To say that Germany’s consul general to the Southeast, Heike Fuller has faced a whirlwind of demands since arriving in Atlanta may be somewhat of an understatement.
Her first task upon arrival in August was to find lodgings for herself and family including husband Kurt, a retired U.S.AID official, and her three children.
Germany’s official residence has experienced structural problems and prior to her arrival was placed on the market in Buckhead. Consequently Dr. Fuller and her family moved into a local hotel while she searched for a school for her twin son and daughter.
With the Atlanta International School accepting her children and a suitable residence found, the baptismal phase was over. But her responsibilities as the consul general quickly clicked in.
Starting with the Day of German Unity on Oct. 5 she did a head first plunge into Atlanta’s German-centric community, which was followed by the first “Wunderbar together/ Germany and U.S.” light show on the facade of the Atlanta-Fulton Central Public Library that had been promoted as a street party.
Before October was gone, she went to the 40th anniversary gala of the German American Chamber of Commerce South, which also was attended by Emily Haber, Germany’s ambassador to the U.S.
During an interview with Global Atlanta, Dr. Fuller recalled her first days in Atlanta as warmly hospitable and had special words of appreciation for the efforts on her behalf of Abby Turano, Georgia‘s deputy commissioner for international relations and chief of protocol and Vanessa Ibarra, director, international affairs and trade at the Atlanta mayor’s office.
The day following the unity celebrations, she attended a serious colloquium on the role of scholarship and science in society meant to link German and U.S. scholars considering subjects such as “the future of democracy” and “imagining the future” from a transatlantic perspective.
Dr. Fuller comes to Atlanta with a wide variety of diplomatic experience and an impressive educational background. She is a lawyer with a doctorate in law. She has served in Portugal, Japan, Egypt, and Rwanda as well as filling in several posts in Berlin and Bonn, Germany’s former capital.
In her remarks to Global Atlanta, she made it clear that as a woman she has been a path breaker of sorts having been the first woman to be assigned by the German government to NATO where she served for two years. She also served for three years as commissioner for corruption prevention in Berlin and most recently was the deputy head of mission in Lisbon, Portugal from 2014-18.
As Chancellor Angela Merkel‘s political future hangs in the balance, Dr. Fuller said forthrightly that the chancellor would be more successful politically if she hired more female advisors.
She is equally direct in staking out her agenda for the Southeast, saying that she wants to focus on Atlanta first before reaching out to the other five states for which the consulate general is responsible.
Even the best laid plans, however, have to be tweaked. Despite her intentions she has made trips to Chattanooga, Tenn., where she visited the Volkswagen plant with Peter Beyer, coordinator of transatlantic cooperation at Germany’s Federal Foreign Office, and Nashville where she accompanied a parliamentary delegation.
A fervent supporter of “people-to-people” initiatives, she said that she hopes to create linkages in the Southeast with German initiatives in the areas of education including vocational training, the environment, health care and language learning.
While serving in Portugal, she was aware of the strides Lisbon has made as a center for information technology and plans to maintain her ties there.
She also wants to develop new ways of bringing people together other than through “conference diplomacy.” She was proud of her success in organizing bicycle tours in Lisbon as a means of reaching out to different communities.
A special interest of hers also is to combat the proliferation of plastic. She takes her own canvas bags to the grocery store to provide an alternative example to the use of plastic bags.
She also is ready to start a campaign against the use of plastic straws which she says end up in the oceans where they cause serious harm to fish and other animals.
As if anticipating her plastic concerns, Delta Air Lines Inc. announced on Oct. 27 that it will remove the use of an assortment of single-use plastic items from flights and Delta Sky Clubs including stir sticks, wrappers, utensils and straws.
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