Leipzig

For a good two weeks I have been, in a manner of speaking, moving about for two: I am assisting PM Raghunandan, the chief reporter of the Indian newspaper Deccan Herald, from Bangalore. More than half of his four-week stay in Leipzig has passed and he has seen a great deal, but it looks like our time is slowly running out.

Tourists or new residents in Leipzig often say that the people here are cosmopolitan and open-minded. Now that I have been en route with Raghunandan, I can better understand what they mean by that. No matter where I show up with the Indian man, he is cordially greeted. All of the doors open and the people turn to him happily, as if he were a good friend. “I know you from the paper, I’ve read all of your articles,” he hears constantly. If I do not bring him along with me, the people ask about him.

“Two weeks are not enough for me to see everything in Leipzig that I am interested in,” he regrets. So, the job is to keep track of at least the main topics. We drive to the Porsche factory, to BMW and then, of course, to the old and new trade fairs, too. The mere size of these two places give the journalist an idea of what the trade fair means to Leipzig. A direct comparison helps him understand why the old fair had become disused after reunification and why a new, modern one was needed – to ensure that Leipzig would not disappear into obscurity as a trade fair location.

We first drive around the new trade fair by car. Raghunandan didn’t expect everything to be so huge: the glass hall, the exhibition halls, parking lots. Today, Modell & Hobby is taking place; it is teeming with people everywhere. Right behind the entrance to the glass hall the 33-year-old comes to a halt by the Messemännchen. There is no need to explain the character with its head like a globe; he is a world traveller just like Raghunandan. He joyfully grasps the little man’s suitcase, at least for a photo.

We had already postponed our visit to the Battle of the Nations Monument, but I do not want to let my 33-year-old visitor go home without having seen Leipzig’s most famous landmark. “It is huge,” my guest marvels as we stand before it. He had imagined it much smaller from the Internet photos. “And so many tourists here,” he says in amazement at the crowds of people on the Lake of Tears. We climb the 500 steps of the monument on foot, perspiring in the 30-degree summer heat. At the top we stop to look at the view of the city hall tower, the dome of the LVZ and the Federal Administrative Court. Raghunandan says he hadn’t expected Leipzig to be such a green city.

This week, I experience him virtually electrified for the first time, namely when Leipzig’s famous opossum Heidi is put to sleep. Heidi was a major subject for him; his very first day he asked whether he could see her. “Oh my God,” is his reaction now to the news of her death. He goes right to work to send a report to his newspaper the Deccan Herald before the copy deadline.

He’s not as fervent about the opera ball. He finally agrees to put on a borrowed tuxedo and even buys himself a pair of black shoes to match. My companion looks very elegant as we walk together across the red carpet, but he had some trouble with the bow tie and I am not very helpful. He puts it in his jacket pocket until we find someone to help, and it turns out to be none lesser than top stylist Boris Entrup who crosses our path. It’s a pity there’s no photographer on hand at that moment. Raghunandan is perhaps the first guest to leave the ball (at about 10 PM), but he did stay longer than he’d planned. He must have enjoyed experiencing the ballet and Gewandhaus Orchestra in an exceptionally festively decorated hall, not to mention being able to stand in the middle of the opera stage, looking at the stage machinery and up at the spotlight beams. An opera house is one thing that Bangalore does not have.