Ausflug 39

The next day we concluded my bank business and then went on a nostalgia trip. First stop was the small cemetery where my parents are buried. We took the S-Bahn to Altona. At the train station, I noticed an advertisement for cigarettes. The Marlboro Man doing "manly" things like driving a motorcycle, seems to be still used in Germany, but under German law a warning also has to be posted. So we got this interesting juxtaposition of " I will do it my way" and "Smoking can be deadly". (Bob: I am taken aback that many advertisements in Germany are simply done in English!)

Rather than staying on a subway, we changed to the streetcar train to Altona because it traveled the old way through the downtown area and across a bridge between the Outer and Inner Alster. That way we got a really good view of the downtown area next to the Inner Alster. Getting off in Altona, we walked past the old houses to the cemetery.

In Germany, each individual grave site is under the care of the surviving relatives. Most families take pride in taking care of the graves and tend them like a little garden plot. In my parent's cemetery you can enjoy the individual graves and even a sculpture made from the stump of a big old tree in the middle that had to be cut down. Heinke and Gustl keep the grave of my parents in beautiful shape.

Our next stop was my old neighborhood. I grew up on the second floor at Friedrich-Ebert-Hof 18. There were bicycles at the entrance, where my bicycle used to stand. I was surprised that the rosebush in front that my mother had planted at least 35 to 40 years age was still blooming. Some things last.

We had lunch at a small Imbiss. What a pub and pubgrub is to England, Imbiss and the Bratwurst and other foods is in Germany. This particular small Imbiss was a few doors down from the S-Bahn station. We sat outdoors and had "Schnitzel a la Wien" with potato salad. The Imbiss proprietress took pains to tell us about the difference between "Wiener Schnitzel", which is made with real calve's veal, and "Schnitzel a la Wien" (English: "Schnitzel in the Vienna style"), made with a thin slice of pork. Whichever, it was good.

The train brought us back downtown for a short walk along the inner Alster, the Alsterarkades, town hall. The ferry boats on the Alster used to be an integral part of the public transportation net, but now are used primarily for excursion trips. One is an old steamboat and we watched it huff and puff towards the bridges between inner and outer Alster.

Across from the Alster is one of the canals that flows from the Alster into the Elbe. Alongside are the Alsterakaden, a pedestrian walk with small boutiques and cafes and a view of the town hall. Since Hamburg has been an independent city since its start in the middle ages, the town hall always was one of the most important buildings in the city.

Our last stop was at the last remaining department store downtown, Karstadt. The entrance was "guarded" by two large Lego figures. I looked for a leather coin purse but did not find what I wanted. Taking the U-Bahn back to Barmbek train station and switching to a bus, we could not help but notice that the old "Herti" department store that had been at the corner by the train station was being demolished. We watched an excavator crawler chomp huge bites of concrete out of the wall. Sad.

After Kaffeetrinken, the German equivalent of teatime, we walked back to our hotel through the largest cemetery in Hamburg. It is 125 years old and had been designed as a park as well as a cemetery. Statues and fountains were everywhere.

It even has a rose garden. So we walked through tree lined paths and across a little bridge. It was peaceful to walk through the old trees, and since it was still light, the ghosts had not yet come out.