Eimsbuettel Hamburg: Our Neighborhood

Well, it has been too long since I last scribed a post on my new blog! But if Aidan can write something up, so can I. I thought I would post a few pics with commentary about our neighborhood to give you a flavor of our life here in Hamburg. The biggest practical difference between Hamburg and San Diego is that you simply do not need a car in Hamburg. Hamburg is extremely friendly to pedestrians; the subways, buses and trains are excellent and go everywhere. My usual wait time for any public transport is 2-3 minutes! In San Diego, wait times for buses are 15 minutes and they are not nice buses. I have never been in a friendlier place for bicycles or pedestrians than Hamburg. Drivers are very aware of people and bikes, and both get the right of way. This safety level is a wonderful thing: it means people are not afraid of letting their kids walk to school or anywhere by themselves. You also notice that there are almost no weight problems here. Ok, on to some neighborhood pics.

Hey! The corner beer store! I can just drop in for a single on my way home for 80 cents and get my choice of some terrific German pilsner. You can see in the store all the plastic carrying containers for drinks: mineral water, beer, juices..etc. The "drivers" put these big containers on their bicycles (front and back) and pedal them over to the customers. Then you put the empties back in the rack (24 bottles/rack) and they get pedaled back to the store. The postal service also delivers by bicycle.
Here's the local elementary school just around the corner. (Aidan is in the foreground.) This is a real brick schoolhouse. It looks like it will be there forever! Probably survived two wars intact. We go to the gym in the back for Aidan's weekly ball-play time and soccer "practice". He loves it. More just kids running after the ball than anything serious.

The school has an open field in the back and we go play soccer there all the time. The playground is a neighborhood resource really. I haven't won a game against HSV yet, but I keep trying!
This is pretty cool: The red light says "Signal kommt" which means the walk signal is coming. It lights up when you rub your hand over it so you actually know (gasp!) that the light will change and someone has pushed the button. These are all over Germany and Hamburg. They are brilliant. In San Diego, the buttons get pushed 1000 times an hour since no one knows if the previous person pushed it already.

Here is a scene down our street. I'm not sure my picture does justice to the wonderful neighborhood buildings here. Most were built just after 1900 and they are solid. They should last 500 years!

The best bakery in Hamburg is on the corner across the street. The camera is pointing right at it. Wow is it wonderful! Fresh bread and pastries every day. 2 Euros for the best bread you have ever had.Ok, I gotta run. Good night!

Der Strohwitwer

Last weekend, I was a Strohwitwer, a "Grass widower", which apparently is an archaic term in both German and English for the husband whose wife went on a trip and left him all alone, poor chap. I guess it refers to when beds were stuffed with grass and the husband slept alone in the grass bed while his wife was away. Kina was back in San Diego for a week dealing with work stuff (ugh) and Aidan and I were all by ourselves. But not for long! I think everyone took pity on me and invited me to do things with them. So Aidan and I were really busy the whole weekend. First, we were invited for dinner and play time on Friday with Maxim's family (see Maxim below), then we went to die Hirschen (deer) forest (see above) on Saturday.

This is Aidan goofing around with his good friend Maxim. Maxim is a giant! He's bigger than Aidan but six months younger. But his dad is like 6'6'' so the genetics are there.
We were invited to the Hirschen Wald by Georg and Ulrike who were babysitting Maxim and Lily (his sister in the pram). This is the gang walking back from the Wald (forest). See all the cute A-frame houses in the neighborhood. Very nice place to live except for the nearby airport...
OK, back to Maxim's house for what else: Fussball! And of course, it is HSV playing against....

St. Pauli!

Then on Saturday afternoon we went with Susanne Dobler and her two girls to a big restaurant/cafe that specializes in telling you all about the ships travelling down the Elbe river. Each time a big container ship goes by, they play the national anthem of the ship's origins and then tell you all about the ship and what it is carrying. They have some old sea salts on hand who know everything (probably retired captains). It was a beautiful day. We played tag (ticken!) and hide-n-seek (verstecken) with the girls and Susanne. But we only got to see one boat go by the whole hour. A sign of the global financial meltdown?

Aidan, Anna (left) and Carolina climbing a tree by the water. Wonderful kids!

Then on Sunday, we were invited over to Aidan's best friend Domenik's house to play, what else but, Fussball! I've created a monster. But at least he is in good shape. You can see Aidan taking a turn as Torwart (goalie). Domenik is in red of course. Mom, Nicole, played on my side and dad, Ralph, played with Domenik and Aidan. The three boys crushed us but our goal was as big as the side of a semi-truck. Nicole and Ralph were raised in East Germany and come from Mecklenburg. Funny, because I grew up near a town of the same name (near Ithaca NY). Domenik is even more of a nut about soccer than Aidan. Aidan played Petric, the HSV Torjaeger (goal-hunter) and Domenik played Oliver Kahn. If you don't know who Oliver Kahn is, then you are not German. (One of the best goalies ever to play the game of soccer.)

HSV Forever and Ever!

Hey, let's start this blog off right! Aidan and his Hamburg Mannschaft: Borg, Ritter and Skeleton all with excellent jerseys of the Hamburg Sport Verein. This is Hamburg's big Fussball club and, as far as I knew, the only Fussball club. Boy was I wrong. As soon as I got here, I learned about the other club: St. Pauli. They are in the second league but they do have a pretty cool symbol:


The Castle is the symbol of Hamburg. But they have a more popular symbol too: the Totenkopf! (Dead Head.)

Aidan's friend Maxim is a big St. Pauli fan and it turns out that most Hamburgers like one club or the other. Can't like both I guess! Must be like Liverpool and Everton, or the Yankees and the Mets. I'm going to buy at least one sweatshirt with the St. Pauli symbol, just because it is cool. But I won't wear it here because it'll cause all sorts of problems in my lab. My lab mate Julia hates HSV and my lab mate Christian is the leader of the HSV online Fan-Club (and has Season tickets).

Ok, I need to eat. More later! -Scott