The Türkmendag family has gathered under the wooden pergola for a short break.

They sit on office armchairs and plastic chairs.

Your property lies between the river Inde and a busy street that leads to the old town of Stolberg.

A week ago it would have been unthinkable to be here.

Since last Wednesday, a path of destruction has been running through the North Rhine-Westphalian town, which was badly hit by the flood.

Here on Eisenbahnstrasse the water stood three meters high.

Dark edges on the walls are evidence of this.

At the roadside, as everywhere in the copper town near Aachen, which is actually idyllically located in a valley, there is what the Stolbergers were able to carry out of their flooded apartments and houses.

Horrible still lifes made from moldy furniture.

Ursula Kals

Editor in business, responsible for “Young People Write”.

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Not only was private life destroyed here, the flood also washed away professional livelihoods. As with the Türkmendags. The couple came from Turkey almost 50 years ago and built up a remarkable small business in the Rhineland. The core is a car dealership, they earn additional money with real estate rental and machine installation. Family ties are great. This is now vital. The capital was in the courtyard: eleven cars have been lost, damaged, swept away, stranded on walls. One of the couple's sons renovated a café for 60,000 euros in order to open it now. That is flooded and the owner goes to the lawyer to check what is still feasible in terms of business. “Everything is destroyed. Our total damage amounts to two million euros, ”estimates the second son.

Father Mehmet nods sadly. The mother sits there, friendly and quiet. You worked hard all your life and now this? She lifts her hands helplessly, “The main thing is that nothing has happened to my family. Money is not everything in life. ”And the main thing is that her daughter Suna Yilmaz no longer has to stand near the call like on the first day of the flood and tearfully admonish her father:“ Dad, don't go down, you will be washed away! ”

And what happens now? The father shrugs his shoulders. “Clean up, we'll move on. There is no point in driving yourself crazy. ”Decades ago he proved that he can make a lot out of a little. His 43-year-old son works for a local industrial company. The trained retail salesman and machine operator helps where he can, which may save him from the professional uncertainty. He is currently exempted, the factory halls have to be renovated. "It will take a year and a half for things to work properly again."

Two grandchildren are visiting, the children of the eldest. The 14-year-old Adnan reports how a woman was stuck with one leg in the gully hole before his eyes and was pushed out again by the water pressure. Broken chunks of asphalt, an exploding power box, tanks that protect the Sparkasse from looting, it is almost irrelevant that there was no electricity at home in the Münsterbusch district for two days and only water in the evening. The teenagers had imagined the beginning of the summer vacation very differently.