Hamburg [Part 3]

Sunday, 20th May '12
Sunday was much less frantic. We woke up around 9:30 and decided to go visit the big gallery near the HBF. We had plans to meet with Marlene at 1:30 to see Tarzan, so we had plenty of time.

 Fancy hostel, everything was so new and swanky!!

I didn't have much expectation for the museum and was nicely surprised. There were some exhibitions that I just glanced over, but there were some amazing installations and museum type pieces that were beautiful. There were rooms dedicated to antique piano, furniture that spanned throughout 18th-early 20th century, Asian and Islamic artefacts and even a room dedicated to jewellery, statues, urns etc from classical antiquity. Amazing! It's almost like the furniture store I would visit if I was made of money. Needless to say, I took a lot of photos.

Below are some of the stand out performances:

Alexander McQueen works

After seeing the gallery, we rushed on over to see Tarzen. The acrobatics of the show were incredible and the lighting and music, atmosphere was incredible. There was just so much going on all the time, in so many different places, it was incredibly dynamic and three dimensional. However, I felt that to an extent, the costumes, make up let the play down. At points it also felt over-disneyfied in a way as well. I still enjoyed it a lot though, and watching it in German was an amazing experience.

There was a moment of excitement, where, during the intermission we chose seats way closer to the front, even though they were more expensive and we were assigned to the very last row. At first we fucked up, and sat in seats where people actually had seats. Luckily we asked the girls next to us, otherwise we would have been stuck in a mad awkward situation. Eventually we found somewhere, we were really not subtle about it, I am so shocked we got away with it. Anyway. It was worth it. We saw the stage and everything in much clearer detail. 

Hamburg [Part 2]

Saturday, 19th May '12

The following morning, we slept quite late and didn't leave till just before midday. We took all our stuff, checked in at our Hostel for the Saturday night and left our luggage there. From there we met Marlene and her friends again at Sternschanze for brunch. I had a crepe and the biggest, most delicious juice of freshly squeezed juice. Orange, strawberry and banana.

After delicious food, we walked around the harbour for a while. Walked through the tunnel under the Elbe river, and then took a ferry around the harbour.

 * Rest under cut.

After this, we went to Häagen-Dazs on the harbour for some Kaffee und Kuchen. I had a toffee cheesecake there that changed my life. My god, it was so good. Definite highlight of the trip, it was soooo good!! So expensive, but so good!!!

Hamburg [Part 1]

Friday, 18th May '12
Over the weekend I travelled together with Sowon, Nicole and Marlene to Hamburg. I didn't sleep at all on Thursday night as we didn't actually have anywhere organised to stay. All we had organised was a way there and back. It was terrifying, I thought we'd end up sleeping on a park bench or something. Turns out, we got everything sorted out. It was all part of the adventure!

So I met with Nicole at HBF. Nicole was very much out of it, having stayed up all night. It was cute. We took a train to Hamburg, and the train ride took quite a while. We left at about 1:30, and arrived in Hamburg at about 5:45pm.

The ride, though long, was quite relaxing. We stopped for about an hour in a small German town called  Schwerin, and just sat outside in the sun for a bit.

We got a call from Sowon during the trip to say that we'd found a place to stay. Marlene and her had arrived earlier in the day and literally walked to every hotel/hostel they could see from HBF to see if they could find a place. We found a separate place for each night.

 First Shot of Hamburg!

I also contacted my great aunt who lives in Hamburg, and as I was organising meeting her when we arrived, my phone cut out. So I was walking around the HBF like a madman, just hoping I would somehow run into her. Miraculously, I DID! It was crazy, I cannot believe we actually found each other! 

When I told my great aunt Rose where we were staying for the Friday night, her face was picture perfect terror. Her eyes went glassy and she clutched my hand the whole time, shooting me these super worried looks. That should've warned me about what kind of place we were staying in...

Looks harmless enough right?

So, to get to the 'hotel' where we were staying, you have to walk down a long street that is 99% sex shops and stripper bars. At night, it is also lined with prostitutes. We arrive at the lobby of the hotel to pay and get the key, and a transvestite prostitute walks out of a small change room.

We then move to the bedroom, it has a double bed, wardrobe, shower and sink. All in the same room. We also discover that the door does not have a proper locking mechanism. We can kind of lock it, but it is unlocked using a coin. Yes, that's right. A coin. From then on, it has now been dubbed "The Hooker Hotel".

Afterwards, Sowon, Nicole and I walked around Hamburg, trying to walk along the Port and somehow finding exclusively the ugliest, emptiest parts of the city. No idea how we managed that.