre to let the water falling through the opening in the dome to drain away…It is consecrated as a church and maybe that is why it survived destruction for all these years.

Christian then drove us to the Campidoglio – a beautiful square in front of the Capitoline Museum again designed by Michelangelo with perfect symmetry.



We then stepped out of the car and walked beside the Roman Forum and Imperial Forum to the Colosseum and walked around the Colosseum. Christian picked us up on the far side and took us to a spot to view the Circus Maximus - training ground for the gladiators who were chosen to perform at the Colosseum. The gladiators walked through a tunnel to the Colosseum so that they were not visible to the spectators until they entered the Colosseum.

Next he drove us to the Knights of Malta headquarters in Rome. If you peek through the keyhole of the Knights of Malta garden, you see a garden path ending in bushes perfectly framing the dome of St. Peter’s in the distance which is definitely a surprise. Next we went to the church of Santa Maria in Cosmedin. In a small gallery at the entrance of the church against one wall is a statue of a lion with its mouth open called La Bocca della Verita. Legend goes that if a liar puts their hand into the mouth of the lion, they will lose it. You might remember it from the movie - Roman Holiday where Gregory Peck scares Audrey Hepburn by pretending that his hand was bitten off…Well both of us decided to put our hands in the lion’s mouth by turn and had our pictures taken for posterity.

Christian then drove us to the famous Spanish steps and the Trevi Fountain. Both places were crowded when we visited. We had really good weather when we visited Rome and of course this would result in a large number of visitors to these attractions. Christian kept reassuring us that it was not yet tourist season, I would shudder to think how many more people would be there during tourist season.

Trevi Fountain is a beautiful fountain with a palace in the background – I think presently being used as government offices. The central piece is a chariot in the shape of a shell drawn by seahorses guided by Triton. Before the central niche stands Oceanus and Abundance and Salubrity are to the side. It is said that if you throw a coin into the Trevi fountain over your shoulder you are bound to return to Rome. I just wish I could enjoy its beauty with fewer people around.

We went to lunch in the old Jewish quarter at a beautiful Italian restaurant. Since my brother had called ahead, we were seated at the last available table on the outside of the restaurant and enjoyed an authentic Italian meal. My brother had asked Christian to bring us back to his office after lunch as he had got tickets for us to attend a service in St. Peter’s. We were dumbstruck as we had not thought of such a thing at all.

After lunch Christian drove us back to my brother’s office, we picked up the tickets and then Christian drove us to St. Peter’s Piazza. Again the crowd of people waiting to enter the church was all around the piazza and coming down the centre of the piazza. I showed my tickets to a couple of policemen standing at the periphery of the piazza and they told me that I had to join the queue like all the rest of the people there.

It seems these tickets could not be bought, but one had to reserve them online over two weeks before and they were long gone. My brother through his connections had got us two of them. There were many religious in the queue – priests and nuns from all over the world and of course thousands of people as well. The queue seemed to move slowly as there are elaborate security checks before you enter St. Peter’s. It was almost 5.00 pm when we were ushered into the Basilica.

We saw that the main body of the church or the elongated cross was full – half with cardinals and bishops and the rest with people. We were led to the left arm of the cross which was also full, then the ushers showed us to the back of the cross i.e. the place behind the famous Baldachin or main altar of the Basilica where one normally is not allowed to enter at all. We were in the third row open to the public – there were about 8 rows ahead of the public rows, but only the clergy and altar servers and choir were seated there.

The pope and his attendants were sitting on a platform in the front of the main altar against a side wall, so we had a nice profile view of him throughout the ceremony. The Passion Service which began @ 5:00 pm was entirely in Latin, but thankfully they gave each one of us a booklet and we could follow along and during ¾ of the service the Pope is standing on the dais for the readings. When it was turn for the Communion service, he came behind the altar and at that point we saw him at the closest. Anand has several pictures of the Pope serving communion and of me with St. Peter’s Chair against the back wall of the Basilica.

