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Nadine Niebank and Sascha Mühlenbeck sell delicacies in the former grocery store
Photo:
Mario Piera
Sascha Mühlenbeck steps over the threshold of his shop, walks over the patterned tiles and heaves a package on the oak counter, right next to the candy glasses and the liquorice sticks.
Behind the counter, wooden shelves with finely carved Art Nouveau decorations protrude up to under the four-meter-high stucco ceiling.
The fine scales are of course mechanical, and the shelf behind the counter has dozens of small drawers.
One would expect a saleswoman to be wearing an apron and a lace cap.
Mühlenbeck could be a merchant from imperial times, but he is not: His "Holtorfs Heimathaven" is completely present, even if the visit feels like a journey through time.
The merchant has been running "Germany's oldest grocery store", as it is called in travel guides, for three years.
Customers have been buying colonial goods from Wilhelm Holtorf since 1874.
Unlike the name, the interior has hardly changed since then, but the attitude towards the colonial past has: "We are not a grocery store," says Mühlenbeck.
"This is important."
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