It was planned, adjourned and rejected. It took about a year. But now it's finally time, praised on both sides of the Rhine: Emmanuel Macron, the French President, receives, according to information from the SPIEGEL this week, the two top German Greens Robert Habeck and Annalena Baerbock in the Élysée Palace.
Only a nuclear war could break the meeting, jokes in Macron's Entourage.
It is, it is certain, not natural for a French President to invite the leaders of the smallest opposition party to the German Bundestag.
On the other hand, what is still natural?
The high-altitude flight of the Greens, their successes - whether in Germany, in Austria, or just as in the European elections, in France - has put them on the political map like exclamation marks.
That Emmanuel Macron should meanwhile cherish lust for a new, different kind of government in Berlin is no longer just a murmur.
Because with Chancellor Angela Merkel or Finance Minister Olaf Scholz to escape the routine frustration of Franco-German relations, no one believes in Paris. The hope is green, and maybe the future too - that's the calculation. Anyway, Greta Thunberg was already visiting the Élysée in February.
It's a bit of a joke to imagine Robert Habeck shuffling around the raked gravel yard with his bicycle messenger shoulder bag and his eternal jeans, where else would the heads of state of this world step out of their polished limousines and the republican guard hack their heels together.
Co-boss Annalena Baerbock will also sit next to him on the golden Louis XIV armchair in Macron's office, which is due to a plan change. Actually Habeck wanted to travel alone to talks: from Brussels to Paris and from there on to Rome. "Robert just wants to learn", the party says when asked what this trip is all about.
But Habeck before Goldstuck alone in conversation with Emmanuel Macron? That would have added even the most harmonious of all double points. That's why Baerbock is now traveling to Paris. The Roman mayor Virginia Raggi is allowed to meet Habeck again alone.
Yoan Valat / AFP
Emmanuel Macron: How green is the president really?
The Green duo ignites thus the second stage of the common political biography. After a small doldrums in the summer, they are back on top, which means that the polls are currently only in second place behind the Union's parties.
Since governing has become a fragile thing even in Germany, you look around. Looking for new alliances, potential partners, not only in Brandenburg or Berlin, but also a level above, the European.
It was a long way to this meeting with Emmanuel Macron, despite the intersection of common interests.
On the one hand, this may have been due to the French's overflowing agenda, and on the other, it was due to animosities in the Greens. Many in the party consider Macron to be a rather nasty neo-liberal, who especially wants to drag the welfare state. An unjustified charge. Alternatively, for a kind of would-be hegemon, the genuinely French interests as European trimmings. A not entirely unjustified charge.
Instead of putting aside these sensitivities in the sense of a higher-level matter, for example the European elections, they lived up to their expectations again in the spring. Sven Giegold, European Greens MP - Baerbock and Habeck visit him this Tuesday in Brussels - accused a Macron overflowed French Greens in public of the stab.
As far as Europe is concerned, they certainly did not wait for Macron, Giegold wrote insulted.
You can see that differently too.
And Ursula von der Leyen, proposed by Macron Commission President in spe, the European Greens did not want to contribute, which is said to have caused at least a slight stomach ache at Robert Habeck. The "quasi-ruling party" (Habeck) may remain in waiting, but likes to retire to the Trotzecke.
If one addressed Annalena Baerbock in the past few months to the ruling French, she became quite snippy. With Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire, whom the Green duo will now meet in Paris, she had sympathized less in the past. However, Le Maire is also a particularly polished example of the ruling class in France.
The green motto: We are tall ourselves
In short, seen from a European perspective, the Greens have so far rather bitchy towards Macron. Not too many concessions, just not too loud applause. Following the motto: We are tall ourselves. Baerbock was also bothered by Macron's "nuclear Europe thoughts".
Whether the approach of the French president is "too intergovernmental" or not, they will all be able to discuss it in person at this first tête-à-tête in the rather impressive setting of the Élysée.
Let's see what Baerbock says afterwards. There are few politicians in personal conversation who can be more engaging than Emmanuel Macron.
A first sniffing took place already on Friday, in Berlin, the two Greens met with Clément Beaune, Macron's chief adviser for Europe and one of his closest confidants. From its environment afterwards it was said, Beaune was a little disappointed by this meeting.
Baerbock and Habeck would have tried to find out how "green" Macron really is.