Sounds and Smells of Deutschland

Difficult to say exactly what sounds bring back memories of Germany but the smell of a Brattie or Bockwurst always brings back memories. In Paderborn we had an Imbiss just across the street and down a little from the camp - and my room was the nearest to it - you could smell the bratties cooking sometimes !

The church bells. When I was posted in Lahr 71-74 I lived in the small village of Kippenheim. I would some times go to the top of Berg Str. which we lived on, to a small chapel on the hill and listen for the church bells to ring the call to come from the fields around 5PM. It would start way down south and work it's way north. It was absolutely enchanting. When I returned as a civy in 84 it was the most wonderful greeting I could have. I know there was a name for this but for the life of me can't spell it, but I can say it. "Angelus Bell" found it in Google. Also from my land lords back yard we had a perfect view of the Protestant Church steeple. We would ping rounds from his air rifle off it. Got people wondering.

Another sound that was particularly noticeable was the sound of a mo-ped at 7AM screaming up a street on Sunday morning and this was usually noticeable for me when I was in Nijmegen on a week end and a bit hung over and staying in an inn that was on the main street and the narrow street with high buildings just reverberated with the noise. Oh lord. It was brain splitter.

Hardrations wrote:

PS: Do you remember Charlely Chamberlyn's (Don Messer and his Down Easteners) son in the battalion or Dennis Underwood who remustered to RCEME also Piper John Huggins?.

I'm sorry Russ. For some reason probably to do with creeping dotage I missed your query about these guys. Just was going through everything after a holiday in the Maritimes as I try to catch up with the on-goings.

I remember Charlie's son, as did everyone else mainly, I guess, because of the blood lines. The other names are "lost in the mists of Glenfiddich". There was a lot of remustering after the Black Watch was stood down as a regular force regiment, but I was back on civvy street by that time.

Again I apologize for taking over 2 months to answer a simple question. As punishment I'm restricting my beer ration for the rest of the day (Sunday at 12:15 PDT).

Rod

Not to worry Rod. My main contact with the Battalion was when I was on course in Fort Henry at 4 Sigs. Sqn. Your crew were doing D&D. I was attached to 1 SSM Bty RCA down in Fort Prince of Wales. I think another son of Charlie Chamberlin was RC Sigs when I was in the Vimy Barracks in 62.

Ross

Hardrations wrote:

The church bells. When I was posted in Lahr 71-74 I lived in the small village of Kippenheim. I would some times go to the top of Berg Str. which we lived on, to a small chapel on the hill and listen for the church bells to ring the call to come from the fields around 5PM. It would start way down south and work it's way north. It was absolutely enchanting. When I returned as a civy in 84 it was the most wonderful greeting I could have. I know there was a name for this but for the life of me can't spell it, but I can say it. "Angelus Bell" found it in Google.

Yes, Angelus...now there's a word from my church-y days! (raised middle Anglican, drifted towards High Anglican then when in Soest I attended a Mass at the St. Patroclus Cathedral and started drifting quite quickly towards Catholicism, although I never converted. That lasted for a good 15 years until I grew totally disillusioned with not just the RC Church, but "the Church" in general. I now style myself as a Born Again Agnostic).

Hardrations wrote:

Also from my land lords back yard we had a perfect view of the Protestant Church steeple. We would ping rounds from his air rifle off it. Got people wondering.

No doubt...tsk tsk tsk, taking pot shots at the church bells!! Good heavens (no pun intended!), we'd catch it if we hung laundry out on a Saint's Day. Not sure what the reaction would have been if we took shots at a steeple! Scare the bejeebers out of the pigeons, no doubt LOL

Speaking of which, I still remember sitting in the inner cloister of St. Patroclus, leaning up against the ancient old oak they had when the bells in the cathedral tower would peal and the swack of pigeons would all take off at the same time and swirl up and around the tip of the steeple under a deep blue sky with huge rolling clouds drifting across it as the big bronze bells tolled...it's an image that has stuck in mind forever.

