DAY two: fireworks or fireplay?

I still have one more day, and therefore I decided to go back to Hamburg, again. Jasmin told me that Alstervergnuken will m more colorful today.

Picture: Somewhere in Elbe.

I take the train to Hamburg, once again. The iron horse clangs along the iron roads over river Elbe. No, this time it is not called Elbebahn. Oh well, Elbebahn does not sound as sweet as Rheinebahn. Anyway, in 'few minutes', i manage to arrive in Hamburg.



I promised to meet Jasminus at 2000 hours, so I run to the Jungfernsteig station, I arrive there at 1951. The problem is there are more then one Jungfernsteigs. Jungfernsteig Europator, Jungfernsteig Alsterwall and so on. I forgot which one was his, however I enter one of those. It looks familiar, must be this one..

At 1955, I start feeling something wrong. I run to next one, but that one does not look familiar, so must be the other one. I run back, and wait... 1959.. 2000 ... 2001.... minutes pass by, he does not come. At about 2008, I leave, and get into the fair.

Maybe I was in the wrong station...

I keep on searching for a good place to shoot around. Apparently I am in bad luck, all nice vantage points are taken up.

After some searching anyway I find a place. There is a fence also on which I can put my camera, but there are other people who are touching and hitting the long fence, so it's not the most stable thing in life, I did not take the tripod with me, which sucks.. Anyway...

I wait. I didn't meet Jasminus, but if I am meant to meet him, I will meet him, No matter what.

I watch the reflecting water surface of Alster slowly turning blue - dark blue, as the sky is getting darker. .. Aparently there's no cloud.. The firework will start from 2200, so there is more than one hour to suck myself.

Pictures: The dark blue Alstair, and Hamburg in backdrop

From the place where I am standing, direct accross the waterbody is a bridge, and over the bridge is the railroad... A regionalexpress (although this name does not sound as sweet as the transregio or rheinbahn, but is beautiful) pulls away over the bridge, I try to shoot, but all blurry. It is over Alstair, but it is not called alstairbahn either..

Picture; Blurry alstairbahn

Beside me is a guy standing, with impressive gear, and appears kinda snob. Another guy hits on a plastic glass for drinking liquid, and then slightly kicks his tripod. It is not entirely the hitters fault, but he could have been more careful. This guy with camera explodes, and a young boy comes and takes the hitter away. The hitter kicks ground a couple of times and goes away. On my other side is another man waiting with his not-so-impressive cam, and also he is not that confident with his camera. Looks at me, smiles couple of times and look around, and again looks at the place from where the firework is supposed to come. A lady comes, I let her to slide front, she smiles, and asks me why I am here, what I am doing, why I do photography, and these usual questions. Comes one more old lady, with a HUGE amount of blood red lip colorings, and a hairdo that i would describe in the following word: Happy. I tell her welcome to the party. She laughs...


Before fireworks begin all the guys with camera (includes me) does some sort of blank firing, that is shoot the night city.

Picture: Alstairvergnucken fair
 

Pictures: Alstair has changed colors (day two)

Picture: AlstairFair
 

Picture: cloud over alstairfair

 

The preview of the big brother (the guy with the most impressive gear) was quite nice. Another older man pops up and asks how he made that whether with fisheye lens or not. He says no, in a very unencouraging tone. The older man pops to my side and brings the preview. His shot is also nice. At my question, he tells me that he made it without a tripod. I exclaim that it was beautiful to me. Then he says he wants to take firework shots, and shows me that he has put his cam to 'firework' mode. I tell him to come to shutter priority mode, and play with the shutter opening time. He can't find the menu, neither can I. He asks this big brother how to do it, and the answer is (as expected) RTFM...

His woman says she does not understand anything of these activity and just smiles at as.



Firework starts.

Picture: Firework starts

 

 

 

 

Pictures: Firework or fireplay?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They explode, high above the rippling water, applauding folks and singing band-on-the-stage.





They leave reflextions on the dark glassy window of multistoried buildings....

Picture: Fireworks reflecting on the black glassy window..








They end also.

Pictures: Game over

I tell this big brother that I stole a sight on his preview. He smiles, and this time he becomes no more arrogant. I ask him whether he will put his images into internet or not. He will put them in his own website. When I ask him why, he says, he does not take pictures please other people, or to meet their standards. It's his picture, and his feelings behind his pictures. This impression of his mind makes them unique, and not neccesarily along the line. And he is not at all interested to bring him along the line. He wants to remain unique. He also knows, that his pictures might not be the most famous, sought after ones. People might not enjoy them. That's why he puts them on his own webpage. A visitor is of course welcome, but not guaranteed of enjoyment. He asks me whether I am in Hamburg for the first time. I reply it's my30-something-ish time. "First time alstairvergnuken?" - "yes." His name is Olaf, and he says he is tired, his day has ended, and he is hungry. That was so informal and intimate for such a big brother.

