The first week in Frankfurt

I have been in Frankfurt since one week. I haven’t gone to different places because it’s raining in the first few days, and I have been training during the week. But still the first feelings.

Nice people.

Aikido makes people happy. That is true. And when people are happy, they are opening to others. Aikidokas in the dojo are very nice. They ask if I need anything for staying warm here. Some of them offer me touring the city. I love to do that. But still, I am missing my friends in Oslo and Hanoi.

Frankfurt is a strange city.

I stay in Alt-Bornheim street, only 15-20 minutes walking from the city center. However, it is entirely different than the downtown. When there are sky buildings with glasses in the center, Alt-Bornheim area is like a village, with older houses, small shops, and pubs. I don’t know about other parts of Frankfurt yet; I will need to explore in next days.

A green or not green city.

There are a lot of private cars in the city. But the air is fresh. It is different than in Wroclaw, Poland. I have better feeling about the air here. Or might be it was just my first impression when I went up from underground?

There are ticket automats everywhere, and each of them has a solar panel. I like that. A very good environment-friendly approach.

However, it is not a very clean city. There are trash bins around, but many people don’t care about that. They come out from a shop, take off the cover of the goods and can leave it on the street right away. The metro stations didn’t give me clean feeling either, but it might because of the color of floors they are using there.

So, I am not sure if I can call Frankfurt a green or not-green city?

Cheap products.

Comparing to Oslo, Frankfurt is much cheaper. I just went back from Penny (a chain store likes Rema-1000, Kiwi in Norway). I bought milk, bananas, fish, yogurt, baguettes and all they cost less than 7 euros. Applying current exchange rate, it is 65 NOK approximately, while they might cost double in Oslo. There are 1-euro shops where I can buy multiple things, each costs one euro only.

When I went to a shop and bought something costing 0.99 euro, they returned 1 cent coin. That is not usually happening in Oslo if I buy something from Grønland area for example. But then my pocket is full of coins now 🙂

That is one complained thing. In Oslo, I rarely have cash in my wallet. Anything I can pay by my bank card. But here, they use cash a lot. I am sure they can process cards, but it seems that cash is a default payment method in regular shops.

Other good things.

I like the public library idea. There are bookshelves in different places. People put books there, or go there and read books. Also, I see some book coffee shops, where people enjoy coffee and reading books together. I would love to make one. There are also shops in multiple places that I can buy fresh food. That is better than in Oslo 🙂

So, I still have two months in Frankfurt. Let’s see what I can find out in this city.