Unexpected philosophy at the Karlsruhe train station

In my travels up and down Germany, I have sometimes passed by the Karlsruhe train station. My train stops, I never have gotten out, and depending on where my train is I have seen this wall of text. It does not look like an advertisement, and it caught my eye multiple times before I finally managed to read it. It simply says,

Ich bin ein Individuum.

Weit mehr als jede ausgedachte Figur aus irgendeiner Erzählung.

Ich atme. Ich fühle. Ich lebe. Und das jeden Tag.

Ich esse. Ich arbeite. Ich schlafe. Ich bin wie Du.

Ich renne. Ich springe. Ich klettere und fliehe. Ich stelle mich. Ich schreie.

Ich erschaffe und zerstöre. Ich mache das, weil ich es machen kann.

Und das mein Leben lang.

My rough translation,

I am an individual.

Further beyond any concieved Figure from any tale.

I breathe. I feel. I live. And that every day.

I eat. I work. I sleep. I am like you.

I run. I jump. I climb and run away. I confront. I scream.

I create and destroy. I do that, because I can do it.

And that, all my life.

I always wondered what it was and why it was there. Reading it sometime around the immigration crisis in Germany around 2015, it was to me a strong reminder of what it is to be human - and why it is so - just because.

Some basic duckduckgo'ing revealed further information:

  • The wall on Platform 1 is an art installation by Berlin artists Wermke/Leinkauf.

  • The wall and the poetry upon it is also mentioned in this blog post (in German). Below picture taken from the same blog post.

Ich bin ein Individuum


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