Day 8 - Hamburg

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Day 8
(Editors note: prior to Day 8 my journal was written in point form with the intention to rewrite it once I returned to civilisation. The previous evening and sequential conversation with Veronica and Melanie caused me to rethink my personal objective as a traveller and as a writer. From this day forth I wrote in long-form. As previously noted this journal has altered from the original but the concepts, thoughts, opinions, activities etc. are pretty much the same.)

Good morning world. Don't you just love dope? One can fry their brain with a few jolly j's until the smell and flavour of eggs is emitted from ones ears and be guaranteed that they will never be bedridden with gut rot from a bad batch of skunky draft. Nope. Smoking that leafy green substance accented with that peculiar essence, rewards one with the capability to wake rested and ready to hit the road without a hangover slowing you down. So here I am. And what an evening that was! “Dank u” Doors Café, “Danke” Veronica and Melanie. While I have only been here for a week, I am amazed that I have been able to consistently meet such interesting people. Compare this to what I would be doing if I were saddled back in Toronto? I would be sucking back pub pints with my buds while ogling hot young scarlet’s hovering nearby and wishing that I had the cajones to rev up a little gab session. It is not that I am too timid to ‘talk up’ the lady folk, rather I just tend to get so pissed that I waste my well-honed charm chatting up the lager. Quite often, the closest I get to exchanging saliva with a buxom blonde is when I blather some drunken drivel and inadvertently spittle in her face. Romeo, I am not. Conversely, I am now in one of the world's greatest and storied cities, sitting in a bar named after Jim Morrison with two tremendously interesting ladies, chatting, unable to understand each other…at all, all the while relaxing in a fragrant hazy atmosphere. Will someone pinch me?

Veronica and Melanie. Wow. What finds! Both young ladies hail from a mountainous region of Austria. Their home town is called Tyrol, Innsbruck Austria. I have Melanie's address in case I am hiking through the mountains and decide to look her up. If I don't, I think that I have a photograph to remember her when I get back to the Canada. On our walk back to the hostel I have the faint memory of snapping off a few pics while we were loitering on a bridge overlooking one of Amsterdam’s many canals. During the haze of our conversation we committed to contact the other whenever either one of us became famous. "Famous?" You ask. Huh? Well, Melanie did some gypsy thing on my hand and said I am destined for fame. Fame? Knowing that she was the artsy type, I assumed the character of my surroundings and boastfully prophesised that I was destined to become a great writer. I will be known as the guy who went to Europe and wrote a book about his travels. Of course, I must first learn how to write but that is just a mere formality.

Veronica was the other companion with whose company I greatly enjoyed. She was the looker of the pair. The young lady was cultured, an idealist, literate and well read (well beyond my abilities at her age). Veronica appeared to be about 19, very cute with a sprinkling of naiveté. However, she had this glint in her eye showing that underneath all the reservation and culture that she sure knew how to party. In a thick Austrian accent, Veronica told me to ensure that my writing ‘changed the world’. Very idealistic of her. Myself? I am more comfortable watching the world from the catbird seat and telling how things are. I have no interest in droning on to the disinterested rabble about how egotistical men should see the error of their ways. I am not motivated by helping the lost find the way. Rather, I find more enjoyment in ridiculing the intellectually and socially disoriented. It is all about me…and you too. I live to provide you levity.

I think I am going to start writing. Although I haven’t read any of my stuff yet, I find the act quite enjoyable. Once I decide to return to the Canada, I plan on typing up my memoirs. My worry is that I will not be able to decipher from the chicken scratch that I have started with. I also told Melanie that if I decide to write up my journal that I will start with the journal notes and then start to embellish. (yes, it is true. You are not reading my journal in its original form) Melanie said that an artist should never retouch a piece of art. He should put everything they have into the original and, then, if he sees anything wrong with it, don’t retouch it, rather, put pen back to paper and write another. In some circumstances, her opinions would ring true, however Melanie is an artist and my penmanship is abhorrent. If I published my first draft, readers would think that my work was more like the work of a spasmatic Picasso on coke rather than the refined works of an O'Rourke, Leacock, Richler or Kenney.

To help me in my travel plans, the two girls outlined some places that were ‘must sees’ when I got to Austria. They advised me to pass on Innsbruck, unless I had packed mountain climbing gear. I can always send them a postcard when I pass by their neighbourhood….Now back to the various exciting events and hi-jinks that have been up to.

