After many months here in Germany, I was starting to get a real stream of visitors. Lalith had just been in town (link) and now my father was due to arrive for the weekend. I met him at his hotel after work on Friday, and was pretty excited because I hadn't seen any of my family since Christmas.
First thing was first, we had dinner. Well, we walked through the town, and down to the river, but not finding anything to our immediate liking, we walked back up a few hundred meters into the Heumarkt area, and then into a small courtyard that is home to a statue a few apartment buildings, and a small tapas restaurant. The place was full when we arrived, but they had a small patio with great heat-umbrellas. (An electric heater with a metal half dome like an umbrella to direct the heat downwards) It was also time for me to introduce my father to K�lsch.
The next morning, we met for brunch. We walked from my father's hotel which was right smack downtown, to the Opera square, and in it, the M�venpick restaurant where we had a good talk over a bigger breakfast spread than I had seen for, well at least a year. Just across the street was the 4711 shop which is a must see. From there we saw a little of my world here in Cologne making stops at my apartment, and the AIESEC office. Then, keeping in style with a laid back weekend, we headed for a walk near the Rhine, and then a settled in for some German food.
Sunday morning we had a little less time as we were both heading for Frankfurt for business reasons. (I had my last big national conference with AIESEC in Germany, and Dad had a meeting with his German counterparts on Monday morning.) Nevertheless, we managed to wander down the main shopping street of Cologne, and took a walk through the Dom. Then it was a short walk to the train station from his hotel, and we took the train to Frankfurt together.
