Thursday, September 15

I have wanted to see the cathedral at Aachen / Aix-la-Chapelle where Charlemagne is buried ever since Mrs. Eckholm in the 6th grade gave me an A on my paper "The Life of Charlemagne," which I wrote in the school library copying stuff out of The Book of Knowledge. "The accomplishments of Charlemagne are the Holy Roman Empire, conquest of the Lombards, Saxon rebellion, etc.".

Here's another reason I wanted to come: Through family research, Missus Slade's late father determined that they are directly descended from Charlemagne. So it's personal. (Actually, the sad fact is that my own family research has determined that I, also, am a descendant, which makes our marriage an incestuous sham and our children freakish bastards. But let's talk about something else.)

To get to Aachen I had to go through Cologne, but the train from Frankfurt was late and I missed my connection. I thought Germans were supposed to be so efficient! Angela's been in office for ten years, and the trains STILL aren't on time? Didn't Mussolini fix that in about TWO years?

My accommodation was near the railroad station. My airbnb host, Magnus, is a friendly open-faced blond youth who studies at the Rheinisch-Westfälische Technische Hochschule here, a high-powered technical and research university that can eventually put you on the board of a major German corporation. Magnus's parents in Nürnberg must have money already, since they've fixed him up with this nice two bedroom apartment, all to himself. It's very comfy - carpets and everything.

Magnus gave me maps and advice on where to eat with the students, away from the clueless old tourists. I walked down to the weird little cathedral and sat in Charlemagne's ancient 1,200-year-old "octagon," looking at the golden box that holds his remains. It's a weirdly laid out church, and not big. Parts of it are fancy gold sort-of Byzantine designs and colored marble, and the new part (only about 700 years old) has tall narrow stained glass windows like at Sainte Chapelle in Paris. 

I lit a candle for Missus Slade's father, my dear father-in-law, at the closest candle stand to the bones of his illustrious ancestor.

The gold & silver Karlschrein
containing Charlemagne's remains

The church and treasury are full of relics. Besides the golden casket near the altar that holds St. Mary's cloak, Christ's swaddling clothes, St. John the Baptist's beheading cloth, and Our Lord's tighty whiteys (or, in more ecclesiastical terms, a "loin cloth"), the cathedral treasury also has many gold and silver reliquaries with bones and other stuff in them, like Jesus' belt, Mary's belt, the whip Our Lord was lashed with, etc.

It made me wonder how all that stuff was collected. Maybe some extremely prescient person moved among the bible-time people saying "Excuse me, can I have that when you're done with it?" and " I'll give you 5 denarii for that whip," and stuff like that.

One of Charlemagne's bones, containing
some of Missus Slade's DNA. Presumably.

I walked up near the university to eat (I had Curry-Hähnchengeschnetzeltes mit Reis, with a draft Warsteiner). In a university area, I'm the oldest person in sight. It's endearing and heartening to watch these nice young wide-eyed people walking around talking and laughing and eating and enjoying their hormones. They're not tired, and their legs don't ache and their feet don't hurt. They're oblivious. They have no idea. It's kind of cute.

Just 'cause you're medieval don't mean you can't have some fun!

On the way back, next to the medieval town hall, there was a great big ferris wheel labeled "La grande Roué Parisienne" - direct from Dortmund! I recognized the music it was playing as "Carolina Moon Keep Shining."

Wow a whole meter of popcorn.
I wish WE had the metric system!