Hamburg

(Not only am I getting worse at remembering to write, I am also getting bad about posting what I have written. This Hamburg bit for example is two weekends ago.)

This past weekend we made the trip to Hamburg, and though it meant a difficult Monday (and Tuesday), it was well worth it. The weekend started on Friday night when we visited the Imtech Arena and watched Hamburg win an important home game against Bayer Leverkusen. We have seen a few games this year but this was our first Bundesliga game and it was a whole new level, it surpassed all of our expectations.

We had heard of currywurst before this trip and though we were skeptical about what is simply a sausage in curry sauce, we tried it for the first time and I would have it again. Sometimes I think things taste better when you eat them outside, we had this experience in Munich at the Christmas market eating our way through the streets and the currywurst gave me that familiar feeling. Another highlight was the Fish Market on Sunday morning (which is much more than just fish) but for us it was also breakfast, your choice from a wide variety of fish on a bun. I had herring to start (how Danish of me) while Gus ordered smoked salmon (lox) and Jesse and Leanne ordered the same fish, which we later learned was mackerel. Gus and Leanne switched part way through and the mackerel was so good I got myself one too. Next time (I will be heading back with my Dad in May when we go take in the Hamburg vs. Bayern game) I want to try the smoked eel and I have done my homework, I will now recognize the word for eel though I can’t remember it without seeing it. I read somewhere that it is a good one and the eel salesman at another stall was entertaining enough (despite the fact that we couldn’t understand him) that I want to try the eel, maybe I’ll bring some home.

Hamburg is a working city, a busy port and this makes for a lot of water and we enjoyed the canals and the river views. We have recently come to accept that we will not make it to Amsterdam so we saw the waterways of Hamburg as something of a consolation. We also paid a brief visit to Hamburg’s red light district – Reeperbahn – but Leanne and I seem to be past the age (or maybe we’re just boring) where such neighbourhoods hold any allure, the boys were wide eyed and amused by the drunks unable to open the taxi doors at 9:30 in the morning and the sex shops advertising creative attire. We had a coffee and then hurried through the pee stink subway station to the trains to whisk us away to another area of town before we checked out and headed back to the ‘routine’ of our daily lives in Ringsted.

Ireland, land of Guinness

I have just returned from a study trip to Dublin, recovery is slow. Ireland is one hour behind in time and then on the day we returned clocks went forward and so I am feeling very much two hours lost. In addition to the time change the downtime that students used for either shopping or resting was spent making sure that everything was where we thought it was and that we knew how long it would take to get there and so much of the walking was done twice to avoid getting lost when trailed by a group of 29 students.

Dublin was in some ways more than I imagined and in some ways what I have come to expect in European cities. My favourite experience was the trip to the harbour town of Howth, a short train ride from Dublin, where we had access to a hiking trail along the coast; this was the Ireland of my mind's eye. There was a convenient pub located along the route (Gaffney's) where I enjoyed fish and chips accompanied by a Guinness, delicious. My other favourite was the Literary Pub crawl where we visited a handful of pubs in the company of two actors who told us about Dublin's rich literary history and performed scenes and quoted from a variety of texts. 

What was also of interest beyond the city was the experience of travelling like this with a group of students, not the same as a trip to the beach with 14 and 15 year olds. One of the most striking differences between here and home has been the different age group I teach, here my students are older, and as I have mentioned before, the drinking age is lower. The result is that most of the students on this trip were legal drinking age (18) so the expectations for student behaviour are formed with this in mind. They are supposed to be functional each morning, they are supposed to be on time, they are given a suggested curfew, and from there we just expect them to be responsible (and given this degree of freedom they were quite responsible). For my part it was a great leap of faith that was difficult to make, and then I found myself with my colleague and three students at KFC at 2:00 in the morning.

The author advises you to drink Guinness and all alcohol responsibly, this is especially relevant when in a town where a pint is never more than 20 paces away (author J.P. Dunleavy).