"The city of the Fuggers, Mozart and... " a Augsburg Travel Page by Mikebond

Augsburg is a city with 260,000 inhabitants lying 65 kilometres to the West of München.
It is the most ancient settlement of the Romans at the North of the Alps: founded in 15 BC, it took from Emperor Augustus the name of Augusta Vindelicorum. The photo portraits a detail of the Augustusbrunner (Augustus fountain).
Augsburg was also a very important centre in the Middle Ages and in the Renaissance, especially thanks to the Fuggers, a family of bankers who gave a huge prestige to the town, and to Emperor Maximilian I who granted to it the status of Freistadt (Free city), giving it even more prosperity.
Later, it gave birth to the father of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and to the playwright Bertolt Brecht. Today, Augsburg has a renowned University and is an important industrial centre.

I went to Augsburg in July 2005 to attend a 4-week German course in order to improve my oral skills. I decided to live with a family, as I have always done, because this gives the chance to learn more about the local culture and also to practise the language.
This time, I was particularly lucky with my host family, the Kerbers. Josef and Ingrid are both teachers and I was very happy when the school wrote me this, since it meant that at least their German would be good.
I loved to stay with Josef, who proved almost a father. We talked about many topics, such as politics, poetry, history, as I have never done with either of my parents. He enjoys life day by day and wants to profit from it as much as he can, since he believes there is no life after death. He is very tall and has a fair complexion. Well, Josef is the typical German.
Ingrid was very different under many aspects. She is small and has a dark complexion, which makes her more similar to a Mediterranean woman than to a German. She also told me that people always think she is Turkish, due to the presence of a wide Turkish community in Augsburg (10-15% of the population). Neither her personality was typically German, on the contrary she reminds an Italian mum who cares a lot about her family. Josef said she was a mama.
I was lucky to meet Josef and Ingrid's children, Florian and Katharina (Kati). He studies engineering in Stuttgart and she studies literature in Leipzig. I enjoyed staying with them, although I preferred talking to Kati, who used to speak to me a lot.
The Kerbers had an old dog when I arrived. She was called Joschi, but she died few days after I arrived. All the family was very shocked for this reason.
Here is a photo of family Kerber. Katharina is not there. I will upload more pictures of them soon.

Although my holidays are usually more cultural than naturalist, I had a rare opportunity to combine them.
Josef and Florian sometimes took me to the country after dinner (that is, around 7 pm, since they are used to have dinner at 6, if not earlier). I have written the country, but it is actually just outside the city. I hadn't gone for such walks for ages and I enjoyed that. I even miss it a little. I will put more photos about the countryside soon.