Cafe Waldluft: The Bavarian Refugee Hotel
In the pristine Bavarian Alps, Mama Flora’s hotel – once a popular tourist destination – has become a home for refugees.
Editor’s note: This film is no longer available to view online.
Cafe Waldluft is a rustic hotel in the picturesque Bavarian town of Berchtesgaden, near Hitler’s former mountain retreat.
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Over the past few years, tourist numbers and the business have started to decline, so when Flora Kurz, the cafe owner, was approached by the German authorities to house refugees, she decided to fill her rooms with asylum seekers from Syria, Afghanistan and Sierra Leone.
“Mama Flora”, as she is known to her new tenants, tells tourists wanting to stay at her hotel that it is “fully booked at the moment” – it has been occupied by refugees for the past years.
Flora and her staff have made this place a special home for the refugees as they hope for a new life, waiting to find out if they can gain asylum, and deal with homesickness and anxiety about their families.
This film is an intimate look at the intersecting lives of the refugee residents, Mama Flora and an East German cook, Ursel, who have found themselves under the same roof, sharing new experiences and a syncretic household. It is a film about human kindness and a different concept of “home” as experienced by the residents of Cafe Waldluft.
Update: In 2017, Cafe Waldluft was forced to close because Mama Flora could not afford the 200,000 euros needed to meet new government fire safety regulations.
Only five refugees are allowed to stay at the hotel. Many of the the others had to relocate to fire safe accommodation.
Published On 8 Sep 2016