Hamburg

Click image for more photos ...

Wednesday, June 8

Our porter for the sleeping car on the overnight train to Hamburg is a real "herr Mueller"; his German is much harsher than in Zürich where it seems to be softened by the French. He manages the border crossing with our passports in hand so we sleep through it all. He's friendly, helpful and we get by well enough given his lack of English and our lack of German. He encourages us to have a breakfast in the dining car and wakes us early in order that we may. 

The breakfast does not bode well for our stay. We think it's included but Kate wisely asks and we're told it's 18.50DM (deutsche mark). This breakfast has some fruit, cereals, breads, jams, etc. But it's nothing to write home about, apart from the cost. Kate just wants a coffee and that's 5DM (the Deutsche Mark is slightly less than the Canadian dollar).

We are a little cranky on our arrival not having had a good night's sleep. We did sleep all right but it was very intermittent. There's the clackety-clack of the train tracks and the occasional crash as things fall off our shelves onto the floor because of the random swaying on the tracks.

The Hamburg Hauptbahnhof (central) station looks something like this. The train tracks run under and through the train station. There are about 14 platforms and as many if not more tracks. On the main floor/shopping concourse there are two walkways above the tracks. Each of these walkways, at either end, feeds into the city. And there's many connections underground to a great/Metro subway system. We don't know where we're going and get a bit lost as we exit — should we exit North or South, East or West. Reg says, "It's this way" and Kate responds, "No it's that way" and we both decide, "No, it's this other way". 

In the train station we had approached the information desk for some assistance. We stand in line and at our turn Kate asks her, "Hallo, excuse me, I'm sorry. Do you speak English?" The less than helpful lady on the information desk abruptly replies, "No, next!" It's another case of the friendly Germans. We end up taking a cab who finds the way for us and this is a good idea as we have way too much luggage to carry.

Our hotel, a Best Western, is about a 10-minute walk from the station — if you know the way and take the right exit. It's convenient to the Central station (Kate and I almost got off at another one), to Kate's conference center, and to an area called St George with hookers and junkies hanging out. The train station is filthy with lots of derelicts hanging around. Some are sleeping on the ground, some are begging, others are horsing around with friends, and some are loons just cursing at the wind. The streets around the train station and our hotel are covered with dog shit and smell of urine. Beer tins litter the parks where seedy characters toss them when finished. There's an IV drug culture as well. There are specialized containers in the park for disposal of needles and sharps but all these, and the litter containers, are packed full to overflowing with garbage piling up on the ground. First impressions are not good. This is not Switzerland and we are not impressed.

Prostitution is legalized here, but who would want to? The Reeperbahn, not too far to the west, is the "official red light district" but there are plenty of hookers by our hotel as well. In the Reeperbahn they have live sex shows and the street has prostitutes sitting in the windows advertising their offerings. Apparently, women aren't allowed to go into this area. This is the city where the Beatles played in their early 60s. That evening, at about 7:00, I was approached by hooker (large breasts, very mini mini-skirt & high boots) on the way to the train station who offered to show me a good time (or at least that's what I understood her to mean). I ought to have said, "Ich bin kein Seemann" (i.e. I'm no sailor) but I couldn't remember the phrase and just said, "No thanks" instead. It is pretty grotty around here in the daylight hours, I wonder what it's like at night?

We went on a bus tour of the city. The guide she had some advice for those going to the Reeperbahn that are worth repeating:

1. Don't take any more money than willing to spend.
2. Always ask for a price list before you order a drink.
3. Watch out for pickpockets.

Why is this such a bizarre city? Answer: location, location, location, and history. Hamburg is the major seaport on the Elbe River with direct access to the North Sea so there are lots of sailors looking for a good time. So, that tradition has been accepted and remains. It's also a city which would have been destroyed during WWII. It is the second biggest city in in Germany and has some very scenic parts along the two lakes (actually they're dammed rivers). Apartments in that area are very expensive — 2,000,00DM for a three bedroom apartment. There's lots of consulates there as well, but no embassies. However, none of this explains the prostitution and why there's so many poor folks wandering the streets.

Reg says he has yet to see any really good looking women in Europe. There's lots of frumpy frau with lace kerchiefs over their hair but no stunning models. Perhaps they're in Paris and Milan. There's certainly not any here in Hamburg nor were there any in Zürich. The hookers on the street look sad, tired, sick and worn out. It's all very sad and not very attractive.

We went on the tour bus of the city that we concluded was a bit of a rip-off. First, we asked before we got on whether it was in English and the tour guide assured us that the main parts were in English which we both took to mean that it was mainly in English. Oh contraire! It was 80 to 90% in German with the main highlights translated only briefly into English and usually well after you've passed the site they're described first in German. Also the day was overcast, the city is not particularly attractive and we got into several traffic jams where Kate got motion sickness. The tour guide kept saying that Hamburg has the best this and the most that, etc. but frankly, we weren't buying it. The city just looked grey, dismal and depressing after having been in Switzerland. Lastly, the tour cost us 24DM each (that's about $22CDN).

But we're here for a conference, the XIV World Congress for Social Psychiatry. Not for the sites, the bars, the hookers, the drugs and "Needle Park". 