Here was my plan. Out of the cot and off to the train station by 8:30 AM with the intention of rolling into Hamburg, Germany by 2PM. Arriving in early afternoon, I would get to select the least mangy cot for my next evening’s rest. Comforted in knowing that I had my chosen hovel, I would be free to wander around beautiful, historic Hamburg and really get to know the city we obliterated in the war. I was hoping that I could find the building that we didn't bomb into smithereens and marvel at its' historic significance. Unfortunately, one thing I have learned about myself during my wanderings was that I was definitely not a ‘plans person’. In fact, I discovered that the mere attempt to plan something tended to mess up my day. One perfect example…my journey to Hamburg.

I arrived at the platform in central Amsterdam at 8:32 A.M. and boarded my 8:30 A.M. train heading to Hamburg. Sorry. Let me back up for a second. I arrived at the train station and 2 minutes after my scheduled departure, boarded the train that I thought was heading to Hamburg. How could I have messed up? Right terminal. Right track….yet there I was an hour later sitting on an empty train, lights turned off, forgotten somewhere in the outer recesses of the Dutch hinterland. One lesson that I quickly learned whist on my travels was that when a European list’s the train's departure time as 8:30 A.M., they mean it. To compensate me for my tardiness, I was rewarded with the happy memory of meeting people I would otherwise never come to meet, namely the perpetually forgotten railway workers of the Netherlands Railway System.

Compare this scene to what I would have experienced back home. The engineers on our commuter trains don’t even start to think about leaving until they are two minutes late. They would still be searching the vast expanse of their minds for a four letter word for “tardy” or be exercising their other mind while ogling the fancy 22 year old admin assistants prancing alongside the train platforms. So I spent about one hour sitting in a plastic office chair, in the middle of idunno hoping that a compassionate engineer passing by would take pity on me, stop and pick me up. Eventually, (probably because they recognized me from a fading picture and mistook me for one of my ancestors who saved their ass during the war) a kind signalman flagged down a passing train and had it shuttle me back to Amsterdam.

After a wonderful excursion through the Dutch countryside, I returned to the centre of the psychedelic universe. On the bright side, I had two hours to blow before the next train left for Hamburg thus had plenty of time to make my next train. As I occasionally like to think of people other than myself, I used this short stay to pick up some postcards for my sibs, Dani and Chris. The only positive thing to come out of the treacherous shopping excursions with the Bobsy Twits was that I knew exactly where the best souvenir stands were located. I bought two postcards that boasted about the vast quantities of narcotics that I smoked while in Amsterdam. They were perfect gifts for bro and sis back home.

A couple of hours after arriving back in town, I was back on the tracks with a new arrival time of 7PM. A mere 5 hours later. I left Holland in reverse to how I entered. The colours faded from a spastic spectrum of multi-coloured haze to the conservative blah greens and browns of Germany. While the train inched its’ way into the Prussian hinterland, I studied the cryptic maps detailed out in the bible and identified a prospective bed in the local HI. Upon arrival in town, I quickly found my lodgings at Auf dem Stintfang. My morning sluggishness was rewarded with the only bed left. My cozy cot was plunked right down in the middle of the ‘land of the teenyboppers’. The hostel was crawling with pubescent punks. One example of my plight was later demonstrated by having to endure “The World Cup of Hallway Soccer” being played out beside my bedroom door at 3AM. Coupled with the soccer, the Euro-brats played their Euro-crap music in the parking lot outside my window till my ears grew weary and succumbed to sleep at some early hour. I may just have a little bitterness left over from my train debacle but what the hell. Bitching makes me feel better.

Stepping back a few hours, let’s revisit my brief wander of the lovely port city of Hamburg. Here is a very little known fact. MacDonald’s called their Big Mac ‘hamburger’ after visiting post-war Hamburg, Germany. MacDonald’s founder, Ray Kroc was flying over the city in 1946 and immediately remarked that as a result of our efforts in the war, the city had been reduced to the same consistency of his new ground-meat sandwich. We can all be thankful to the precision carpet bombing of Allied Bomber Command or today we would be eating its former namesake, the Big Mac Milledmeatwich.

