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Gute reise!

Stop off in Aachen if you can, just so that you can claim to have seen what survives of Charlemagne's capital.

Are you going down through Belgium? Lots of nice places to stop off at - my favourite is Gent. The tower of St Bavo's Cathedral is not normally open, but the Belfry offers a decent 'short' climb.

James (Ulm Munster!)

Thank you for the blog! Your insights and descriptions were brilliant.

By the way, has Joachim told you about the movie (international title: No More Mr. Nice Guy) where he played Rudi Kipp? It's a terrific "road movie" with - believe it or not - German humour. Strange characters experiencing adventures in East Germany - sounds familiar, or?

Plot summary from :

Joachim Król stands out in this movie through his brilliantly persuasive acting as Rudi Kipp, aka ‘Kipp’, dressed in a black suit, with a speech impediment and the irresistible charm of an enthusiast. His brother Moritz Kipp, aka ‘Most’, who dresses in forest worker clothes, has plenty of scepticism towards humans and an old Diesel truck. This vehicle is to take them to the Promised Land, a country estate in eastern Germany left to them by their grandmother. But soon the journey becomes tricky, because our intrepid travellers are illiterate and street signs do not speak. Viktor, however, can speak - Russian. A deserter from the Red Army and also heading east, he is equipped with a Kalashnikov and a solid knowledge in handling Diesel engines. Soon a genuine friendship develops among the three and Viktor’s Kalashnikov saves them from a gang of tattooed bandits, who are sunk in the river. The fact that two of them cannot swim goes unnoticed by our heroes; just as the fact that they are now looked upon as dangerous killers. As the police track them down they kidnap beautiful Nadine. When despite all adversities Kipp and Most eventually stand before their inheritance, things are not quite what they expected.

What is it with the climbs James?

You're obsessed!

If we climb anything it will be Cologne cathedral thismorning but I are say I might just give it a miss - done it before you see.

hi fletch & ricco,

many thanks for this great blog, i really appreciate that you rememberd my invitation. but as you guys were in really great company last night in cologne (i dont know if you are aware of joachim krol beeing really one of the most known german actors for a long time) i am sure you had a great final for your trip.
keep my email- adress , the invitation has not expired yet :).
and i am really looking forward to recieve an original "fletch & ricco" shirt.

cheers lads,

hope svan makes the last miles to bring you back to your WAGS, beds and showers

see you some day in germany

florian

thats a great end to your trip, I love Cologne, great city, lots to do...

Only regret I have about the World Cup is by the way that I didnt get to see any game live in the stadium although I live in Germany which is such a shame :( But the public viewings were definetly a lot of fun too!

1)Thanks so much for the blog, it fed my (temporary) football obsession perfectly. Being the compulsive-obsessive type, I usually read all the comments, too. I hope it'll be someone's task at the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳, too. You'll find (a.o.th.)quite a bit of criticism regarding the commentary back in the studio, in terms of quality (or lack thereof). Please take it to heart. English is the lingua franca, and people from all over the world tune in. (And - hello! - some of us who live here have dual or multiple allegiances, and unless we have a satelite dish, we have to listen to British terrestrial tv coverage.)
It's embarrassing to say the least to have so-called experts in the studio who display little expertise but plenty of bias and chauvinism. We have the gutter press for that sort of thing, the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ should be a cut above the rest. I really felt for the lady with the Portuguese husband ('Sardao', see earlier comments)and her children.
Personally, I found everyone's attitude towards the third place play-off totally out of order. "Nothing reveals more about a person than what they deem worthless and ridiculous". (I'm quoting Goethe here, probably wrongly). - Had England, Scotland or Northern Ireland (no Welsh commentator present)been playing in this match, how very different their patter would have been! Someone should play it back to them and ask them to imagine how their attitude would be received by a German, a Portuguese, or - lo and behold, could they even imagine such a thing??? - someone genuinely interested in a game of football in the WC and not just their own (proxy) team and winning the trophy.

2)Is there going to be a programme with all the highlights of the WC '06? Please, please, please, say yes!!!

Yes, see Gent. Specially if you go this Friday or WE, since then the Gentse Fiesten starts (the whole city centre becomes full of live music, entertainment, etc. for 10 days). lol.
Just thought I'd put in my two cents, and promote my city.
Thanks for a great blog, and such a great tournament. Maybe next time though, Belgium will actually be IN it!
Cheers

So does this mean you might be back playing footie next week to run off all those sausages Mr Webmaster? And no doubt the quiz will start again to!

To comment 2: Axel, thanks for the information about Joachim Krol.
I'm a portuguese cinema student and Ricco's mention of Joachim Krol interested me enough to do some research about him. I don't know much about contemporary german cinema so I went to Wikipedia and typed Joachim Kroll... But to my dismay I read something like: "Joachim Kroll was a German serial killer and cannibal." And as interesting as that experience may be, I don't think they would have dinner with a cannibal, so I assumed this was the wrong person!

Funny how one single letter can change everything, hein? Poor Mr. Krol, being confused with a German serial killer!

@ SD

Either you're joking or you must have made a typo:

(German)
(french)

Sorry, no english entry yet (maybe a task for his new fans?.. ;) )

This is your serial killer... His last name is "Kroll" instead of "Krol"... but really interesting. I didn't know about Kroll, the Ruhrkannibale and Menschenfresser from Duisburg.. The Italians stayed at Duisburg during the WC... unfortunately Kroll died in 1991 ;-)...

Hi SD,

a good source in English is Joachim Krol's .

His cinematic breakthrough, I think, was his part in the film "Der bewegte Mann" in 1994. In this year, he also became the Bundesfilmpreis (German Film Award) in the category "Best actor".

We've come full circle. "Der bewegte Mann" was directed by , a well-known German film director who is also a real football fanatic. After graduation, he played professional football for three years but he wasn't good enough. Wortmann made the most successful German motion picture of 2003, . It's about the West German victory in the 1954 World Cup Final in Bern. And this year, during the World Cup, he shadowed the German team from the preparations to the "little finale" last Saturday. He filmed the team at every opportunity, even in the changing room during the half-time break!

I made a typo yes, but a funny one. That's why I mentioned how a single letter in the name can make such a difference. How many chances there were of finding a Joachim Kroll/Krol that was a serial killer?

I noticed later that the killer died in 1991. Of course I never believed that Flech and Ricco were meeting a cannibal, but it was a funny mistake.

Thanks, Axel. I'm always interested to learn more about cinema. I usually consult first IMDB, but I have no idea why I decided to try Wiki first.

"Goodbye Lenin" must have been the last contemporary german movie I watched. There's always Fassbinder, but his movies belong entirely to another dimension. He is and yet is not of this time.