Becoming Fool of Love: Grosse Schwarze Hamburg

Back in Berlin after a short visit to Hamburg.

I found a ride there for the ridiculously cheap amount of 10 Euros, thanks to another "revolutionary" website called mitfahrgelegenheit (which, think about it, translates as with-"drive"-opportunity. Isn't' that amazing?). On Wednesday morning, a few hours before I left, I asked a roommate: "Was ist ein LKW?" He laughed, "It's ein lorry... ein... big truck!"

"What?! Ah! Ah! Ah!" I hadn't realized when I booked the ride; now that was gonna be my first "trucker" experience! I packed my bags: clothes, camera, juggling clubs, snacks... and pepper spray. I hate to be so cautious, but I guess it's better to be safe than sorry.

Indeed, a big white truck waited for me outside the train station. I climbed in, shook the man's hand, and laughed to myself.

Michael turned out to be quite a sympathetic and humorous fifty something year old fellow. He didn't speak much English, so we spoke a lot of German. I asked a few questions about the truck; I said, "It's a bit of a life of freedom, nein?"

"Nie," he answered to my naive comment. He explained that a little black box records the truck's each and every movement, to the minute. We made small talk for a little while, and then I took out my book. It's Khalil Gibran's "Sand and Foam", aber in Deutsch. When I travel, I like to immerse myself in the language as much as possible. I look up every other word sometimes, but I find it's a good way to learn. Besides, Khalil Gibran's aphoristic style is lovely, and the philosophical lyrical field he plays in is right in my chords. Michael seemed to take great pleasure in describing the definition and nuances of the words I asked him to help me with. Our three and a half hours went by quite smoothly; and before I knew it I was buying my ticket for yet another city train, this time in Hamburg, to go meet my host, Alyssa.

Alyssa just turned 22. She graduated from a drama school in England where she studied a lot of interesting stuff: from chinese opera to stage combat, shakespeare to Butoh, contemporary theater, etc. I found her on couchsurfing, by typing the keyword: Butoh.

Colorful Alyssa :)

Alyssa's parents are currently staying in their other house, in Thailand, so she is living by herself in the family house.

"You want me to speak English?" she asked.

"Nein. Ich muss Deutsch lernen." I said, before adding: "Although, I am starting to think that I could perhaps allow myself to speak English a bit more, and thus actually be able to connect with people a bit more. So, let's just do half and half?"

"Ja. Gut."

In her palace of a house, she fed me some soup she had made and suggested, "I was thinking that we could go out to the city tonight if you want."

It was wednesday night, and there was not much going on so we simply walked all over the streets of Hamburg. Alyssa showed me some of her favorite spots: Binnenalster lake, Planten und Blaumen Park, the Hamburg Campus, etc. It seemed that we knew each other for a long time already, and quite easily we talked about everything and anything, from theater and clown to love and relationships. After a while, we stumbled upon the Hamburg FilmFest. The showings were over for the evening, but I bought us two local beers -the famous Astra - and we sat for a bit.

"City of Hamburg's Debt vs Salary of the Richest Few."
Political statement at Hamburg University.

It was now approaching 1:30am, and the trains weren't running anymore. We had to wait until 4 or so.. so we walked some more... She led me through the popular Schanze and St.Pauli districts, pointed out some famous squats and sex shops; and I (re-)learned that Hamburg was where The Beatles made their breakthrough back in the 1960s. St.Pauli is indeed famous for its clubs and music scene.

We strolled until the train started running again. By the time we got back to her house, it was 5am.

"Monument" to the Fab Four

The fifth Beatles?

I woke up at 3pm the next day. Alyssa had just finished cooking some breakfast. I was obviously filled with gratefulness and exclaimed: "I'm gonna give you some nice review on couchsurfing!!" She laughed. "I need someone to help with all this food before it goes bad. It's perfect."

"Amen!"

Then she said: "My friend Alex has invited us to go see some old silent movie in a pub by the old harbor. It's at 8pm. We gotta dress like the 1920s. You want to? You can borrow some of my clothes."

"Sure thing!"

Nice bowler!

The spot, and the film were called "The Golem". After the feature, a blues guitarist played upstairs in the pub. We ordered a glass of wine (2Euros!) and I lit a cigarette to celebrate the fact that a guy was playing Jimi Hendrix's "Wind Cries Mary"... and we could actually smoke inside!

Outisde, the night was cold and windy. In fact, by Thursday, it was definitely Fall time in Hamburg. The smell of rotting leaves on the pavement reminded me of Quebec, and of this sensuous season I haven't had a chance to experience in the last several years.

That night, we went to bed around 3am.

On Friday morning we did a little bit better, and woke up before noon. Alyssa brought me to "the cellar" and she led us into an hour and a half of Vinyassa yoga.

The "Cellar" !

Then we ate breakfast, rested for a little bit, and started to get ready for another evening out on the town. The plan was: party at a friend's place, then Dubstep at some club, and then joining again with her friends for the "Grosse Schwarze Nacht", a big heavy metal party on the crazy Grosse Freiheit strip (part of the red light district, near St.Pauli).

Freiheit?

Friday, last night in Hamburg, and there I was: sitting in a smokey one bedroom apartment with a dozen of German metal heads. I was the only one to wear a white shirt. Even though I couldn't quite take part in the general conversations, I could tell that these "kids" -as I'll endearingly refer to them, since they were probably all under twenty-five years of age- were extremely nice, as Alyssa had told me. They all wore black. The guys had long hair and a few of the girls had dressed up in corsets! But most pleasing to me, was to see that they enjoyed both metal music and dubstep! However, only three of us were going to divide the night in two and go dance at the club before the Schwarz Nacht (black night).

Finally, after about two weeks of being in Deutschland, I got to get my groove on!

A couple hours on the dance floor and we proceeded to meet the others at the metal party - there was actually no dubstep, but rather some gooooood classic hip hop and a bunch of African dudes happy to dance with the three of us.

Talk about a change of mood! In GrosseFreiheit 36 (Where the Beatles played back in the days), everyone wore black!! I took a moment to readjust and rest my dancing feet, but soon a favorite of mine came on the speakers: "Killing in the Name of" ! Alyssa and I went to the dance floor and rocked for a bit more: Rage Against the Machine, System of a Down, Marilyn Manson, Rob Zombie... I can sure have a good time with the metal-heads!

Gothic? Sure! :)

All in all, I didn't really get to see Hamburg by day. I get the slight feeling I might have missed out a bit, but for my defense, I should specify that it was actually raining for most of the time. I am told this is typical of Hamburg. After all, it is the third largest port of Europe. In fact, there are so many streams, rivers, and canals, that Hamburg holds the title for most bridges (2300 of them!) than any other city in the world.