This is a post for Good Friday, known as "Karfreitag" in the country in which this photo was taken. Jennifer took this shot last March during our tour of the Rheinland. As far as church holidays go, I always liked Good Friday, its solemn processions, the dirge/hymns sung at a snail's tempo about garden meditations and sleepy, unreliable friends. There's a pathos and romance to it that the rest of the church calendar lacks, and I think this photo does a good job of capturing it.
The location is Bad Godesberg, Germany, Villenviertel neighborhood, March 2005. The building behind the gate is the once-proud sanitorium/studentenwohnheim of Rheinallee 37-43, built in 1894, turned into student apartments in 1972 and shut down just months after I moved out in summer 2002. The "passion" in this case is Rheinallee's demise and subsequent renovation into luxury apartments. God only knows how the project has turned out, having long since abandoned its red brick walls and lush courtyard to partial demolition and deforestation, respectively.
Such is the fate of old buildings. Their original structures are altered and repurposed, but the spirits of their inhabitants dilly-dally on the premises. When I went by last year to view the ruins of Rheinallee, I swear I could hear my friends and I through the window in the second-floor balcony, laughing, listening to music and pouring wine into tea glasses, waiting for a nachtbus that would never come.
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