A city on the street

A most astonishing thing occurred.  One hundred year ago today, at 6am Germany declared war on Belgium.  At 8am Germany invaded Belgium.  A better commemorator than I would have woken up early and made sure that they were at the border by 8am, however, I don't think I could manage the 10km both ways given how much walking I've been doing.  So I'm going to see if I can get the car a little later and position myself just a little closer to the border.

So I prepared the previous post and went for some früsthück instead.  I finished breakfast at about 7:50 and felt like I wanted to at least be out and walking around for a bit, so I took a stroll around the neighborhood I'm staying in.  It's not a particularly fancy neighborhood, I would say working class.  It's also garbage day, so all the bags of rubbish were on the street and I could see the truck creeping along trying to make it not garbage day anymore.  Everything very ordinary, but I found some nice streets where I could reflect.

At one intersection I glanced in both direction and noticed there was mural painted on a wall a bit of the ways down the street.  I figured I might as well have a look.  And there it was.  I believe it's a mural of the history of Germany and the city of Aachen, from Roman times all the way to the second world war.  I believe it is a work in progress as there is more wall space and the beginning of shapes taking place after the last frame.  But on the corner, the first thing I see is this:

The war brings death to the people, and death of European Monarchy.
Also note as the mural transitions to the second world war, there is a commemoration of Kristallnacht, which
did see the city's synagogue destroyed.

I check the time and it's exactly 8am, the moment one hundred years ago when the war in the west began.  Chilling, but abundantly appropriate.  I did a terrible job of recording the other sections of the mural but here they are.

It's hard to see but on the far left hand side are Roman settlers.  You should be able to click through
on the images to see more detail.

The far left commemorates the city fire in 1656.  I believe next to it is a reference to the Peace of Aachen
which I think refers to what is known in English as the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle.  Then the mural
shows the springs that Aachen was known for in the 18th century.  And of
course, Napoleon.

This frame is clearly Aachen during the second world war, when it became the first German city to
be captured by the allies (specifically, the US).