HAAAAMBUUURG

(NB : all credit for the hamburg night photos goes to erin butler, located at http://community.webshots.com/user/erinbutler211.. all credit for the other photos goes to torge fischer)

i know a blog on copenhagen is supposed to be next, but i cant bring myself to write one. its too sad to think about it all being over, so ill defer writing about the gap between rome and exams.. and skip to post exams. after three nights of straight partying, i went to hamburg.. avoiding saying all the goodbyes on the last saturday night. i was anxious to avoid the climax of the beer tears which had been flowing the last couple of days.. combined with 'oh it was so nice knowing you/i wish id got to know you more/ill see you in australia/ill miss you'.. i dont like goodbyes :P so i jumped at the chance to visit germany instead. torge, a friend id met here, was driving to copenhagen from his hometown. his suggested game plan was for me to take the train down to hamburg and then drive back up to copenhagen in the morning. i thought it was possibly the best plan ever.. ROADTRIP WOO.. mini roadtrip but roadtrip nonetheless. so off i went to hamburg.

hamburg is the second biggest city in germany, and apparently has some of the best christmas markets around (im not sure how accurate this information is, torge is admittedly biased cuz.. well.. hes german :P). we hit these markets after dumping our stuff at the hostel (we found it with very very little help from me.. after a couple of attempts at reading the map, i was designated the job of just holding the book open, and even with that, i lost the page a couple of times). from my unbiased point of view.. they're fairly huge. and from just walking around town that one night, we came across four different ones, all buzzing with people. one had an artificial snow slide thing (i refused to go on it because i didnt want to cheat myself out of my first snow experience).. another was in front of the town hall, with santa flying overhead. santa looked pretty cool ho-ho-ho-ing his way forwards on the cable.. but unfortunately there was only one such cable, so he looked pretty silly going backwards :). the best one was the first one we went to.. stall after stall filled with pretty things, sweet things, shiny things, useless things and kick-you-in-the-crotch expensive things. can i just say, if you have the option before freezing to death, to drink just ONE thing.. just ONE.. remember this word - gluhwein. its magic. its hot wine with either rum or amaretto in it, and you can have nothing better in your hands on a night where the temperature is four degrees. except maybe gloves. oh and PLUS they let you keep the mugs, so that saved me having to buy a souvenir.

after wandering around the christmas markets for a long while, we took a walk around the town. i have no idea where we were half the time, but hamburgs a pretty city. i guess you can say that about any city around christmas time.. dressed up in christmas lights, and stars, and what not.. but i guess what singled hamburg out here is that its a port city. theres canals all over the place.. its got 2300 bridges crossing the canals at various places (thats more than the 400 ones in venice AND the 1200 ones in amsterdam COMBINED.. crazy).. and oh oh OH my personal favourite.. the massive christmas tree floating in the middle of the main lake. or was it a river.. either way it was pretty. we ended up at speicherstadt.. the worlds oldest warehouse complex (wikipedia).. turned into apartments now by the looks of it.. i thought they were unused and got pretty freaked out when i saw a person in the window (GHOST! AHH!). there was this wooden bridge around them that we followed around for 29390829 kilometres.. approximately.

from there we hit reeperbahn.. torge had been talking about this street since the second hamburg was on the board.. when we finally got there, i saw why. its northbridge to the power of 1230981, minus all the asian gangs. its hamburgs red light district.. except instead of there just being your average prostitutes (on the street corner wearing highly attractive bum bags.. and by that i mean not), pimps (come on.. anyone in a hummer? DEFINITELY a pimp) and dirty old men. in torges words, this street pretty much goes bar, club, strip club, bar, club, stripclub and so on. theres something for everyone which makes it impossible to have a bad night out (okay.. thats a big call.. so ill change that to.. it makes it highly possible to have a GOOD night out). 'sexyback' drifts out of a club, right next door, 'ymca' blares it way out of a bar and across the street, strains of the chilli peppers can be heard. i think we went into about four different places and every place was packed (personal favourite being the one with crazy german drinking songs.. but only because this time, i got to understand what they were about.. most are about drinking.. surprise?).. everything about this street just screams AT-MOS-PHERE. we walked around a lot just taking this in.. i was highly curious about a sidestreet with a wall at the entrance completely blocking any view.. but apparently i wouldnt have got to the other side alive so.. it remains a mystery :(

normally, i would have missed the fishmarkets which start at five in the morning in hamburg and finish at ten.. but torges wake up methods (a combination of light flicking, WAKE UP WAKE UP WAKE UP, pillow throwing, and german drinking songs being played off his mobile at a volume level which simply should not be technologically possible) saw me standing (barely conscious) at a metro station at 9 am (after sleeping at 3am the night before.. argh). by the time we'd got to the markets, things had toned down a bit.. but there were still stall owners who managed to yell out things to the crowd (despite the past four hours of screaming out the same things.. and louder, most probably). its not just fish at the fish markets (surprise!).. its veggies, clothes, souvenirs, fruits.. one cool stall owner started throwing bananas into the crowd.. what a way to wake up in the morning.

after that, we did a cruise of the port (its the second biggest port in europe.. therefore.. its massive).. there was a lot of information on containers and shipping and so on.. and a lot of big.. big.. big machinery things outside the window.. but most of its significance was lost on me because the tour was in german :P torge did his best to keep a running commentary going but it wasnt enough to stop my eyes closing now and then.. much to the amusement of the lady opposite me.. she laughed every time i shook myself awake. i dont know how i always manage to fall asleep on tours.. if the top of a boat or the window of a bus is not open, i just get lulled to sleep.

after all this, we made a one and a half hour drive to flensburg (no no, dont get off the roads, dont worry i DIDNT DRIVE), where we stopped to get some lunch. we drove through there for two reasons.. one it was on the way to copenhagen and two.. torge knew it cuz its where he went to uni. there wasnt much in the city itself to make it stand out but by the water.. by the water was gorgeous. talk about a scenic town (torge take a photo take a photo TAKE A PHOTO TAKE A PHOTO).. little houses and boats and hills and.. sigh.. yes. pretty. thumbs up to flensburg.

from there, it was onwards with the three hour drive to copenhagen. to be honest, i was SO disappointed when we crossed from germany into denmark.. i expected fireworks.. horns.. balloons.. SOMETHING other than the puny sign that said 'welcome to denmark' - how about make me FEEL welcome you stupid sign. but what WAS awesome were the two bridges we crossed. the second was the big belt bridge, the second longest free span suspension bridge in the WORLD. i have no idea what this officially means you realise, all i can tell you definitely is that its bloody long (all up, it goes for about twelve kilometres) and TALL (the free span suspension bit is 1624 metres). and its highly impressive all lit up at night, ESPECIALLY with the two christmas trees on top.. i expect they must be huge to be seen from such a distance. i want my present under THAT tree thank you.

we pulled into copenhagen at around seven that night.. absolutely exhausted. so that was my first european roadtrip.. a massive thanks to the awesome driver who managed to stay awake throughout the whole ride (and put up with a constant stream of questions such as hey torge, what does that sign mean? and that one? how about that one? what'd she just say? are we there yet? are we there yet? how about now? and so on..). merry christmas to you all.. and a happy new year. my next stop? NORWAY :)

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