One of the last things that we did before leaving Frankfurt was to go around to our favorite places and take photos of some of the friends that we had made. We feel fortunate to have met such wonderful people who were a tremendous help to us as we struggled to live in a foreign country where we knew very little of the language. This week’s Daily Post Photo Challenge is Friend, so here are just a few photos of the friends that we made during our time in Germany.
Kassel is part of the German Fairy Tale Route and is best known for being where the Brother’s Grimm went to university and lived. The museum itself is dedicated more to the work that the brothers did on documenting the German language and creating the definitive German dictionary than on the fairy tales that made them legendary. The tales themselves were collected by the brothers by visiting the owners of inns on the heavily traveled roads in the area. The owners of the inns would recount stories told by travelers as they passed through the region, which provided the brothers with a rich collection of folklore to work with.
Over time, the brothers wrote down and printed over 200 stories, which are still popular to this day. Cinderella, The Frog Prince, Hansel and Gretel, Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Rumpelstiltskin, and Rapunzel are just a few of the folklore stories that the brothers published during their illustrious careers.
Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm were born in Hanau, Germany, which is now the starting point of the fairy tale route. They moved to Kassel to attend the University of Marburg, which only had about 200 students. Jacob became the court librarian to the King of Westphalia and later became librarian in Kassel. Although the museum isn’t solely focused on the fairy tales, it is still very interesting and worth visiting. Children will definitely have fun seeing the various exhibits, but the museum is perfect for people of all ages. If you travel the German Fairy Tale Route or plan a trip to Kassel, you should definitely take a few hours to visit this fascinating museum.
We don’t usually eat sweets or desserts, but occasionally we do indulge in something a little decadent. During our time in Europe, we did allow ourselves to have a few special treats. Obviously, we couldn’t leave Germany without having apple strudel, but we also love a good cheesecake, so that is often our go-to dessert when we do decide to have something sweet.
Even though we may not have dessert very often, one thing we learned was that European’s definitely make wonderful cakes, pies, and other sweets. We would have loved to try even more of the incredible sweets that we saw, but we were too often full from the heavy meals of the season. We will just have to schedule a return trip so that we can try even more specialties.
Perhaps in the future, we will skip the main meal so that we can concentrate on the various pastries, cakes, custards, and pies. Until then, we will just have to look back fondly at what we were able to enjoy.
