Kosmos

Culture, travel, fashion and culinary delights: the Kosmos pages of Lufthansa Magazin bring you interesting and useful tidbits from around the world

Accessories

Culture clash

Fans cool your face and maybe even your temper, but that’s not all: They
transmit secret messages, are crucial dating props and deadly weapons.

Japan

En garde! In the Japanese martial art tessenjutsu, fans are used to parry knives or swords, and also to provoke attacks. Even the Samurai used to use the harmless-looking fan as a secret weapon, its metal ribs sharpened to a point. Potentially deadly, such fans could come in useful on occasions which required that swords be set aside.

Spain

Can you read me? Spanish fan gestures like “Follow me!” (1), “I love you” (2), “I love someone else” (3) were once used to convey secret messages. Some fan researchers claim that they were really just a 19th-century marketing trick, but fans really are great flirt aids, even without the knowledge of a complex secret code.

Currywurstburger “Die Begegnung” by SchillerBurger in Berlin — © SchillerBurger

Berlin, Germany

Wurst Case

The Currywurst sausage was reputedly invented in 1949 by Herta Heuer in Berlin, home to the Currywurst Museum since 2009. The fast-food snack now also comes as a burger: Berlin’s SchillerBurger chain serves a tasty, homemade Currywurst burger called Die Begegnung.

schillerburger.com

Number of the day

209

When the 2017/2018 German Bundesliga soccer season begins on August 18, 209 nations will be tuning in to watch. The Fiji Islands, Nicaragua and Mongolia are just three of the many countries to have secured the official broadcasting rights. Some Bundesliga games will air on live TV channel Sport24 on long-haul Lufthansa flights.

Mr. Know It All

Aim for the sky

Who says you need mountains to go climbing? There are plenty of alternatives in the shape of spectacular climbing walls on churches, dams and the cooling towers of nuclear power plants.

Awesome walls

Built 150 years ago, St. Alban’s Church in Liverpool, England, inspires aspiration to other spheres. Today, visitors no longer come here to pray, but to climb its venerable walls, including an overhanging 17.5-meter lead wall.

Powerful thrill

The cooling tower of the former nuclear reactor in Kalkar, Germany, stands 58 meters high and has been repurposed as a climbing wall. If you prefer a different kind of thrill, there’s a roller coaster next door.

Head in the clouds

Surrounded by authentic Alpine peaks, the steep wall of the Lago di Luzzone reservoir in Switzerland offers a unique challenge: It is the world’s highest artificial climbing wall with 650 holds over a vertical distance of 163 meters.

Sandibe Safari Lodge Botswana — © Martin/Le Figaro Magazine/laif

Botswana, Africa

Stylish safari

The Okavango Delta covers more than 20 000 square kilometers and is home to a staggering variety of species, including elephants, lions, hippos and leopards. Stylish, sustainable Sandibe Lodge with its twelve luxurious wooden chalets is in the middle of the great outdoors.

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Dark side of the sun

Miniature utopia

Ancient culture, new pride

Oceans apart

The Light Master