Pauline Cilia writes:

We are all in shock over the death of our dear friend, Rainer. My husband and myself still question each other if this is all true or if it is a bad dream, which we will wake up from. Alas, this is reality. Rainer has been taken away from us in a most horrific way.

A lot has been said and written about Rainer. I will relate what he meant to my family. He was in close contact with my husband, Alex Vella, giving him the countdown of how many days still had to pass before his next visit to Malta. When the visit would be imminent, he would ask us to make plans to book dinner with other fellow modellers and their spouses. He always asked that we go to the same Ta’ Xbiex restaurant, where he would make it a point to give his order in Maltese, to the utter surprise of the waitresses. This was standard practice and we would wait to see the surprise on their faces when this Bavarian would speak to them in Maltese.

He loved meeting my husband and myself at our favourite coffee shop on the Msida seafront. I had introduced him to the bone-shaped marzipan pastries, which he really loved. Thus, every time he came in November he would find his “borża tal-għadam” (bag of bones) as he called it, waiting for him. He also bought lots of goodies to take home to his family from this establishment, which became a must on his every visit to Malta.

He loved Melitensia and bought numerous books on Maltese history and culture. When my daughter was preparing for her thesis on old Maltese cinemas, he took such an interest in the subject that he even managed to find good material for her, together with photos which we ourselves had never come across.

When my daughter needed a precision instrument related to her profession, which she could not find in Malta, he immediately did his best to order it for her in Germany. This was Rainer.

He visited our home every time he came to Malta. He would spend hours in my husband’s workshop, discussing scale modelling and sharing information on the subject.

My husband met him several times in his travels to Germany and, in December 2012, he went to his home where he met his family and visited his workshop and saw his models. Now, my husband and two members of the Association of Model Engineers will return to Aschaffenburg, only to attend his funeral, which will be held in St Michael’s church where a young Rainer had served as an altar boy.

Rainer has been described as a “gentle giant”, always kind and willing to lend a helping hand. He always had a smile on his face, he was childlike in his ways, not naive but like refusing to grow up, maybe like all scale modellers, after all.

Rainer has been ‘untimely ripped’ from his young life. Let justice be done now. We will never get our dear Rainer back but we owe it to him and, mostly, to his parents.

Thank you, Rainer, for your love for everything that is Maltese, for your sincere friendship, for the good examples of sound values and kindness, for your good sense of humour and, mostly, for your warm, endearing smile.

You will be sorely missed by all your friends in Malta.

Our sincere condolences go to his parents and sister, Monika.

Farewell Rainer.