Before I review my quick jaunt around the city, here is a quick synopsis of Hamburg, Germany. While most people have little knowledge of the city, it is important to understand that I was not just there to visit the famous Reeperbaun. Rather, the bible noted a few other attractions which caught my interest. Firstly, I was attracted by the fact that Hamburg was situated midway to my eventual destination, Berlin. It served as a convenient rest stop for my journey east. Hamburg is Germany’s second largest city with approximately 3.5 million people living in the metropolitan area. It is also home to Europe’s second largest commercial port. Another interesting titbit of info, being a port city and it’s proximity to water the city boasts over 2300 bridges, well more than both Amsterdam and Venice.

The first item on my itinerary was to get some food. After travelling all day on trains to nowhere, I was starving and needed some replenishment. Leaving the hostel, I followed the banks of the Elbe towards the city centre. On the south side of the river, I noticed a rather ominous complex that looked like it was the Hamburg Gulag. That captured my attention for almost 6 minutes. Following along, I ran into the burnt out remnants of the St. Nikolai Church. As a lesson from their war years, Hamburg decided to keep what was left standing from a bombing raid. This was done to teach their youngsters that the next time they try to take over the world, not to hide in a church. As I trudged along the main street, Ost-West-Strasse, my hunger steadily continued to overtake me. “Belly need food….belly need food”. Unfortunately, after walking for 45 minutes I did not find anything that remotely resembled food. So, like a witching stick to water, my starving belly swung me round and pulled me west.

During my desperate search for sustenance, I stumbled upon an incredible statue. Standing proud and strong within a park at the east end of the Reeperbahn, a towering representation of Otto von Bismarck overlooked his Prussian lands. Actually, with a wanting, eager, frustrated look on this face he presided over Germany’s most famous red light district. (We will get to that later.) For those who are not students of 19th century European history, Bismarck was the 19C Prussian general who marched his men across France and brought the Republic to its knees. His efforts were very significant as his memoirs reminded future generations of crusading Krauts that the roads into Paris were well paved and that the French women were always very accommodating to visitors.

It was down the road in the Reeperbaun when finally I found a place to grab a bite to eat. As the saying goes, when in Hamburg, eat a hambu…sorry, pizza. I had a couple slices of pizza. (I chose the slices with ground hamburger so I could say I ate local fare) It was on my return journey from my consuming meagre spoils, when I stumbled upon the red light district. Remembering back to Amsterdam, I revisited those scant surviving brain cells and recalled that their young ladies propositioned horned-up lads from behind glass windows. In Hamburg, the maidens ply their trade a bit differently. Instead of alluring you with eager eyes or suggestive looks, these dames use a more aggressive approach. Check this sequence out.

My walk down the Reeperbaun Red Light was one of the coolest things that I have ever seen. Try to visualise this. Close your eyes. Make your mind blank. For some this will require little effort. Picture a block on a rather nondescript street; say one hundred meters in length. Now place a six foot tall buxom blonde at 8 feet intervals for the entire length. Make sure that are all 6 ft and blonde. Line them up like dominoes. Now in your mind’s eye, strut down that street in all your machismo glory. Pass the first lovely without saying a word. You can never stop at the first knowing that there will be better ones in the bunch. Like the herd of buffalo, the weak ones are always pushed to the outside. However, before you pass the first lady she stops you and propositions you. Looking out for better grades of meat you turn her down and continue on your mission. Four steps, 2.5 meters. The second lovely has already made the move to greet you. Another buxom blonde for your pleasure. Wait…before you assess the second, also reject and proceed to the third, glance back for a sec. The first one, is not screaming at you, dejected and still badgering you for your business. Nope. Upon receiving her formal rebuke she has accepted your decision and orderly moved back into position along the line. Now to the second lovely lady. Greet, assess, rebuke. She, like her neighbour took two steps forward and then two steps back. This fascinating scenario is repeated down a line of about thirty girls. They are all good, pleasant, orderly whores. Only in Germany. We need some of these hookers back home. It would definitely clean up Parkdale.

Eventually, I made it back to the fun house. Fulfilled, amused and exhausted I decided to make the evening a short one. However, my day ended slowly falling asleep whilst the rug rats were, as what Veronica’s termed, ‘engaged in chaotic behaviour.’

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