Hardrations wrote:

Another sound that was particularly noticeable was the sound of a mo-ped at 7AM screaming up a street on Sunday morning and this was usually noticeable for me when I was in Nijmegen on a week end and a bit hung over and staying in an inn that was on the main street and the narrow street with high buildings just reverberated with the noise. Oh lord. It was brain splitter.

ehehehe...that could have been me!! Oh, Nijmegen...nope, not me. Iserlohn, yes. I had a 49cc moped that I used to rev, rather pointless as it was a gutless little thing but to a 17 year old still harbouring images of "Easy Rider" it was my chopper LOL. No doubt drove the neighbours in our quiet neighbourhood on Am Tyrol batty! Glad I didn't live next door to me :-)

Just remembered-sound
I was in a church near Gutersloh on Christmas Eve with my future wife. The congregation sang Stille nacht, heilige Nacht.
Wonderful and never sung better.

Happy days

And that reminds me of...

Being in Soest and attending an event at the St. Petri Kirche -- the onion-domed Protestant church right across from the St. Patroclus RC Cathedral. We all stood down in the Marktplatz as the church choir, holding candles, wound their way down from the top of the spire singing Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht. The snow gently drifting down, the whole city quiet except for the sound of the choir voices floating down from the spire and the flicker of the candles as the choristers made their way down the twisting stone steps inside the steeple. Something pretty special.

What about the sound of the little 'two stroke' cars which were much about in the sixties?

What about the roasted mandeln nuts which were at every Schutzenfest?

Re the bratties. How many people realise they were quite often eatinghorse meat without knowing?

Remembered the bratties, knew they were horsemeat and still found them delicious

I knew the frikedellas, those cold meat patties one could get at the bar of your neighbourhood gasthof, were horsemeat (and delicious!) but I had no idea bratwurst was...I knew it wasn't pork and assumed it was beef or...something....Never heard they were horse. They didn't taste like it but then apart from the frikedellas, I really didn't have anything to compare them to. I'm pretty sure, though, they were just sausage, which is made up of a variety of beef/pork parts left over from the processing of more standard types of steaks etc.

Please note.
Bratti's in the whole were not made from horse meat. Sorry if I gave the impression they were!

Alan

The frikedellan that you can get in some Brit supermarkets taste the same but alas the bratwurst don't, maybe it has something to do with the time of day that they are eaten, we used to have ours anytime between midnight and 3am or at shutzenfests done over charcoal. Can almost taste it now.

Yes, you are correct about the time of eating brattis. Must not forget the quantity of beer prior!

The Bratti Bar we frequented whilst in Hildesheim after midnight usually had to serve us with the 'well done', nearly burnt sausages. Don't ask me why? It is how we liked them.

Strange, but nowadays, one still can get the mandatory dry bread and of course, the tear-off strip off the paper plate. Must not forget the Senf though. Not sure squaddies liked it? Of course it is on my plate when I grill these days.

Whilst visiting Kiel recently, I had an official titled 'Horse meat bratti.' Rather a bit strong tasting.

Brattis from Lidl are about 90% as good as the oldddddddddddd ones!

The best frikadelle and bratties were from a place just off the autobahn I think it was near Venlo. We would fill up the car and jerrican with gas on the coupons, and belt off to the ferry in Belgium.
Remember sailing past the ferry lying on its side.
Ratios car park in Munster had passable bratties but those fish things they sold were disgusting.
Chips,mit mayo, were always good. Lekke
Dont like the Lidl bratties, maybe its the way we cook them

Seeing as the 'Chemist' mentions filling the jerrycans up near Venlo. This was a must in the days of cheap BP petrol coupons for Forces personnel dreading the driving 3-4 hours more on the Dutch/Belgium motorways at night where there were NO petrol stations open in those days.

I thought you may have actually forgotten the last BP petrol station near Venlo, just before the Dutch border. The village was called Wankum.
Even nowadays, every time I pass the Wankum sign post on the Autobahn, I look across at my wife and grin. She knows exactly why!

