Four days a week, volunteer workers of the Speak-Out organisation in the Niederdorf provide homeless people with a free meal and sometimes a vital lifeline. Here, the homeless can find a wholesome hot meal, human contact, conversation, or simply a place to sit and be themselves.
In exchange for their free meal, visitors must agree to observe certain rules. Drugs, alcohol and violence are banned, and everyone must wash their own dishes. There are between 30 and 40 guests each evening – people on benefits, the unemployed, pensioners, the mentally ill, and homeless people of all ages; the majority are men.