Anand was telling his family later that he had never entered a church before for a worship service and the first time he broke this rule is when he received a pass for St. Peter’s Basilica and how could one turn down that kind of offer. In the courtyard of St. Peter’s is a gift shop and a Post office. I bought two cards and sent it off to my parents in India and my sister in the US with the stamp of St. Peter’s. We were on such a high after that experience that we just went and had dinner and went back to the hotel.

Next morning my brother had reserved tickets for us to visit the Borghese Gallery at the Villa Borghese set among a beautiful garden. The Borghese Gallery is filled with beautiful statues, sculptures and paintings. We fell in love with some of the sculptures Bernini’s Apollo and Daphne, Pluto & Proserpina, his David and another one titled Truth Unveiled by Time. Many many famous paintings as well – to name a few – Carvaggio’s – David with the head of Goliath; Raphael’s – the Deposition; Jacob Bessano – the Last Supper.

After our visit to the Gallery we walked along the famous Via Veneto to the Piazza Barberini – finally stumbling on this square two days after we had gone in search of it. This piazza has another of Bernini’s fountains - the Triton Fountain – four fish hold an open clam upon which Triton sits (a mythical sea God with the body of a human and tail of a fish), blowing water from his horn…

We then took a taxi to the Colosseum…We had to stand in queue of course to buy tickets and this took some time, but at least the queue moved quickly…Standing inside the Colosseum (even though more than half of it is in ruins) one can still very vividly imagine how vast this structure which was built so many thousands of years ago was and the huge number of people who would have stood in the very same spots that we were standing…


We wandered all around the Colosseum and looked at the tunnels which were partially excavated and the best stands in the house – where the Emperor and his guests would have been seated etc.,

We left the Colosseum and walked to the Palatine Hill which was nearby and best of all did not have to queue up again for tickets. Our Colosseum tickets also gained us entry to the Palatine Hill and the Roman and Imperial Forum. Rome as you know is built on seven hills and the Palatine Hill is the most central of all. This hill once had palaces of the emperors and even a temple dedicated to Apollo. At the moment these are mostly in ruins but the views overlooking the Circus Maximus and the Forums are very nice. Many people come here to have a picnic on the grounds.

The Roman Forum next door is one of the most important sights in Rome even though it is mostly in ruins. Thankfully our entrance ticket also provided us a good map, which allowed us to find the main points of interest without going on a guided tour. It might seem unbelievable when you’re looking at the ruins of the Roman Forum that such a small area could be so important, but it was the political, economic and religious centre of the ancient city of Rome and hence the entire Roman Empire.

Some of the buildings which you can see ruins of include temples dedicated to Saturn, Romulus (Rome’s legendary founder), Vesta (where the Vestal Virgins came from) and Caesar himself. There are triumphal arches built by some of Rome’s emperors, the house where the Vestal Virgins lived and the largest building in the Forum - the Basilica Maxentius, the Curia Julia – where the Roman Senate met – one of the more intact buildings. You can walk up to the door and see the intricate marble mosaic floor on which senators walked over 2000 years ago. Just walking on the cobbled streets of the Forum is like walking through time - you can still see the ruts made by chariot wheels on some of the stones. Even the funeral of Caeser is said to have taken place here. You will also find the Umbilicus Urbis – this was the designated centre of the city, from which the distance to all points in the Roman Empire were measured (Rome’s belly button!)

We entered the Roman Forum from the Palatine Hill end which is one of the entrances. We exited near the Capitoline Hill where the famous Capitoline Museums are located. In front of the Capitoline Museum is the Campidoglio Square. After having walked through so many places of interest that morning we had no energy to tackle the Capitoline Museum. We went back to the Pantheon neighbourhood to buy an Uova de Pasqua as we were invited to my brother’s house for dinner and were going to meet his wife and two little daughters for the first time…

We went back to the hotel, rested for a while and my brother had arranged for a car and driver to take us to his house. When we came to the entrance of the hotel we found Christian again waiting to take us to my brother's house. We had a wonderful time with my brother and his family. His little daughters were adorable and they made me Zia Annie within a few minutes of entering their home. They showed me their room and drew me pictures to take with me.

