Th odd/funny things about Hamburg so far…

Fischmarkt

the U-Bahn station „Schlump“

the U-Bahn station „Alte Wöhr“

The annoying child voices who say the station names on the U-Bahn

Some traffic lights just switch themselves off at night

Post boxes are hard to find

„Spunk“ brand chewing gum

Penny-people in Pennymarkt

Dodgy tramps who look in every bin to find things to pfand

Everyone smokes

„Funky Pussy Club“ – its a club, not a strip joint

The pole dancer at the beach Doll House

The prostitutes and their bum-bags

Everybody is either a hardcore HSV fan or a hardcore St.Pauli fan, yet they never fight.

The man who looks like a down-and-out and who sits outside Lidl asking people for money, then at the end of his „shift“ gets in the back of a car

People love to practice their English with you

There are more bikes than people

Without sounding racist; none of the black people here can speak German very well

There is no train to the airport

 There isnt enough Hamburgers in Hamburg

Where is the REAL cheese? 

There are more people who take stuff OUT of bins than people who put stuff IN the bins

The most attractive girl here is English

Fischmarkt

Fischmarkt is officially the best thing ever! It is such a shock to go theree for the first time! It is only open between 5am and 9am of a Sunday morning and yes it does sell more than fish!

We usually end up going there direct after a night out on the Reeperbahn so obv I am still drunk when I get there, which heightens my feeling of Fischmarkt-ecstasy I guess. It is always so busy and we always wonder why Germans like to get up at 4am on a Sunday for such a thing??

There are rows and rows of market stalls across the harbourfront at Landungsbrücken selling everything from Hamburg jumpers to Matjes Brötchen and eventually you get to the Markthalle and the Pilgrimage is over.

Inside it is nice and warm and there is a live band playing old-school music (even so early as 5am) and there are always people dancing and enjoying themselves. There is also a Tchibo stall selling delicious hot chocolate and you can buy possibly the best fish and chips in the whole of Hamburg in the Markthalle – its the perfect breakfast and hangover prevention tool!

 I love Fischmarkt.

4 months in and I finally decide to write something…

Well I have been in Hamburg 4 months now and this is my first entry. Poor effort i know.

Things are going really well here, I have met some really nice people, both German and English as well as being reunited with my old exchange partner and her friends. It is also great to see my old flame again – HH.

 I shall ATTEMPT to summarise everything that has happened in the past 120 days or so here so here goes:

 First thing I want to say is how great everyone at euroShell (the place where I am doing my internship here) are! Here is an example of just how great they are.. Before i arrived here on July 1st I had signed to take over the apartment of the previous interns on September 1st – which consequently meant that I had nowhere to live for the first 2 months. However Jasna from the Personal department went out of her way to find somewhere for me and I had two apartments in a posh part of town for the first two months! The first apartment was literaly a penthouse suite. It was HUGE with a massive living room complete with desk, tv and sofa and then I had a master bedroom with a king sized bed and 4 wardrobes, my own kitchen completely kitted out and a bathroom with bath AND shower! The best thing about it was that Shell was paying for the rent! Which amounted to 1200 euros for the month :s The second apartment was slightly smaller and round the corner from the penthouse one – the difference being that the bedroom and living room were combined, however it was still a swish place and again I didnt have to pay for it!   

For the remaining 10 months I have left here in Hamburg I am sharing a 2 bedroomed apartment with a girl called Hayley Sleigh on Flotowstraße in Barmbek-Süd. It is a really nice apartment, with balcony, nice kitchen and the bedrooms are of generous size – I would estimate 19 square metres each, as the whole apartment measures 58 square metres. We had some problems at the start – mainly with the internet connection. Story is, the internet refused to function and one friday night I was on the phone to the customer service Centre for 4 hours complaining in German and trying different things to get the connection to work all to no avail. Eventually they agreed to send us new equipment for free which arrived just 3 days later and now the internet works fiiine! The apartment also gets painted afresh every 3 years and luckily this year was the year for it so it looks nice and new now! Also last weekend we went to Ikea in Moorfleet so I have been able to pimp up my bedroom!

Enough about accomodation, now on to work!  The internship is really good and I am definately enjoying it! My colleagues are well nice and are always willing to help and talk to me. It is also very relaxed here – I am writing this atm at work and nobody is batting an eyelid! Since I have been here I have been working on a project to create a new version of the euroShell Deutschland website which is enjoyable as well as productive and challenging. No opening letters or making tea for me thankyouverymuch!

Finally I shall mention all the fantastic people i’ve met since being here then call it a day for this entry! There is a large number of english students here at Hamburg also on their year abroad and an especially large contingent from Leeds. To be honest a few people from Leeds uni who are here I have never really spoken to that much before but now we do and they are all really nice people! Also everyone from all other different universities as well – in fact EVERYONE here are really great people and I am very glad to have met them! Final year of uni should be fun now! :p

Untill the next time – in Hamburg sagt man Tschüß!