When I walk, I run...

It's appropriate that I quoted Polar Bear Club's song Chasing Hamburg for this title, seeing as that's where I am. I've just got it in my head now because I had to reply to Matt's facebook message with another video post (I'm a fan of video-conversation) and of course I had to find a video... which was hard, and gave me a choice of two, and he's not singing terribly well in either. Such is life. I do confess that without that song, my interest in Hamburg probably wouldn't have been stirred enough to get me here. I'm glad that it was - seems pretty cool here.

So, this morning I got up early. Train at 9:15am to Hannover, then an ICE to Hamburg. I got one of those deluxe shiny-new ones, which I totally loved. I sat alone in a "quiet area" - which, of course, ruled. Ate an amazing pretzel covered in pumpkin seeds, bought from some organic/health food shop in Hannover Hbf, and drank the standard overpriced on-train coffee. It was a really pleasant journey, actually, and I probably could have stayed on the train for a lot longer if I'd needed to. But I got off at Hamburg Hbf (the train finished at Hamburg-Altona, so there wasn't exactly any point in staying on, hahaha) and dealt with an only-just-helpful lady at the tourist office. I got a map and my travel pass (gives me discount to museums etc, too) for four days. Almost wish I hadn't bought it, because no one has checked it, and you don't need to scan it to get into the subway system. Oh well.

I caught the bus to the hostel, which is a fair way out of the city centre (though it's much faster on the train). However, my room is really nice and spotlessly clean, plus there's extras like free Wifi in all rooms, and cable tv. The tv is on at the moment, to some badly dubbed detective show, more because I'm listening to the people who tell me I need to hear more German. I'm exhausted though, so I don't think it'll stay on for long. Anyway, I saw the Michel church, a bit of the red light district (was too early to see hookers flaunting their wares, thankfully - did see a few walking about with their groceries, etc). After my Amsterdam experience of seeing one of the girls I was with having a boob grabbed by a (female) prostitute, I'm not keen to go strolling alone. The area around St Pauli is pretty cool, though, and definitely warrants another (daytime) glance.

Took a stroll through the gardens in the middle of the city, and searched for a few vegetarian restaurants that I'd looked up online. The first was no longer in existence, or certainly not on the street that it was listed as being on, and the second was a buffet-type place that was already closed. Might go back there for lunch some other time. I went into a nearby Thai restaurant and had awesome vege stir-fry and rice for dinner. The stir-fry even had asparagus in it! The meal would have been reasonably priced, too, had I not seen the sticky rice and mango in the desserts section... I won't tell you how much it cost, but the nice wait staff did tell me that they had their mangoes flown in from Vietnam. They were the long ones that we refer to as Fillippino mangoes, and rest assured, it was the absolute best mango I've eaten in this entire hemisphere. Seriously, phenomenal. And the sticky rice was divine... even though there was no coconut milk with it. Ahhh, so full. I was starvingly hungry by the time I got back here, and ate too fast.

The room was really cold (turned the heating up but it had no effect whatsoever, I think it must be otherwise controlled) so I had a shower to warm up and now I'm hanging out under the quilt. Time to catch up on my blogs and catch up on some sleep... I'll work on being a better tourist tomorrow. Though I think I've done pretty well by talking to people in German (even though I get replies in English all the time), ordering real food for dinner (as opposed to something from a supermarket, which leaves me dissastisfied, or street food, which makes me a fatty and upsets me stomach) and even slowing down to stroll, instead of racing around in my usual style. I guess that's the joy of coming to a city without any real goal - it's a much more relaxing way to tour.

Anyway, enough rambling. Reading and then bed. So tired.