A 24-hour Introduction

An entry in a diary:

So today my girlfriend and I will take a look at Marburg. First of all we delve into the freshly launched homepage of the City of Marburg, where we also find the Office of Tourism. We want to know ahead of time what it’s like in the university town where we might begin to study.

Then we are sitting in the train. Only one hour’s journey from Frankfurt or Kassel - that’s a positive sign already: the great wide world is still within reach …

The train (see link at right: Bahn-Auskunft) arrives on time even at 9:20 a.m.! At home we found information about the bus connection ahead of time (see link MR-Busverbindungen). Most of the buses that will take us in the direction of the city centre leave to the right of the train station’s plaza. Everything’s okay so far, now it’s time to look at accommodations.

Camping under the open sky (see link Campingplatz Lahnaue) may cost only 4,00 Euro, but we would rather try out the youth hostel (see link Jugendherberge MR). We are in it for 18,00 Euro, but at least we have a roof over our heads and the hostel is in a pleasant and convenient location between the Lahn River and the University Sports Centre (Jahnstr. 1, tel. 06421/23461).

When it starts to get "serious” about new living quarters, the Students’ Union (Studentenwerk) has recently opened a housing market database (see link Zimmerbörse). In addition, we can pick up the magazine "Express” free of charge almost anywhere in town; it appears every Thursday and has a classified section and tips for upcoming events.

The classified ads are even free online (link Express-Kleinanzeigen). In the Marburg city guide "Marbuch” we find "impressions of Marburg” (see link Stadtführer Marbuch).

Now, off on a tour of errands! Naturally we surfed the university pages beforehand and acquainted ourselves with location and office hours of the central student counselling services (Social Services, see link Studienberatung ZAS). Very convenient, that you can go in Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays to seek advice even without an appointment. You don’t find that everywhere.

We’ll definitely take advantage of that later, because unfortunately (sigh!) some things are still very unclear: exactly which courses of study, foreign language requirements, application procedures, local particularities, etc. But today we just want to collect a few informative items and find out more about the university’s interesting orientation programs we read about in the Social Services (ZAS) web pages.

The "trial courses” (Schnupperstudium) during the semester, for example, or the "University of Marburg’s Orientation Courses” (Marburger Universitätskurse zur Studienorientierung) in autumn (something of this sort is offered all too seldom!) - these aroused our curiosity right away.

In this way you can become much better acquainted with major courses of study before you make a decision. Please take note of at least this much - after all, who wants to buy a pig in a poke?

To get to the Social Services, we take a short walk along the Lahn River and across the bridge to Biegenstraße, where the university administration building is located.

If you keep your eyes open, you’ll find pedestrian signs everywhere showing you the directions.

In the meantime it is already past 11:00 a.m. - the ideal time for a second breakfast. And right away we have to decide among a variety: the student dining hall (Mensa) or a café? We make the "classic” decision: Café Vetter in the historic high town ("Oberstadt”). They have everything there from breakfast to candies, homemade ice cream and on to cakes and snacks (an absolute must for your parents’ first visit!).

In Marburg there are a few metres’ difference in elevation to climb! So - either climb the stairs or take a convenient ride on the Oberstadt elevator, to the accompaniment of its rustic noises.

After the statisfaction of having accomplished something we continue our venture on the tourist route and journey up to the city castle, the Landgrafenschloss (see link Stadtführer Marbuch). Along the way we also take a look at the historic first university buildings, such as the Physics building and, right next to the Church of St. Elizabeth, the "Alte Ochsenbraterei” (the old ox brasier), where Geography now has its home.

However, we’re primarily interested in Literature, so we give ourselves a chance to take in the "PhilFak” (the Department of Humanities). The towers are more on the prosaic side, but one does have a fantastic view!

Next door to the towers is the interesting silver cube: the University Library (see link Universitätsbibliothek). Now, as long as we’re in the neighbourhood, we do want to get that total "studi-feeling”: we try out the students’ dining hall (see link Mensa)! More precisely, Marburg has two dining halls, one on Erlenring and one on the Lahnbergen (the Lahn valley hills), and a nice cafeteria in Biegenstraße. We go down to the bistro on Erlenring; upstairs only students and staff can pay for meals with a "U-key”. - So, not bad: complete menus or buffet, a newspaper stand, delicious TransFair coffee, housing notices, internet - what more could the heart desire…?

While we’re here we might as well check out the tips for events taking place today. Cool, it seems as if there were constantly some kind of party or city festival going on here. Let’s see whom we might meet!

Planning our evening turns out to be quite a chore:

Marburg has the highest concentration of pubs per capita in Germany! So, perhaps we’ll start out simple, say, with a beer or an apple cider. Or shall we go to the theatre or to a concert?

Let’s take a look at the calendar of events. Hmmm, a movie?! Blockbuster or artistic films and open-air cinema - or instead, some alternative screen (see the links Cineplex, Kammerfilmkunsttheater, Café Trauma)? When it comes to cinema, Marburg, not the "metropolitan” areas, stands at the front of the class...

But now let’s live it up with more of the night-life. A tour of the pubs from classy to rustic; we’ll save the discos for another trip. Whew, never a dull moment in 24-hours … Breakfast at the youth hostel, back into the bus (lucky for us they leave often…) and off to the train station. Just in time, although this time the train arrived ten minutes late.

In the train we have to go through everything one more time. We have got a good first impression, the city seems to a great extent to be made up of "university”, and there is quite a lot to do in all of the areas of interest. Let’s see if we’ll decide on Marburg as a place to study…