Interview with Jannek
Jannek, how did you come to become a tour guide here in Bautzen?
My mother discovered an advertisement in the newspaper that city guides were being trained here. At the time, I had a gap in my studies and many courses were canceled due to coronavirus. So I signed up for the course. I've always been interested in history, especially here in Bautzen, and at the time I didn't even know that such city guide courses were offered here.
How exactly did the course work and how long did it last?
The adult education center offered two courses here in Bautzen, one to become a tour guide and one to become a city guide. I opted for the city guide course. We were first taught the theoretical knowledge, then we were able to sit in on various guided tours. Sometimes we also met up in the city and learned about the history on site. The training lasted a year in total. As the training was in the middle of the coronavirus period, the course took place once a week, but sometimes once every two weeks. Sometimes you weren't allowed out at all. It was quite chaotic.
Do you have any special recommendations or tips for future tour guides, especially younger ones?
First of all: you can definitely do it. As a part-time job, city guiding hardly appears anywhere, most people give private tuition or train as lifeguards. But nobody thinks about being a city guide. It's a job in the fresh air, of course you have to be able to speak persistently and also loudly and clearly, but if you speak a little less clearly it's not a bad thing, the guests will get along and let you know if something was incomprehensible. You have to keep your sense of humor and be able to laugh at yourself from time to time, the tourists are here in their free time and they want to have something to laugh about. Guests often don't remember dates anyway, it's better to tell one more story, because tourists are more likely to remember special facts and stories.
What were your best experiences with tourists?
I once had a guided tour of the city with lots of young people, aged between 12 and 18. They were so interested and asked lots of questions. That was my highlight. As a city guide, it's generally nice when you realize that tourists are interested in what you're telling them and ask detailed questions. But I haven't necessarily had that one experience yet. Every city tour is special in its own way.
What makes being a tour guide so special for you?
First of all, it's completely different to my main job as a teacher, but there are similarities somewhere, you explain a lot of things. But tourists are there voluntarily, students sometimes aren't. You're outside, you always have something new to discover, Bautzen is my home town, the town I love and I can show people who come here voluntarily in their free time my home town and show them how great it is here. I regularly get comments like "Oh, we didn't think it would be so beautiful here!" And that's always worth a lot.
How was your first tour? Were you very excited?
My first tour was my exam tour with guests and two employees from the tourist information office, who then decided whether I had passed or failed. I probably would have been nervous, but at that moment I suppressed it and went through my almost memorized program. In the end, the tourists couldn't believe that it was my first guided tour. After that, I knew that it worked and that I could do it. I only mixed up one year, but that wasn't too bad.
One more question, what are the biggest challenges for you as a city guide?
Definitely the pavement here. You walk and stand a lot. It can be very tiring on the uneven pavement here. Of course, the weather can also be unpredictable, sometimes it's cold, sometimes it's really warm, so you have to think carefully about what to wear. But even in the pouring rain, the guests have already come along and were totally enthusiastic despite the weather. And thirdly: the microphone in the bus on the city tour, I personally don't get on well with it, I either get too close or too far away. But the problem is usually in front of the technology.
Thank you very much for the interview!
