(September 11, 2023: Frankfurt am Main)
It only takes a few minutes on the increasingly crowded S-Bahn to get from Gateway Gardens to the Frankfurt (Main) Hauptbahnhof, as the woods around the airport give way quickly to suburbs, then you cross the river Main and you are surrounded by all the accoutrements of big European cities — the old European architecture mashed in with tall glass skyscrapers, railyards full of graffiti, lots and lots of little Achtung! signs warning of rail hazards, and then you have arrived at your rail hub, tons and tons of people going to and fro and much more racially diverse than some people in the States (who have never set foot here) would have you believe.
I peeked out a bit to get my bearings, but my goal for the day wasn’t the city center, but a transfer to the U-Bahn, and thence to the eastern suburb of Bergen-Enkheim.
I love public transit so much. Even the single train line at home in Austin means I get to skip out on 45 minutes of stressful freeway gridlock, and I don’t mind the additional walking from station to work because it means I don’t have to set aside extra time for the equivalent amount of exercise. Gyms bore me; long walks don’t, especially when there are flowers to photograph for iNaturalist, public art to go on Instagram, and joggers and cyclists to greet.
Extra points, though, when that long walk gives you time to acclimate to entirely new surroundings across the ocean.
The moment I stepped out of the train and started eastbound on a street called Leuchte, I knew damn well this was Texas. Business with names like “Best Döneria” and “China-Thai-Snack”, tucked into quaint, freshly-painted buildings that nevertheless feel like they were surely there before Texas was a republic. While not as vertical as Japan, the residential zones here are still much more communal than in America; no single-story homes, but three or four-story buildings with small, immaculately manicured rose gardens. Within a few more blocks eastbound, and these give way quickly to surprisingly dense deciduous forest, still mostly summer green but with hints of autumn beginning to touch the alders and maples. A break in the woods and I walk past a sizable community garden broken up into small family-sized plots full of fall vegetables. And then, a bit further into the woods, and I follow a few signs to my destination: Enkheimer Ried
Hey, wait, you’re in Germany, you can read German? Y’all, German uses the same letters as English, so it’s not exactly a huge leap to go from following signs to Schulenburg or New Braunfels in Texas to, um, following signs to original non-extra-crispy Schulenberg or Braunfels in Germany.
In retrospect, living in Texas prepared me surprisingly well for visiting Germany, with all the immigrant German culture that is deeply infused into Texas life, from the cuisine (chicken-fried steak being localized schnitzel, actually decent beer and sausage) to the pervasiveness of German names in Austin (Koenig, Dessau, Mueller).
Only, there are no Panzerschwein in Germany. Or as they would call it here, Gürteltier. Armadillos are indeed much safer from the Autobahn than the 130 Toll Road.
I also know my links from my rechts, despite having literally never set foot in an active German language class. Besides, what better education is there than immersion?
So, Enkheimer Ried. What is that? We already mentioned Bergen-Enkheim so that’s the locality name where we are. Ried sounds like, well, “reed”, the stuff that grows alongside a lake, and that is exactly what you see: a reed-lined lake formed by a berm protecting the residential reaches of Bergen-Enkheim to the west from the waters draining a small vale to the east, and forming a wetland lake, lined on either side by tall trees threaded by hike – bike – equestrian trails.
Yup, I flew nine hours to one of the most prominent cities in Europe and my first destination is basically the swamp, because, as I mentioned last blog, the way I recharge is through birds and this is the number one place in all of Frankfurt to see them.
It took me all of ten seconds to get a lifer (for non-birders: this is a bird I’m seeing for the first time in a lifetime): a flash of red in the trees revealed a foraging European Robin (Rotkehlchen to the locals, which of course must be pronounced like that doofy YouTube KRANKENWAGEN! meme). This being literally my first day in Europe, a high percentage of today’s birds were brand-new to me, but not all, with some birds being familiar introductions to America (European Starling, which defies the above meme by just being called Star) or also showing up in Japan (White Wagtail, Bachstelze). An impressively sized Eurasian Green Woodpecker (Grünspecht, and they really are that grün) chased off an energetic – and it turns out, embarrassingly generally named – Middle Spotted Woodpecker (Mittelspecht).