Next morning – our last day in Rome, it was raining. I abandoned my plans to go to Saint Peter’s for the Easter Service as it was going to be held outdoors and instead went to a neighbourhood church. After mass we decided to visit Castel Sant Angelo which is the tomb of the Emperor Hadrian. It was built as a mausoleum but also served as a fortress, a castle and now as a museum. It seems there is secret passage from the Vatican to the Castel Sant Angelo – but whether this is fact or fiction is not known. Again you can have a grand view of Rome from the garden on top of the mausoleum but because it was rainy we could not spend much time admiring the view.

By the time the Easter Service at St. Peter’s had just finished and Anand and I had an interesting time walking against the crowd towards St. Peter’s to buy rosaries for my family which I had forgotten on the two previous days that we had been there. Also because of the rain, we could not find any taxis for love or money and spent a scary hour trying to find a taxi to take us back to our hotel. We finally managed to return to the hotel, check out and leave for the airport in time for our flight back home….

Guardian Angels watching over me....

Guardian Angels watching over me….


Some people would prefer to call it glucklich or lucky but I prefer to believe in Guardian Angels watching over me. They have been working overtime ever since I got to Dusseldorf a few months ago. Here are a few instances I was convinced that they were especially looking out for me…

First was the week I successfully parallel parked on Nordstrasse at the first attempt as I had found a two car empty space. I was thrilled with myself that I did not have to reverse multiple times to squeeze between two cars and I was about to open the driver’s door and punch my fist in the air. Don’t know what instinct made me look in the driver’s side mirror and saw the tram approaching less than 1 ft behind my door – now this is a street which is open to two way tram traffic and only one way vehicular traffic and you park half on the pavement and half on the street. If I had opened the driver side door without looking the car door would have been history and I felt I had to thank my guardian angel for watching over me

Second time I followed a delivery truck into a pedestrian only plaza and got really wild stares from pedestrians who were walking there. I knew I was in trouble when the delivery truck parked and carried items into one of the stores and I found myself in a cul de sac with no exit.

I parked my car and walked into the first store that I saw. It was one selling infant clothes. Since my German was rudimentary, I explained my predicament in English. The store keeper could not understand me, but she found a colleague who could. I told her I was new to Dusseldorf and did not know my way around and had followed the delivery truck into the pedestrian zone.

Both of them conferred with each other and then the lady who could speak English told me to go out the opposite way and drive to my left and I would join the main road. I drove out in the direction that she had pointed and found myself on tracks which were solely for trams and not open to other vehicular traffic as they were doing some major renovation work on that stretch of the road. I had visions of encountering a tram going in the opposite direction and drove off with my heart in my mouth as there was no way to turn and go back. I reached a traffic light and found I was perpendicular to other traffic.

As soon as the traffic light turned green I made an illegal left turn to be on the same side as the rest of the traffic on the street. Was definitely sure that my guardian angel was looking out for me both on the tram tracks and at the traffic light and that is how I escaped becoming an accident statistic.

Third time I found two guardian angels in physical form. I was out doing my weekly errands – laundry, throwing away the different recycling items – paper, glass bottles etc., Some time back I had lost my wallet, so I was extra careful to lock the car door after I had the boot opened. I placed the car keys in the boot, so as not to accidentally throw it out with the items for recycling.

I threw away all the papers, cardboard and the coloured bottles in the different recycling bins and then shut the boot door with the keys safely in the boot of the car. So there I was locked out of my car with my handbag with wallet and phone sitting in the passenger seat of the car.

I must have looked totally shell shocked as I crossed the street and met a couple walking on the opposite side. I asked them if I could use their phone – they looked at my face and asked me what was wrong. I told them that my car was on the other side of the street and I had accidentally locked myself out of it. They asked what I would like to do and I said I wanted to call my husband who could give me his keys and I would be able to open the car door and drive away.

They asked how I would get the keys from my husband and I told them that I would take a cab there. They asked if his office was too far away and I said no, just 15 mts away and they offered to drive me there to get the keys as long as I could direct them. They were new to Dusseldorf like me and had arrived just 10 days earlier. They drove me to my husband’s office, where I collected the second set of keys and money for the cab and returned to pick up my car and went on my way to finish rest of my errands...

Changing to Winter time...

