50 years DHL postman: Alfred Kierstein found a trick to make dogs friendly, saved a life, delivered incredible goods. Fredi is now retiring.
- 50 years of messengers at Post and DHL - not many can do that.
- Alfred Kierstein already - but now he's retiring.
- His “customers” will miss him.
Gröbenzell - "He was the best," enthuses Helene Dietrich. Susanna Niedermaier even speaks of an angel. This means the parcel carrier Alfred Kierstein, shortly and affectionately called Fredi by his customers. After 50 years at the post office , he has now retired . For years, the 65-year-old delivered parcels in the north of Groebenzell.
50 years of DHL postman: a dog snapped not only once
Not only is he missing from the residents, but also from many a four-legged friend. Because Kierstein was always on the go with a bag of treats. Gröbenzell knows Fredi like the back of his hand, he grew up there, was an altar boy and a boy scout. His first dream was to start an apprenticeship as a cook. However, he ended up at the post office. There he completed part of his training in his home town. He sat at the counter in the old school, where the post office was until 1992. And he carried out letters and packages.
Especially during this time there were always the unpleasant encounters with dogs that were proverbial for postmen. Ferdi was pinched more often, and once he even had to be sewn. Finally he fell for the trick with the treats. This appeased the animals during the rest of his professional life . Perhaps that was also one of the reasons why Fredi Kierstein decided after military service to work as a parcel deliverer in the future.
Postman at DHL: No street he doesn't know
“I liked the cohesion so much,” he recalls, that was “a committed community”. So he got the postal driver's license - and off we went. He was also used as a representative in Maisach, Augsburg or in the Gröbenzeller south. Mostly he was traveling in the north of Gröbenzeller and delivered packages. "There is no street that I do not know," reports Fredi proudly. But not only the streets, but also the people who lived in them, are well known to him. He had adjusted to their rhythm of life.
When Kierstein noticed that a resident works in the ambulance service, he automatically delivers his parcels to neighbors when the roller shutters are closed during the day. So he didn't have to wake the man or woman. Susanna Niedermaier will remember this for a long time.
Kierstein was in a much better mood in his work than this postman : In the district of Munich, delivery was completely freaked out. First he stepped on the door and then on a package - for no reason whatsoever.
DHL Postman even chased a thief
Of course there has been a lot of excitement over the years. Fredi once observed on Kirchenstrasse that a saleswoman was chasing a thief. The courier quickly intervened and held the man until the police came. In another case, Kierstein wanted to deliver a package, but nobody opened it. Although he was convinced that there had to be someone in the house, he continued.
However, he later returned to the address. Fortunately for the customer. Because he was helpless on the floor after a heart attack. The man was at home alone, the wife was on a cure. Thanks to Kierstein, he came to the hospital and survived.
Above all, the amount of packages that he had to carry out changed for Kierstein during his professional life. There were more and more. In the beginning, a VW bus T2 was enough to transport its daily shipments. Over time, the packages got bigger - and the vehicles bigger. In terms of goods, there is hardly anything that Fredi has not found.
50 years DHL postman: always with fun
Some customers asked the parcel carrier to deliver their potatoes, others even the wood for their ovens. In such cases, Alfred Kierstein had to haul up to one star of wood in 16 packages. Fredi even transported earth and cement.
At the very end of his professional life, the Corona virus also haunted his tour.
Despite all this, the 65-year-old still has no back problems. "It was always fun," he emphasizes. His last day on duty was one of the hardest for him. "At the beginning of my retirement, I wanted to treat myself to a cruise with my wife." He couldn't make the trip because of the pandemic. But Fredi kept his positive attitude to life even when he retired: "Probably the trip is only postponed." Kierstein doesn't know boredom anyway. In his home town of Mering, the father of two children and grandfather of two grandchildren maintains an allotment garden and is the chairman of the allotment garden association.
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