I’m just imagining old Linnaeus studying this: “It looks like it’s in between that bigger spotted woodpecker and that smaller spotted woodpecker in size, so, let’s just goldilocks this sucker.” Except in Swedish, I suppose.
A truly mid name for a very fun little bird, but at least it’s not just English where this suffers, because even the Latin name calls it medius, at least we didn’t name this thing “Medium Spotted Woodpecker” like it’s a friggin’ soft drink size.
I follow the hike – bike – equestrian trail along the lakeside, helpfully labeled “Nachtigallenweg” (“Nightingale Way”! sadly no nightingales this late in the year) and enjoy the cooling afternoon breezes in the shade of tall and aromatic noble fir trees.
Bliss.
Every so often passersby on bikes would wave. Hallo! or Guten Tag! for older folks. One older gentleman was curious as to how a clearly non-local would even find their way here, and I just pointed to my bird book and stammered out, “Ahhh, vogelbeobachtung” because the word for “birding” (birdwatching) in German is, no offense, really effing difficult for non-speakers to parse, though I definitely grew more confident with that word the more I had to use it.
It was more enough to satisfy the neighbor who smiled and nodded and wished me a “good luck with the photographs”, “there are many birds here” before we went our separate ways with a friendly “Tschüss!” Over and over the next few days I really honestly could have just flipped back to English, but he was the first of many to seem honestly surprised I was even making the attempt since, y’know, obviously not German here with these genetics. But also, I’m here to learn, not impose my brand of Standard American English (or my California Valley Speak, or my adopted Texas Drawl) on the rest of the world.
Generally, though, I felt curiosity, not hostility, because a smile is a smile wherever you go, and people are generally going to react with “friendly” if you project “friendly”. (Not as easy when your facial default saddles you with RBF but I at least try!)
One circuit around the big pond was plenty to give me almost three dozen species (and almost 50 on the day, 21 new), a great start for my trip, since one of my goals was to see at least 150 species of birds (100 new) over the next three weeks. But also, the sun was getting lower, and my stomach was beginning to growl.
Back to the train station it was, this time through the neighborhood, and back to that “Best Döneria” because, when you’re in Texas, you get tacos or barbecue, and when you’re in Germany, you get currywurst or döner kebab. They do say hunger is the best seasoning, but whatever magical spice blend they use (paprika? cumin? marjoram? garlic? thyme? all of it?) always feels perfect, that heady mix of spice and the unctuousness of the meat and the freshness of the vegetables, a little fizz from that bottle of Mezzo Mix (basically the logical conclusion to ordering an “orange coke” anywhere but Texas) and the growl is tamed.
As night fell, I heard the echoing song of a Black Redstart (Hausrotschwanz) from the tiled rooftops, oddly reminiscent of Canyon Wrens in the rocky vastness of Arizona. An ocean away from my (rented) bed, surrounded by chatter in Deutsch and Türkçe, and yet, somehow, I was home.
All too soon, I was back in my lodgings for the night, getting ready for the next day’s international travel, and trying to forestall the inevitable jet-lag you get from a nine-hour flight, when I spied something interesting — a rare bird unlikely to be seen anywhere on my itinerary had been seen in a wetland in rural Hesse, an hour north of me.
When I had my own working vehicle (and not the sadly derelict remains of one, permanently sidelined by a trashed transmission), I would drive clear to the Mexican border and back in pursuit of rare birds. When going to Japan, I’d use trains to do the equivalent, so, hey, when in Germany, why not do that here too?
I closed my eyes, eager for the journey ahead, with an alarm set for four…
Stories That Are All True 