Chemist its the way we cook them. The wife has a cast iron griddle ( no not girdle ). She slashes the Brattie on the diagonal and cooks them without oil.
Almost as good as I remember them.

alan
WANKUM -That was the place,how could I forget it! Tip the gas into the car just outside the port and then-over the bank with the can. Bloody vandals. The cans were rejects from the Depot.
When and where were you in Muenster?
bob
Good tip with the bratties.Showing your age with the girdle crack.Yes I do remember pantie girdles. Thats another story

I finally discovered that the proper wurst for curry wurst is the Thurungia Wurst, my curry sauce I make my self, from no name ketchup and a curry rue. Just as good as I remember them. To get a curry wurst in Germany now is the pits. The sauce is watery and the wurst are crap. But then again, I don't drink any more so really have no excuse to have a curry wurst mit pom frits at 3AM. Ah well, t'iss still a good memory.

And reference carrying gasoline in jerry cans on the auto bahn. Man!!! I think of it now, we were lucky not to have a serious accident while trucking it around.

I really do think the time of day..or night...one had a bratwurst and senf contributed to the flavour. No doubt some of them had sat on the grill for quite some time, although I don't recall having many that were burnt or really dark. you know, that rather blistery, splotchy look sausages, wursts, smokies, whatever get when they've sat cooking too long and the rather bitter flavour they often have as a result...nope, in my memory the brats were always good!

Not sure what the senf/mustard was about...I've not found mustard like that here, really. The closest I've got has been Poupon, a French mustard that is quite strong and while I like it, it's not the same. The usual mustard we get over here to go with our hotdogs is some processed crap, put out by a company called "French's" and it's an unholy shade of yellow...a totally different animal from good, sinus-clearing German senf.

Glad to hear from Alan that he still can access traditionally-served bratties on cardboard, with the tear-off strip and dry bread slice....I mean, fine dining is all about the experience, isn't it? LOL

The best brats I had were from the schnell-imbiss across from the NAAFI in Hemer, and also a little hole-in-the-wall kiosk in Soest, not far from the Palette along Uricher (?) strasse. The ones served out of the various kiosks at the Moehnesee were pretty good too.

Hardrations

I agree about carrying jerricans of gas in cars -daft and dangerous and I should have known better.

But do you remember those 5 litre cans which I was told we had to carry? Most of those were plastic.I tried for years to get the Army to adopt a 25 litre plastic jerrican, nobody was interested.
At 4PD we scrapped no end of damaged steel cans.I reckon decent plastic cans would have lasted a lot longer.

Any ex users agree?

I regulary carried a couple or three jerry cans on long trips.

The plastic 5 litre cans were a requirement if travelling on Autobahns so I remember to meet the requirement of running out of fuel. I think plastic was the better solution so as not to have a bomb effect when a metal one finally gave way in a fire?

Not sure what the Germans now require. Maybe someone living currently in Germany can bring us up to date?

alan8376 wrote:

Seeing as the 'Chemist' mentions filling the jerrycans up near Venlo. This was a must in the days of cheap BP petrol coupons for Forces personnel dreading the driving 3-4 hours more on the Dutch/Belgium motorways at night where there were NO petrol stations open in those days.

I thought you may have actually forgotten the last BP petrol station near Venlo, just before the Dutch border. The village was called Wankum.
Even nowadays, every time I pass the Wankum sign post on the Autobahn, I look across at my wife and grin. She knows exactly why!

Yeh it was quite close to us at Wildenrath and raised a few smiles. Time dims the memory but I am sure there was one of our guys who either had his petrol confiscated at the Dutch border or had to pay some kind of duty on it once?


I was unfortunate to be on leave in the UK when the Arab/Israeli war was going. Driving was banned in Holland on Sundays due to the fuel shortage, and as luck would have it we arrived at Rotterdam at 0800 on the Sunday. We had to stay in Rotterdam until midnight. No fun with a little baby either. Most annoying that we were told forces were exempt by the authorities in Hull before we left.

wankum,happy days,i used to tell my wife the sign was mandatory but she would,nt believe me,dave.

I know there are a few funny village/town names around. I regulary take Route 404 then Route21 out of Kiel to Lubecke Airport. Enroute is the village of 'Wankendorf.'

Not sure where the village of 'Fuck' is? It often appears in the news, as people nick the road sign.

alan there you go...............
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fucking_Austria

My kids still snigger whenever Wankum is mentioned and the out-laws wouldn't believe me it existed...............they thought it was a squaddie joke. Same happened with AusFART. They loved that one.