Walther le Kon

Back in the days we celebrated the first snow in winter with a beach party. We had a huge flat which was unrenovated and had coal ovens in the rooms. We bought half a ton of sand and poured it into the biggest room of our flat.

We had this inflatable pool that we blew up and filled with water. We heated all five furnaces non-stop for two days straight until they were glowing orange-red. When the party started, the flat was hot: 49°C on average. You couldn’t touch the glasses in the kitchen cupboard anymore. It must have been 65 degrees in there. Although we warned our guests that it would be hot, most of them didn’t take us seriously and couldn’t imagine that it would be even warmer than in the summer. Neither could we. The ones in doubt couldn’t help themselves and were forced to strip down to their underwear.

People got drunk really fast, some collapsed, some passed out quite early. In the middle of the party one ring of the pool got damaged and half of the water ran out and caused a tremendous water damage downstairs. That night was a rush I will never forget. I took the picture the morning after, when I inspected the destroyed flat.

Walther was featured in Romka 9 in 2015.