Germans and their shoes

Some people fetishize shoes. Others just have overflowing collections of them. Former Philippines First Lady, Imelda Marcos, who denied rumours that she owned 3000 pairs of shoes, owned up to 1060 such pairs.

 

In Germany, I have come across a rather schizophrenic relationship, which some Germans have with their shoes. Having worn them all day, they leave their shoes outside their own apartments, in the common parts of the buildings, in which they live. Evidently, they find their own – lovingly and expensively purchased – shoes either too smelly or too dirty to bring into their own flat. It is often quite disgusting.

 

Here’s what I was greeted with on a recent visit to a colleague’s house in Berlin. (Not the colleague’s but an adjacent flat)