The plan was that Kate would meet her friend Irmgard in the Congress Centrum Hamburg (CCH) at 4:00p.m. and they would have a coffee before their 5:00pm workshop. Reg walked over with them and when we met up with Irmgard she told us that the workshop was at a high school some distance from the conference. She thought that no one would turn up because it was so far off. If nobody showed, then she and Kate and the other two presenters (Beate and Elfrieda from Berlin) would have coffee together and then go to dinner. Beate and Elfrieda were a jolly pair and had done research on prostitution and AIDS.

When we arrived at the conference center, it was a strange looking crowd for psychiatrists. It looked more like a punker conference. No one looked like our psychiatrist friend Hans from Bern who we had met at the KBS conference! Kate thinks there must have been a lot of students attending. There were even two women necking! So much the norm in Hamburg.

Kate suggests that we should all go to dinner dinner together (including Reg and Cindy who was arriving later). The two jolly women from Berlin knew of a really good Portuguese restaurant and went off to make reservations. This turned into quite the production because they couldn't remember the name of the place (it's called "Porto") although they knew vaguely where it was to be found. But, ultimately reservations were made and Reg went off to take some photos of the city (the photo above is from a fountain at the old Rathaus/City Hall) and to meet up with Cindy at the train station. 

The four speakers set off for about a 2km walk to a sketchy classroom where no audience was expected. As Kate and her friends were tromping along they were joined by a woman (Danish, about 55, who had lived in Canada and was interested in going back to study in art therapy) who asked whether this was the right street to get to their presentation. So they knew they had an audience of at least one! In fact about 25 or more people showed up. There were two men (who were both physicians/shrinks), the rest were women and none of whom were physicians. Most were young students.

At the presentation there was no overhead projector and most of the attendees didn't speak English. The meeting was conducted in German with only Kate's little presentation in English. Fortunately, she had made photocopies of the handouts and many were graphic, so most people seemed to be able to follow most of it. Of course Kate wasn't able to follow much of the German!

After the workshop Kate, Irmgard and friends made their way to the Portugese restaurant. Cindy and Reg found their way okay having figured out the Metro/tube station from the Hauptbahnhof. It's easy enough to do and we even had a local volunteer to help us when we look distressed. That's so unlike the brusk information desk lady Kate encountered that morning.

In any case Reg and Cindy arrived shortly after 8:00 and found four giggling adults chatting and laughing loudly while working on their second or was it third litre of dry white wine from Portugal. Why does green describe this wine? They have been munching on bread with garlic butter and antipasta to snack on. We got two more glasses and soon more wine.

Vinho Verde, or green wine, is made from grapes picked before they are fully ripe. This is a regional wine from the north of Portugal where the cool climate makes it difficult to get fully ripened grapes. It comes in both red and white versions and each are low in alcohol content as the grapes, and sugar, have not fully developed.

Everyone had seafood for their dinner. Reg had a "lochs" dinner: salmon with boiled potatoes (having figured out that "lochs" is salmon, c.f. bagels and lox). One of the Berliners had octopus which was actually not too bad. Another, or perhaps it was Irmgard, had the monkfish. Kate and Cindy had a seafood platter with all sorts of stuff including prawns, salmon, sardines, squid, cod, and more! It was a huge platter and took up most of the table. The wine flowed freely interspersed with mineral water for the Berliners (recall JFK's famous line, "Ich bin ein Berliner" which doesn't translate as intended).

The waiter was Portuguese (we believe) and spoke pretty good English. We explained that we had no cod fish in the Grand Banks of Canada anymore as the Portuguese had caught them all. He explained that, "Yeah we've done that to Canada. Now we're doing it Norway." We're sure he's just joking but then we'd need to confirm with our Norwegian friends.

Someone tried to explain to Kate what a monkfish was. In German the name is something else of course and although we've never met a monkfish we know what they are. Someone described the fish to Kate, "It's called seeteufel or devil fish and has an ugly head with its body coming to a point and only one big bone." That's not a very appetizing description, but when all you see is a nice filet of fresh fish on your plate it does good to remember where it came from.

We took a cab back to our hotel from the restaurant so Kate never did experience the tube — she says she didn't miss it. At the Best Western hotel Cindy is next door to us and both our rooms look something like this: you enter from the hallway and there's the bathroom on your right, clothes hangers to the left, and another door that leads into the main bedroom. At about 6:00 a.m. we finally figured out why there's that second door. If you close that door it will keep out most of the noise from the hallway. And it was awfully noisy all night long. So, we live and learn.

We all enjoyed the dinner very much. It was great food, interesting dining with more or less local people. Our German friends were gregarious, laughing, loud and very friendly. We sometimes felt a little bit as "odd man out" since the conversations would mostly range in German and only sometimes veer into English. But in sum we ended up having some fun in Hamburg. The conference and dinner worked well, but we do not plan to ever return to Hamburg if we can avoid it — it is a pretty ugly city!

Fortunately, we're only here for the day. Tomorrow we're off to Cologne/Köln to the southwest on the Rhine.

Slides scanned and notes composed during the Russian Invasion of Ukraine, March 2022 — as if living through the OMIGOD! COVID variant wasn't bad enough! The diary entries were made by Cindy, Kate and Reg at the time.