These Germans!
They really gotta get into every act, haven't they?NY TIMES NEWS SERVICE , COLOGNE, GERMANY
Tuesday, Oct 19, 2004,Page 6
This city's glorious cathedral, a jewel of Gothic architecture and Germany's most popular tourist attraction, is being shunted aside these days by a church so humble and disfigured by war that it does not show up on local maps of houses of worship.
The Church of St. Johann Baptist has something the Cologne Cathedral cannot match: a leaning tower.
Two weeks ago, as workers were digging a subway tunnel near the church, its bell tower began to list precariously.
Since then, curious tourists have flocked to St. Johann to take pictures, vendors have hawked T-shirts and the tourism office has begun debating whether it should try to cash in on what it readily admits is another European city's franchise.
"Cologne already has some parallels to Pisa," ventured a spokesman, Olaf Pohl. "We have a warm climate, we're very Catholic and we have a lot of churches. Now we could have our own leaning tower."
Christa Borghoff, who runs a nearby beverage shop, said she has sold nearly 400 T-shirts, at about US$15 apiece, with a drawing of the church and the words "Leaning Tower of Cologne," in the local dialect.
People here are savoring the fact that their one-stop town has become, if temporarily, a two-stop one.
But for Ulrich Krings, a curator in the city's historic preservation office, the whole thing seems a little tacky.
"Given the dignity of a church, turning it into a tourist attraction like this is profane," he said. He would like to see the 37m tower restored to its original position.
Marianne Kloppel, a member of the parish council, wants the entire church fixed, and does not care about it losing its notoriety, since she believes tour bus operators are more likely to profit than her parishioners anyway.
What I want to know, though, is why I should find out about this from the Taipei Times of Taiwan?
Tuesday, Oct 19, 2004,Page 6
This city's glorious cathedral, a jewel of Gothic architecture and Germany's most popular tourist attraction, is being shunted aside these days by a church so humble and disfigured by war that it does not show up on local maps of houses of worship.
The Church of St. Johann Baptist has something the Cologne Cathedral cannot match: a leaning tower.
Two weeks ago, as workers were digging a subway tunnel near the church, its bell tower began to list precariously.
Since then, curious tourists have flocked to St. Johann to take pictures, vendors have hawked T-shirts and the tourism office has begun debating whether it should try to cash in on what it readily admits is another European city's franchise.
"Cologne already has some parallels to Pisa," ventured a spokesman, Olaf Pohl. "We have a warm climate, we're very Catholic and we have a lot of churches. Now we could have our own leaning tower."
Christa Borghoff, who runs a nearby beverage shop, said she has sold nearly 400 T-shirts, at about US$15 apiece, with a drawing of the church and the words "Leaning Tower of Cologne," in the local dialect.
People here are savoring the fact that their one-stop town has become, if temporarily, a two-stop one.
But for Ulrich Krings, a curator in the city's historic preservation office, the whole thing seems a little tacky.
"Given the dignity of a church, turning it into a tourist attraction like this is profane," he said. He would like to see the 37m tower restored to its original position.
Marianne Kloppel, a member of the parish council, wants the entire church fixed, and does not care about it losing its notoriety, since she believes tour bus operators are more likely to profit than her parishioners anyway.
What I want to know, though, is why I should find out about this from the Taipei Times of Taiwan?