I did NOT spend the nights in the famous Hotel Atlantic above (yet love my photo so much that I wanted to show it) but stayed with them in the vivid quarter St.Pauli - you may have heard from the Reeperbahn? There a normal supermarket looks like that:
You see Olivia Jones, glittering German Drag-Queen on the Kiez, making a pun.
The weather was fine, and the inhabitants of Hamburger are very ingenious to add what might lack - one glance at the Elbphilharmonie (in the background) and you know: Hamburg doesn't lack anything. I lived there for eight years and still miss it - though it was me who decided that we go to Berlin.
And in Berlin I stayed for a whole week - so many friends to see, so many restaurants and exhibitions and shops that I almost felt like a tourist.
"So happy it hurts!" (Couldn't get the original Brian Adams version in the last post, thus I deleted it).
And after seven happy days I sat at the Victoria Luise Platz two streets away from my apartment with a glass of Rosé and thought: "What a beautiful city! I am so glad to live here. "
Yesterday (after an odyssey with the train) I came back to Bavaria - which is also a sunny dream at the moment:
(When I've landed on my feet again I might write something more substantial about an exhibition or the moral of the odyssey - but at the moment I am so happy it hurts!)
A lifetime ago I visited Hamburg. Don't really remember much. Berlin was a no go due to the Cold War.
ReplyDeleteBut I've been to Bavaria several times and it's one of my favourite places to visit.
I do understand the love for Bavaria - lovely nature and tradition. Hamburg is a very sophisticated and elegant city (as long as you don't visit the Reeperbahn and St. Pauli :-) - but the weather is...very British (by the way: Hamburg and the people there are very, very British). Berlin - well, that is another number: so mixed, so much variety, so much life. I love all three, and am fortunate to be able to "spit" my love between them.
DeleteI am pleased to hear you are bubbling over with happiness Britta, a good place to be. I look forward to hearing of an exhibition perhaps in due course. xx
ReplyDeleteThank you, Rachel - a change in routine is always invigorating for me. I have been away from Berlin due to circumstances too long. Last time I stayed only 4 days, and when you are in the (lovely) company of another person, it is different - this time I could follow every spontaneous whims of me. My aim is to find a good balance between countryside and city. And yes: one exhibition touched my heart especially, thus I will report. xxx
DeleteI have spent many happy weeks on the Reeperbahn. The Silbersack was a favourite. Hans Albers would buy me drinks.
ReplyDeleteI love that quarter, Tom. And that you met Hans Albers is something I would have liked to - he was a one-off.
DeleteThe Silbersack still exists, and the Ritze too. What changed is: among the tourists are almost as many women as men, and I seldom heard the typical Hamburger slang, gentrification here too. .
And now you are back to the babies!
ReplyDeleteYes, Joanne - I see the triplets tomorrow, because they did their second travel to Hildesheim, where the parents of my DiL live. I missed them, but enjoyed the meeting of so many grown-ups too!
DeleteBy the way: at the first glimpse I read: "Back to the basis" - that's nice too :-)
Hotel Atlantic is so expensive, you would never be able to eat in a restaurant again. But the architecture and fittings make the choice tempting. Could you sit and drink a coffee in the hotel reception area and enjoy the atmosphere?
ReplyDeleteHels
Dear Helen, you might know that I am from Bremen - and every day when I walked to school I passed the "Park Hotel" - a very old, very British, very fine building. And wished ardently to stay there at least once. And: I did - some days in a wonderful suite - which proves you often can fulfil dreams if one really wants. :-)
DeleteIn the Hotel Atlantic I saw more than one exhibition.
Getting back to good travel and having access to everything we enjoy will make a huge difference. You sound delighted to be traveling again.
ReplyDeleteDear Susan, thank you! Yes, I am delighted to travel again - but it is more: it is a journey back to my own self - being able to see my goals again, and my way (hopefully) - in other words: getting back a sort of balance.
DeleteWhat a lovely post! It's fun to be a tourist in your own city, jamming everything in like there's a plane to catch and you can't be left wanting - although, of course, in your case there was a train to catch.
ReplyDeleteAnd what a treat, a visit to an old haunt to see friends! and to check if the palm trees are still alive :) Your friends' local supermarket really has gone all out to make sure shopping for groceries is no drudge! I spy coloured lights, too, no doubt to dance merrily when the checkout is open.
Looking forward to discovering your odyssey's moral, if you care to enlighten, and some glimpses of your cultural injections!
Thank you so much, Pip! I couldn't answer before, we had so lovely weather that I was needed very much to accompany the triplets to the zoo two times etc.
ReplyDelete"Tourist in my own city" is a lovely way to enjoy one's surroundings. I was often astonished that people who live where there are spectacular buildings or whatsoever sometimes never have put a foot into them. How strange!
Yes, the supermarket is a cracker - with a lot of puns as headlines hanging over the goods: "Off to bed!" for vegetables (playing with the word "Kiste" = box, a word we use in slang for bed (in a British pun one might use "sack = bed"?); most others are not translatable or don't sound funny - if I write "All cheese" as headline for the cheese counter one wouldn't laugh if one does not know that we say that (decent) if we mean "My foot!".
As we have a huge thunderstorm this evening, maybe tomorrow I will spend some time indoors - and so might have time to give the cultural injection - only a little prick, it will not hurt.
I'm so happy that you're so happy Britta !!!! What a lovely sentence that was and such a joy filled post. Bask in your joy. XXXX
ReplyDeleteThank you, Jackie! Bathing would be absolutely fine - today we have 30° (not that I complain :-)
ReplyDeleteXXXX!
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