A Foreigners View!

The first impression that one has of Hamburg is that, as a city, it has an amazing feeling of self-awareness: you really know that Hamburg, as an entity, exists. This feeling is amplified by the fact that it has its own press, TV and radio stations. Also that a Hamburger in his car (there are quite a lot of these around - more below on that theme!) can recognise any other Hamburger by the HH number (e.g. HH-AA 1234), whereas his "country cousins" from neighbouring areas have numbers starting with PI for Pinneberg or WL for Winsen Luhe or SE for Segeberg. Hamburg's history and its logo the "gateway to the world" are to be found everywhere.

Since the second world war, nationalism has had a very bad name in Germany and so compared to other European countries such as France or the United Kingdom, this aspect of life is almost totally absent. In Hamburg, it is replaced by "I am a Hamburger!" (sounds funny to those of us, who always thought that a Hamburger was something only associated with fast food chains - again more on that topic below!)

The second impression is just how many trees there are in Hamburg; from Spring through Summer, the city is extremely green and in the Fall the roads and footpaths disappear under vast heaps of fallen leaves. The trees of Hamburg are very important to the population, so that as soon as it was discovered that salting the roads in Winter damaged the trees, the use of salt was band. Now the trees are only damaged by vehicles sliding into them during the sometimes very icy Winters!

A third early impression (which turned out to be not quite correct) was that the Hamburger are a very religious folk (many are, but . . . ) as they were always talking about to going to the "Dom," which my dictionary refers to as a "Cathedral." Even the children were always pestering their parent to pay this great place a visit. Hamburg has numerous largish churches, but none appeared to be the cathedral. I even found the Cathedral Street (Dom Strasse) but was assured that I should seek further on the Heiligengeistfeld (field of the Holy Ghost - sounded promising!), but not today! Uh?

The place was duly found, but it was no more than a large car park - not really that interesting! But what was this, a moveable Cathedral? It was there and today was not. What amazing technology was it that allowed such a feat - a disappearing Cathedral? Stranger and stranger. I returned home, confused.

Several weeks later, it was Easter and I was going into the city for a shopping expedition and wait! At last, there it was, no longer a car park, no longer empty and certainly not particularly religious! The Dom or to be more correct the Easter Dom was back!

The "Dom" is, in fact, the largest mobile fun-fare in the World: giant Ferris wheel, candy floss, ghost house, bumper cars, etc. you name it, it's there and then it's not there and then it is again. It was certainly not what I had expected, but had plenty of technology and plenty of fun.

Before arriving in the north of Germany, one often hears that the locals are rather "reserved" and also that Hamburgers are the most British Germans because of their reserved manner. There is a little truth in this rumour, but it is much more so, outside of Hamburg than inside of it. One thing is clear, even if it takes a little longer to make good friends, once made, they are then really good friends in all the best senses of the word and then for life!

In fact, I suspect the "Britishness" of the Hamburgers has a lot to do with the generations of trading families that have kept up close connections with London over the centuries. Also the Platt-Deutsche or local dialect, spoken in the area just down river to the west of Hamburg has a lot of similarity to much of the old London cockney dialect. Probably showing that contacts were not just made by the merchants, but also by the able-seaman visiting the London Docks and vice-versa!

Given that the inhabitants of most big cities think that only they live at the centre of the Universe, then you will find Hamburgers are different. For many, it is clear that Hamburg is the "Gateway to the World": a very different and refreshing focus.

Above, I had mentioned the Hamburg traffic: in terms of numbers this can hold its own with any world city, despite a well built up Underground and Urban railway system. My impression here has always been one of amazement as to how much traffic flows compared to say London and that despite a closely policed 50km speed limit in the town (watch out for the red flashes - they can be very expensive!) Much of this success can be put down to the (unfortunately, now ageing) computer controlled traffic light system. Although, in the last few years, one has to admit that even Hamburg is beginning to struggle with this problem - maybe a new computer system would help?

Also mentioned above is the "Hamburger" (the fast food variety) - here there is, in fact, a "dish" or food that is probably the forerunner of the hamburger: it is the "Hamburger Rundstück" and consists of a round bread roll of the familiar type with a filling of sliced beef - well almost? This was once the staple diet for the harbour manual workers.

By the way, if you thought that "Hamburger" sounds funny, then consider this: a "Berliner" is a doughnut! Can you imagine hearing JFK standing up and saying "I am a doughnut!" (It was just a thought ;-)

The success of the fast food Hamburger is also a reason why many Hamburgers (people), when travelling in foreign parts are loathed to say exactly where they come from: it is all too embarrassing!