I meet Astrid Eisenhut-Sattler in her café in the town hall. It is very hot and we drink “Hahnenburger” together, cold tap water.
Astrid Eisenhut-Sattler has been running the "Stadthauscafé" at Stadthausgasse 13 for 10 years now. It's wonderful there in the summer, especially when you can spend time in the beautiful courtyard of the listed town hall (seat of the citizens' community of the city of Basel). It's quiet there, you can hear the chatter of the guests, the twittering of the birds and the splashing of the fountain.
Ms. Eisenhut, you have a demanding job. How long do you have to work?
For me, running my own small restaurant business is a dream. I grew up in a family of restaurant owners, and nothing else was ever an option for me. And I think the advantage of being self-employed is that you can decide for yourself when you want to stop.
How do you know?
You can feel it – or at least you should! And of course external factors such as financial security are also important components of a retirement decision. The day of departure will definitely come at some point.
How do you deal with this day of farewell?
At the moment it's not an issue for me. And after that... I need challenges, I have ideas and I'm open to new things. Doing nothing is not for me!
At Seniors@Work there are many senior citizens who would like to work part-time. You also offer catering. Would you need a helping hand?
I can imagine working with senior citizens at club events. However, large catering events are very physically demanding. You have to be able to carry things, the business is usually hectic and stress resistance is required. And honestly: do senior citizens still have to carry things and stress? Let's let the young people do these things!
But I can certainly imagine a project in which senior citizens bring out their old recipes, bake cakes and then offer them in a café. There is something similar in Vienna called "Vollpension". There, grandmas and grandpas bake traditional family recipes, such as cake highlights and much more... However, the legislation here in Basel stipulates that you cannot bake cakes at home and bring them to the café. They have to be produced locally.
You can tell that Astrid Eisenhut-Sattler is going through a thought process. I would like to thank her very much for this conversation and wish her lots of fun developing and implementing new ideas.
Beatrice
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