Europe changed to winter time one week before the US i.e. the last Sunday in October. Somehow Anand and I were not clued into it much at all. Maybe because we don’t know the language well, did not hear much comment on the radio or TV as we would have back in the US. Anand said he had not even been aware of it at work – (God I remember how paranoid we would be about our appointment calendars back in the US during the time change process).

So last Sunday – 25th Oct, we woke up at our usual time and did the morning routine, sit down breakfast with coffee etc., We wanted to visit a ceramic museum in town and we knew it opened at 11 am so took our bikes and reached there promptly @ 11.

The doors were of course shut – we looked at our watches and then decided to walk to the back of the building – thinking that we were at the wrong entrance. We did not have much luck when we got to the back of the building as well. Next door to the Ceramic museum was the Film museum and we saw some activity there – a lady was behind the ticket counter and there were a couple of other staff as well.

We went into the Film Museum to enquire what time the museum next door would open. The lady at ticket counter was getting ready for the day by counting notes and coins etc in her cash box. She took a break from counting and told us – elf uhr – which meant 11 o’clock. I showed her my watch and told her it was elf uhr and of course she went into an explanation in German – which I could not follow. She looked around and spotted a man having coffee and asked him to translate and he repeated what she had said in English. When we pointed out it was 11.10, he said no – it was only 10.10 as we had just turned back the clock by 1 hr.

We felt so stupid at our mistake and promptly changed our watches. We then wandered around the quiet streets of the old town or Altstadt till 11 am when we went back to the museum. It was more than worth our 1 hr wait to see the museum.

I guess the best thing about turning back the clock is that now when I walk Socks in the morning it is light at 7 am, but I hate it that it gets dark at 5.30 pm and I have to take her for her evening walk in the pitch dark. I guess the reason I hate the dark evenings is that there is no possibility of seeing light till the next morning….

Had a wonderful laugh early this morning....

I took Socks for a walk in the Hofgarten around 7.30 this morning. Met one of my friends returning from her morning walk with her two small dogs. As usual, the dogs always want to say HELLO to each other before moving on and the two of us started chit chatting. Just then another one of my neighbors’ joined us with her dog. I was introducing her to my friend in the park and told her that my neighbor had been here just ein monat. She asked us whether we were married to Germans. I told her no - my husband was Indian like me and my neighbor and her husband were Japanese.

She asked us what brought us to Dusseldorf and we told her our husband’s work. Next she asked how long we would be staying here and we told her about 2 – 3 years. She asked us if we didn’t mind that we had to move again in 2 – 3 years and we told her that we had been doing it for the last 20 – 30 years. She said that must be hard.

Her next comment was that our husbands should be paid well if they keep going to work in different parts of the world and that they should give us nice houses, pets to keep us company, waitresses (I think she meant maids) to help us adjust to moving around the world every 2 – 3 years.

I really laughed aloud at hearing her words. She thought it was only fair and asked us to pass on her compliments to our husbands. We wished her a schon tag and continued on our walk… I thought my early morning laugh was a wonderful way to begin the day..

Driving alongside trams in Dusseldorf

I grew up in Mumbai, India and am familiar with city trains but they always had their special tracks and the only time that vehicular traffic would interact with them is at railway crossings which have gates and lights and alarms which would open and close to allow the trains and road traffic to cross one another safely. This was similar to the other countries I lived in – US, Singapore and Japan.

However coming to live in Dusseldorf, I have had to learn to drive alongside trams on streets sometimes with scary results. My first experience of driving alongside them was my venture into Nordstrasse in the first week that I arrived here. I was in search of mundane things a dustban and brush, large towel for exercise etc.,

Parking along Nordstrasse is itself a nightmarish experience as I was re-learning to parallel park again after almost 4 years of never using this skill in the US. You also park seitenstreifen – which means half on the pavement half on the street. This is not helped by the fact that the street is only open for one way vehicular traffic but two way tram traffic. I had just managed to parallel park my car on the one available free space on the right side of the street, when the first tram came by. He patiently inched past my badly parked car. The second tram driver was not at all that polite. He came and stopped right beside my car and opened his window and rang his tinkling bell very much like a cycle bell.

