Please note: This is not actually Hamburg. |
I wasn’t supposed to be here, really. Not until the Sunday before I left England. I then wasn’t supposed to be here so early. Not until I had dallied in Paris too long to cycle to Bonn. Bonn, where I was supposed to collect a train to Hamburg. Instead, I dallied in Paris, ate croissants aux amandes, went to the theatre and drank vin rouge. It was all very Paris.
This is actually Hamburg. |
And the suddenly it wasn’t very Paris, it was very Hamburg. By which I mean: ports, building sites, graffiti, squats, ships, cranes, burlesque life-drawing, wind-farms, compound nouns and absurd uses of the word ‘super’.
“Brunch”, c. 2 p.m. |
Still, I was pleased to see that they do patisserie here and have duly invested heavily in baked goods. I was also pleased to see that they have shoe shops here and have duly invested in a pair. Of shoes, not shops. So Hamburg passed by in a glaze of eating (Pakistanisch, Portugiesisch, “Brunch”), walking (docks, Schulterblatt, Alstersee) and keeping my hair out of the wind. None of which is interesting to you, I’m sure.
So I won’t say any more about Hamburg, except to invite you to suggest purposes for their tower:
Flying saucer? Mind control tower? Enormous hypodermic needle? Whatever it is, there are plenty of them in Germany. |
I can definitely imagine cycling lanes for the place. The humid weather in the morning makes for easy sweat and a good workout.