Fresh from a whole three days back at home in Cologne after IC, I found myself riding the rails north again, back to Hamburg, this time for another of the most celebrated reception weekends on the AIESEC in Germany calendar, Pirawo (Piraten Wochenende). AIESEC Hamburg organized huge tents and barbeques to house and feed 80 would be 'pirates' from all over the world. AIESECers from thirty countries set up camp on the river Elbe just outside of the picturesque Blankenesse district of Hamburg for a weekend of boat tours and sea shanties. We walked as a group through the town, through the harbour and finally through a long underground passageway that took us to the other side of the Elbe from our camping spot in a quest to reach our harbour tour boat. We were quite a haggard looking bunch by the time we reached the docks as we had chosen the hottest day of the year in Germany to make our journey, but it was worth it once we got on board. Spicy summer music and cool spray from the water came to together to provide a great atmosphere as our boat made its way nimbly through the harbour, between larger boats and finally back to our campsite. My first real summer day was filled out with Frisbee and soccer on the bank of the river before a fantastic barbeque ended my time at Pirawo.
Of course, since I was going to Hamburg, I took the opportunity to see Michelle and made a long weekend of it. I took left on Thursday night having taken the Friday off. Hamburg is 450 km away from Cologne which means a 4 hour train ride. I arrived in time for a late supper and then we headed to a bar with Latin music to see how our salsa skills had held up to the test of time. After quickly deeming the answer to be, 'quite poorly', we settled down to talk over Latin American drinks, AKA Caipirinhas. On Friday it was bright and sunny, which as far as I can tell is an unprecedented phenomenon in Hamburg, all you have to do is take a look at all the umbrella stores to back that claim up. Anyway, I went with Michelle for a walk around one of the nicest neighbourhoods, which we later discovered would also be the scene of Pirawo, Blankenesse Small houses and gardens blanket the rolling hills outside of Hamburg. Interconnected by a series of winding paths and unmarked streets, you really get a sense of a quiet and unchanging community. Many of the houses are hundreds of years old, some still sporting thatched roofs and aging brick work. At the top of one hill in the heart of Blankenesse lies a beautiful restaurant. It looks like a huge Tudor house, it's white exterior broken by a pattern of black cross-timbers. Sagebiels F�hrhaus is actually a surprisingly good Chinese restaurant. Since I had just been paid, we decided to have a nice lunch and enjoy the view of the town and coast below. After lunch we made our way back into town to go the main city park. Hamburg sports more canals than Venice, several of which flow through this park, and you can rent rowboats to punt your way down their winding paths. We took turns rowing and being rowed. We even got chased by swans. We passed a couple of swans that had been lounging outside of a waterfront restaurant, but minutes later noticed that two of them were swimming behind us with their wings held menacingly up in the air. I was rowing at the time, and figured we might as well just keep going and leave them behind, but was a little surprised to notice that even though I had picked up the pace, the swans were still gaining on us. I decided just to move over to the side a little, and the swans quickly blew by us and kept heading down the canal, man those things can move, and they weren't even flying! After all that rowing we were ready for dinner and were happy to go back to Michelle's and partake in the simple pleasure of cooking for ourselves. We both enjoy cooking, and Michelle's kitchen was freshly stocked with a collection of sauces her brother had brought her from Canada. We had peanut chicken, and it was delicious.
The next day was Pirawo, the day after we decided to mix culture and laziness. In the morning we visited an exhibition called 'Dialogue in the Dark'. It is housed in the warehouse town in the centre of Hamburg (Speicherstadt) and is essentially a simulation of what it is like to be blind. You are guided through a series of rooms by a blind volunteer. Each room is a different experience, walking in a park, crossing a street, buying a drink in a restaurant and taking a boat tour. It was really amazing. It is next to impossible to actually be in the dark these days. Even at night, there are lights everywhere. Here you absolutely cannot see at all. I was completely disoriented after a minute. I didn't know how big the rooms were, if I was walking straight or in circles. I also discovered that I must have hit my head a lot in the dark because I couldn't help walking stooped for the entire 45 minutes even though they assured us that there were no stairs or low ceilings / doors. The only thing I seemed to have any skill for was counting change in the dark, I managed to pay for the simulated boat tour and to buy a coke at the 'invisible' bar without any trouble, but all in all it was clear that on my own in the real world, I would be killed on my first day of being blind.
After coming back out of the dark, we were greeted by what had become the hottest day of the summer, and this is where we got lazy. We headed to an outdoor swimming pool to cool off and just laze about in the sun. The pool itself was beautiful, surrounded by grass and trees in the middle of the city, but on the outside, the pool area was scary. It has seven foot high walls, all topped with razor wire! And it really is razor wire, not barbed wire, there is no way in this place without paying, and they're obviously pretty serious about it. In any case, we made good use of our entrance fee, jumping in the water long enough to cool off and then taking a midsummer's nap on the grass. All in all, we managed a fantastic weekend in Hamburg.
;)