I had to perforce roll down my window as well and he vociferously proceeded to tell me to tuck my car in further into the sidewalk all in German of course. Though I did not undertstand a word of what he said, his manner and demeanour was loud and clear. After another four attempts I managed to park my car with no inch of free space between the car tires on the right side and the sidewalk. I was so thrilled that when I returned home I posted on my FB page that I had successfully parallel parked my car.

On most streets which have tram traffic you see two sets of traffic lights at every signal. The first is the usual red, orange, green for vehicular traffic and the second is the same set of three lights but these light up with a white light - a horizontal line, a circle or vertical line. When we first arrived here we would notice these two sets of traffic lights at every junction. When my husband asked someone in the office they said we should not worry about the second set of lights just concentrate on the vehicular traffic lights.

But I learnt to my dismay that you very much had to pay attention to the tram traffic lights as well. When you drive beside trams on main streets – vehicular traffic is on the extreme right and left of the road while the tram traffic goes through the centre of the road. Often when there is a tram stop, there is a traffic light which lights up just behind the end of the tram with the words Linien verkherfrei (I guess literally means leave the road clear ahead for the tram stop) and this turns red and you stay behind this line so that the tram doors can safely open and take in or let out passengers who have been waiting on the sidewalk.

On one such occasion I found myself right beside the tram driver at the head of the tram both of us waiting for the traffic light to turn green. At this particular traffic light I had to make a left onto a main street and since there was no dedicated left turn signal as soon as the light turned green my usual practice was to go forward to the centre of the road and wait for a clearing in traffic from the opposite side before making the left turn. Most of the time I would only be able to complete the left turn when the lights were turning orange and the opposite traffic were slowing down in anticipation of the red light.

On this particular occasion on receiving the green light I made the usual move into the middle of the street to make a left turn. What I did not realize is that the tram driver had received the green light to move ahead as well in his case the vertical white light on the traffic signal and usually trams have the right of way in such situations. I unfortunately did not know this so was blocking the tram driver who needed to go straight across the main street to the opposite side. He was furious and kept ringing his little bell at me and I had no hopes of making a safe left turn until the last minute when the lights were turning orange and by then the tram driver had a stop signal as well.

My husband when I narrated this story had visions of getting summons in the mail for huge fines for having hindered tram traffic. I learnt a valuable lesson to look at the tram traffic lights as well when I am beside them at traffic junctions.

The neighbourhood I live in.....

The first time I thought that that the neighbourhood I live in was unusual was when my husband gave me instructions to drive to our new rental apartment. He said from the main road I should turn right into Arnoldstrasse and the landmark was a boutique selling wedding dresses called Veronica which was at the corner of the main road and Arnoldstrasse. Sure enough I saw the boutique first before seeing the street name due to its large picture windows which were all filled with mannequins displaying beautiful bridal dresses.

Once I had got familiar with driving to our new apartment I noticed that just two blocks around the apartment there were at least 6 if not more bridal boutiques with names such as Honeymoon, ATV Design, Braut Modern etc. Did not understand what the mystery was till we came to collect the keys to our rental apartment. We live two doors away from the City Registry office for marriages and births. Not sure whether the abundance of boutiques in my immediate neighbourhood is supposed to make people crave to get married and they can fulfill their desires by first buying or renting proper wedding gear before proceeding to the registry offices.

On the very next day after we collected the keys and the packers were busy unpacking all the doors and windows of the apartment were open, I could hear shouts and clapping sounds and found that I had ring side views of various groups of people going to the City Registry office for weddings. The ceremony itself is done inside the Registry offices but often the wedding parties stand on the pavement outside posing for pictures.

Other times since the Hofgarten is just across the street from the Registry offices, they put up tables and have champagne and music and hors d’ouvres etc., Living on the first floor and having a balcony which juts half way across the pavement below I get a bird’s eye view of all the events. Some weddings are simple with just the bride and groom and a couple of friends.

Others are more elaborate with families and friends and parties in the park. I have seen a fiddler serenading one of the wedding parties. Other times the bride and groom being driven by someone in full livery and a top hat in a decorated cycle rickshaw in the park. Often at the end of the festivities the group of cars with the wedding party will go honking down the street to announce the happy event.

