Page 21

Willi is about 19 here

Berlin

Opening of the Berlin chapter: the journey via Leipzig, arrival in spring 1925 and starting a new salon post

Diary page 21

Translated from Willi's German.

VI. Berlin. Herr Vogel helped me get my trunk to the station, three-quarters of an hour away, and shortly before five in the morning the train carried me off towards Berlin. I had a stopover in Reichenbach in the Vogtland, which I had a look around - a factory town through and through. From there I travelled on to Leipzig, where I spent the night in the municipal journeymen's hostel. What I found interesting was the fine station, the business quarter, and above all the magnificent Monument to the Battle of the Nations. In the evening I caught up on the latest news of the Hindenburg election. On the onward journey I had the chance to see sooty Bitterfeld, and by way of Wittenberg I reached Berlin's Anhalter Bahnhof at around twelve. From the journeymen's house I spent the time until Tuesday noon strolling through the giant city, forever amazed at it. I presented myself to a boss of about forty-five, whose wife and two children were there too. He at once began showing off in the Berlin manner, and I nearly lost my composure. In the men's salon I quickly found my feet, but on the ladies' side I had stiff competition in Herr Wagner from Wiesbaden, who with the bourgeois clien-...

People: Willi Distel, Herr Vogel, Herr Wagner, Hindenburg

Places: Berlin, Reichenbach im Vogtland, Leipzig, Bitterfeld, Wittenberg, Anhalter Bahnhof, Voelkerschlachtdenkmal

Interesting facts