Düsseldorf – 26 January 2015

First, a couple of things left over from yesterday. The first photo shows the other elevator, which goes to the basement. This is the first time I have seen a negative number on an elevator panel. The second photo shows the ticket for the K21 museum; it has the word “Welcome” in French, English, German, and Dutch.

Most of the museums are closed Monday, so I took one of the trams out to the end of the line to see if there was anything photo-worthy. Unfortunately, it was raining, so there wasn’t a whole lot I could do. As you can see from the first picture, culture is a big thing here in Germany.

Street in residential area; yellow house in front left.

Light blue house with light purple borders around windows

These were in some businesses; the second one is a company called BåRWALDSON, which sells Swedish furnishings.

As I headed back toward the tram station, I saw this DHL PackStation. Apparently it’s a place that DHL delivers the package, and you use an ID code to unlock the locker where your package is. Amazon is using a similar system for its Amazon Locker service.

Small yellow outdoor building with automated package storage

I stopped in at a grocery store called kaufpark and bought the following stunning array of chocolate for a mere 5.00€. On the left are the famous Mozartkugeln.

Mozartkugeln, Ritter Sport peppermint bars, and Rewe peppermint patties

I passed by this one because it was milk chocolate, which is not my favorite. But, of course, I couldn’t resist the picture of the cat. (The product name translates to cats’ tongues.)

Package of Katzenzungen (Cats' tongues); chocolate candy shaped like a cat's tongue, hence the name.

Here is a children’s store on the main road.

TEDi (childrens' articles) storefront with large teddy bear cutout

I returned via tram to near the main train station, and then walked to the Düsseldorf Arcaden shopping center. No pictures from there; for its type, one mall looks pretty much like every other one. However, I did see them most whitebread models ever in an advertisement for a mattress store:

Ultra-whitebread models on ad for mattress store.

The first picture was on the side of a building, the second on the plywood around a construction site; the others were on utility boxes.

Bubbling glass of water painted on side of building

Poster of raccoon in work clothes; graffitti'ed with a bird on his hand

punk hula girl painted on side of utility box

Partially obscured picture of woman with caption “F**k your life”

Smiling husky dog painted on side of utility box

Dancing green Mickey and Minnie Mouse painted on side of utility box.

Posters

These posters are from a group called D-Facto (pronounced day facto). Hover over each one to see my best translation for the text. The second one refers to Düsseldorf’s tourism logo :D.

Line drawing of man hiding canvases under coat

Half-smiling, half-crying line drawing of eyes and mouth with text “Humor lives on”.

Signage

Hover over a picture to see a rough translation.

Berliner filled and powdered doughnuts; B on one line, “ERLINER” on next.

Sign for “Baker Wolff”, with O in red and other letters in light blue

Demonstration

There’s a group in Düsseldorf called Dügida, against the Islamization of Germany by Foreigners, and they were a march. I joined the counter-protestors. Here are a couple of pictures before things started happening. I put together a very short video here.

Food

For lunch, I went to a vegan restaurant named sattgrün (site is in German). Most of the times that I have had vegan food, it wasn’t all that great. It was undercooked and bland. This place, however, was quite wonderful. The food is buffet style, and a medium size plate is 7.90€, which is a decent price.

After the demonstration, I went to the Izmir Kebap House for yet another döner. I was just about the only non-Turkish guy in the restaurant, so if it’s good enough for the local natives, it must be pretty good. And it was.