1. Kö is the common short name for “Königsallee”. It’s the central boulevard in Düsseldorf. The western part of the street is rather boring, the eastern part is said to be the one to be on if you want to go shopping on a quite luxury scale. It’s the Champs-Élysées or Sloane Street of Nordrhein-Westfalen.

Recently, brands of a more affordable price segment settled down here, such as H&M, Zara and Esprit.

2. Alt is actually German and means “old”. But it’s also just another term for “Altbier” (you see, they do like abbreviations there). It’s your Düsseldorf sort of top-fermenting beer and you might get in touch with it very soon, or might have already. You can do so in one of the brewery-pubs like Füchschen, Schumacher, Schlüssel, Uerige and Kürzer. In the shops you will get the most successful brand “Diebels” (they also have other sorts of beer); other popular names are Frankenheim, Schlösser (sponsoring the EuroClub venue “Schlösser Quartier Bohème”), Gatz, Hannen and Rhenania.

3. Köln is German for “Cologne”. It’s close, bigger and a lot more popular than Düsseldorf, and that’s just one reason why the two cities don’t get on well. In fact they hate each other. Other reasons include rival football and ice hockey clubs, mostly in the lower leagues recently – only Köln has a team in the First Bundesliga at the moment. A fact that the Düsseldorfers surely don’t like! On the other hand, Köln got a shock when it didn’t become the capital of NRW – let alone Germany – after WW2. Düsseldorf instead became the capital of the state they are both located in. Let me tell you this much, Köln is better than Düsseldorf.

4. Verbotene Liebe is German for “Forbidden Love”. It’s one of the most popular long-running daily soap operas on German television, namely on your Eurovision host broadcaster Das Erste / ARD. A big part of the story takes place in posh Düsseldorf. The show is very popular among gays, because some characters in the 16 years long history of the soap already have been gay or lesbian. Recently a gay couple got married in the show.

5. Fashion. After all you have read about Königsallee and posh soap operas you can guess it – fashion plays a BIG role in Düsseldorf. No other German city is as successful when it comes to this industry. Düsseldorf hosts one of the biggest fashion fairs in Europe, the “Collections Premieren Düsseldorf”. More than 600 showrooms are located in the capital of NRW.

6. Wärst Du doch in Düsseldorf geblieben (“If only you’d stayed in Düsseldorf”) is probably the most popular song about the town.

The Danish singer Dorthe Kollo sang it back in 1968, where it took 2nd place in the German Schlager Contest. It’s one of the biggest evergreens of German Schlager.

7. Düsseldorf is the capital of the German state of Nordrhein-Westfalen (NRW). 586,217 people live there, making it Germany’s 7th biggest city just behind Frankfurt (671k) and Stuttgart (601k).

In 2011, it will host the Eurovision Song Contest. But you knew that already!