Celle for a Bee Meeting
Post date: Mar 16, 2017 5:23:23 PM
The past few days I was in Celle for a local Bee conference. The talks were mostly in German. I mostly did other work. But on the plus side, I found the cutest town in Germany. Celle.
I’ve mentioned before, World War II shaped a lot of German towns and the German culture. In Celle this is sort of true. Celle was never hit or involved in any war. It wasn’t damaged during World War I or II, or the 30 years war. So all the buildings are super old.
Most of the buildings above are more than 500 years old. The church is over 700 years old. That simply blows my mind.
Celle has an abnormal number of museums for a town it’s size. For example, this building which looks super old, but is actually only 100 years old. Young whippersnapper.
Next to the old building is a new museum, hailed as “the only 24 hour museum in the world”. They don’t mean it’s open 24 hours, but that the outside of the museum has light shows, and exhibits that only light up at night. Like this one.
So you have a really modern museum, with exhibits like the “fireworks” here, next to a church that is 700 years old. Which is cute.
But most of the time I just walked around Celle taking photos of the buildings. These are called “Half-timbered” houses, and they are SUPER German. Feast your eyes, on ancient but adorable city.
This is the part of town where jousting used to happen. You know, back when people rode horses to hit each other with lances? That’s how old this town is. Apparently one of the Dukes at one point fell of his horse, so the horseshoe is planted in the ground. If you stand on it you can make a wish. If your wish comes true, you can tell people, but if it doesn’t you’re not supposed to say anything. This is how rumors start.
Cool diarama of old town, it’s that cute in real life though.
There is beer here! As with most of Germany, the majority of the beer is brewed locally. But apparently beer from Celle (called “Celler Beer”, I kid you not, I can’t make that up), gives you a really bad hangover. I can neither confirm nor deny these allegations.
But most of the time I was inside with this view. Don’t be jealous.
FUN BONUS STORY: We drove to Celle (group of 8 biologists from my lab). I sat shotgun, and the driver was German. I knew that prostitution is legal in Germany, and as a result it’s really regulated. For example, prostitutes pay taxes, and have health care. But apparently, if a city is below a certain size, then you can’t have a brothel within the city limits. The solution? These little campers. There is one at every side street coming out of town, and apparently, you can just stop on by if you are in the mood. How civilized.