All in all I think we have found a happy neighbourhood to live in as both weddings and babies celebrate life.

Navigating underground car parks in Dussseldorf....

I am very glad that living in Singapore taught me to reverse park. Almost every commercial building you went to in Singapore, you would find signs on pillars either saying reverse parking only or the aisle ways were so small that reverse parking was an easier way to get in and out of the car park – especially since we always had huge cars. And I think I got the hang of it over the 3 + 6 years we lived there… I did not want to forget this skill and all through the 4 years we lived in the US I would reverse park into my garage every day and try to do the same at car parks at work etc., I am glad I did because now I have to use the same skill on a daily basis.

Here are my adventures of getting into the two residential car parks on a daily basis since we arrived in Dusseldorf more than two months ago. We had picked up our rental car at the airport and drove to our service apartment in Felix-Klein-Strasse. Our instructions were that the keys to the apartment were in a lockbox right next to the apartment main door and we were given a code to open the lockbox and get our keys. The apartment key also opened the entrance door to the apartment complex. There was another key which was to enter the garage.

The entrance way to the garage was right beside the apartment complex a tight single lane, which had a wire fence on one side and huge concrete planters on the apartment block side. At any point of time only one car could go into or come out of the car park. This is quite common in residential car parks. You drove straight for about 150 ft and on the driver side you found a post with a keyhole in it. You put in the garage key and turned the lock and you would see the lights outside the garage come on. Basically traffic lights but only red and green.

As soon as you turned the key to open the garage door, the red light would come on both outside & inside the garage. This signaled to someone inside the garage that a car was on the driveway outside and to you that the garage door was not fully open. The entrance into the garage was a curved 90 degree ramp into the underground car park. We would inch forward down the curved ramp and as soon as the doors were fully open would enter and park inside one of the marked car parks. Again we had a huge car, so I would try to reverse park my car every day, unless I had to take Socks somewhere. Since she had to get into the trunk, I would park forward and have to go back and forth at least a couple of times to stay within the marked lines.

While coming out of the carpark, we would turn the key at the beginning of the up ramp and wait till the signal light turned green before turning out as you had no visibility of any cars trying to enter the garage. The rule was that if there was anyone driving into the car park on the straight entryway as another car was exiting the underground parking – the entering car had to back out all the way into the street so that you could exit the car park as it was more difficult to reverse back into the car park on a curve.

I have had this happen to me twice as I was driving into the car park and had not yet reached the key pole. It is scary backing out into the main road especially because there was a high school on the other side of the wire fence and restaurant delivery trucks parked on the street. Many of the students would be hanging out in the driveway and I would inch my way backwards hoping that I would not run over anyone’s shoes or get hit by some vehicle on the street. Anyway got the hang of doing this at least twice a day over the two months we lived in the service apartment and then we moved to the rental apt. And I have had to relearn the process of getting into the underground parking at the rental apt…

The entrance to the new apartment car park is from the street behind our apartment building. I have to make a sharp 45 degree right turn to enter the car park driveway and there are always cars parked on the street up to the entrance to the carpark and just beyond the entrance, so that at any point of time only one car can go in or out. Again there is a green hedge separating our car park driveway from the street and the key post on the driver’s side.

We put our garage key into the key post and here we have just one light outside the garage door which lights up orange to indicate to someone inside and outside that the garage door is opening. Once we enter the car park, we make one right angle turn and immediately another right angle turn to our car park which is numbered and allotted to an apt. Ours is number 21. I have become an expert in reverse parking with about 6 inches to spare on either side of the marked lines.

Getting out of the car park is a whole new process. We make the first right turn and the key post is right in the middle of the second straight stretch on the extreme left and your car is in a curve, so we almost drive up to the garage entrance and then back up and straighten the car and drive forward till we reach the key hole, put in the key and wait for the garage door to open before exiting the car park. This was really getting on our nerves and we asked if there was a solution. The house meister said yes, we could order a remote which we did. It took two weeks to arrive, but now we don’t have to back up and get close to the key post inside the garage, just point and aim as we are approaching the garage door to go in or out…..