It’s getting much, much colder.  We people in Dunedin/ New Zealand should stop complaining about the cold, because we have nothing on Germany.  At least we get into the positive temperatures during the day.  Hamburg hasn’t been over 0 celcius in the last few days.  It has also snowed.  It was quite pretty until the next morning.  Salt on the steps to the underground, sand (I think it was sand any way) on some main paths, and the snow melted/ got trampled into a brown slush, or was frozen over by the next day.  It was so cold today.  It was -3 at midday, and only rose to -2 at 1, before dropping off again.  It’s that cold that the Alster Lake actually froze.  We are meant to get between 5-10cm of snow tonight....

 

I don't know if you can tell, but the seagulls are standing on the ice, not sitting in the water.

 

Last night (Friday night) I went out with a few people from the Goethe Institut courses to the Shanze.  It’s a strip of bars.  I tried a Bananenweizen which is an Edinger Bier with a bit of banana juice.  Then Viktor and Javier made me have a “real” beer.  You guys know I’m not much of a beer drinker and how exceptional this was for me.  We talked to two Brazilians, one happened to be in New Zealand, and had been staying in Christchurch when the earthquake struck.  He said he was lucky because he had gone to Queenstown that weekend.  He said he had one of the best beers, while in New Zealand.  It just so happened to be Speights.  Good one ya mate.  People started leaving, and it was just left to us three.  We went and got food.  Currywurst and chips.  It had nothing on Willowbank, which I had a severe craving for last night. 

I know I seem to always talk about Christmas in these blogs, but that’s because I keep finding more interesting things about it.  I went into the city to do some shopping, which was mostly a failure.  I came away with “die Kleine Raupe nimmersatt” which is “the very hungry Caterpillar.”  I was going to find some new clothes, specifically something warmer, but alas I was too cold to do much.  Plus the line into Abercrombie and Fitch stretched for half a block, even in this weather.  The main shopping area was PACKED.  There were so many people.  And the Weihnachtsmärkte had grown.  I still can’t find something I want to buy from them though, but the main problem for me, was that there were too many people pushing through, so I didn’t really bother to have a look.

 

This is the Rathaus and one of the markets.  This one was the most popular and hardest to move through.

 

Speaking of more Christmas, Wednesday was the Goethe Institut’s Christmas Party.  It was pretty good.  A few people sung/ or read a poem from their homeland.  Unfortunately I could not think of anything off the top of my head.  It was quite interesting.  Then a small choir came in and sung a couple of songs for us.  Everyone seemed to be in good spirits, although I think the glühwein helped.  It snowed for us too, just to make it extra festive and special.

The Christmas tree at the Goethe Institut.

The snow after the Christmas party.

 

I also have a very nice host family.  The 6^th of December is a special day in Germany.  It’s St. Nikolaustag.  The tradition asks you to leave a shoe at your door in the hopes that St. Nikolaus would come and leave it full of sweets.  The family gave me a Hamburg mug, which was full of chocolates.  I hope the mug survives the voyage home.