Now, the show ended, I became a little sad. One of the old women takes pity on me, and says that it's pretty ok, that there will be show for next two days. But by that time, I will well be in Crete. They say "ohoohhhhhhh, have a good flight."

I decide to take a look around the whole place once more. I walk. People are too drunk and shouting. It is really difficult to move around with my laptop in my back and so on. But I go on. At some point of time, I find a more open space, and keep on walking. Suddenly, about a cople of meters away from me, a guy is standing in the middle of the road, and has spread his hands out, and wants to stop me. It took me a few seconds to understand what is going on. JASMINE..... SO WE MET.

AGAIN

We decide to take a walk around.

As we walk through the crowd, he says he was late, but was "within the akademische viertelstunde" - that is, in germany you are allowed to be late by EXACTLY 15 minutes or less. If you are late by 15 minutes and 01 seconds, no one will wait no more for you.

He also says that he talked to a friend of him about me, my love on Shanty and so on. His friend is also surprised to see that I actually like shanty. He tells me that he was sad to not see me there, because he thought he lost me as a friend as well...

We walk. Accidentally I touch a girl in the crowd. His Turkish boyfrind leaps in front of me, and gives me a harsh look. I just ignore him. I take Jasmin past the place where I was taking pictures, where he buys cigarretes from some women.

The next thing is a stall of skydiving club in mecklenburg. I and Jasminus both are there, even though it's my interest mostly. I probably became overjoyed with stuff. So one of the presenters give me a brochure and ask me to try a Tandem jump. Man I am a parachutist in making!!!! As soon as I say I am a student-parachutist, everyone from the club goes liquid, and slids to my side, and the formal "sie" becomes "du".

The LCD screen shows an exit. I shout in joy. One guy says, "come on, take it business, you too do it"



They invite me to their airport - airport friendship.

Jasminus sees me off in the Hauptbahnhof.

On the way we meet a group of girls, One of them wearing a cow costume, yah a COW costume, and selling toffees to strangers. I ask what is going on? The answer is the cow-maid (as in mermaid, not as in cow-girl) is getting married to a cow owner, and thats how they celebrate it  Then they bring their fireworks out, and starts singing a birthday song, I am more and more confused - isn't it supposed to be a pre-marriage party?

The manager (is the most elderly one whilethe chief is the one getting married) explains that another chick has a birthday today, and they are burning the fireworks surrounding her to bring her blessings.

This hardcore street-partying is not so common in Germany, at least not in northern germany. Once some people wanted to do  in in their house, where I was a guest.  Another guest said that this is not "german", this is extra. I exclaim to the girls that this is not what I expect. One says, maybe I come from a conservative family, I say that I live 80 km away from her, in Bremen. She says, that Bremen is a completely different culture.
-"You come from a different culture,  you are now in a different culture, when you go back, you will tell that you saw a premarriage party, you heard a birthday lied (= song) ... "
There are still some toffees unsold, They decide to consume it themselves, and invite me and Jasminus to join them. i take only one lolipop..

 

 

 

 

 

Pictures: Ecstasy everywhere, in street,in Bahnhof ...

 

" Only one lolipop, you kid, you ought to take more"


I am waiting for the train. A couple arrives, a drunk German girl, and a Turkish guy. The girl is crying and saying to the guy that he always fights with her. The boy looks at me and fires a sheepish smile. The security comes and says "no fight in public place" The boy is saying nothing to the girl. At some point, the girl annouces in the empty station, that she is splitting up with him, because of his possesiveness and fighting. I witness a splitup. She waits a while in the same platform, and then goes to other platform waiting room, sits, and breaks into uncontrolled tears. I see her from my platform, sobbing and crying...

Two guy comes, one of them seriuosly ill. He vomits in the station. The other guy takes a piece of paper, and cleans the trainstation. I do not think one can see this sort of sight, anywhere in world, out of Germany, that passengers clean their train station from their own vomit. This act repeats for a few more times. Germany knows where dirt belongs.

I sit in the staircase in the main station building. The security comes and drives me from there. It is not allowed to sleep in the train station. Another traveller going to Kiel is also driven away. We go to the waiting room. He was not able to find it, but we find it at the end.

His train leaves long before mine.

In the waiting room, people were mostly sleeping, so did I for a while. Two young people whom I thought a couple because of their intimacy, went away with different trains, without saying a single word of bye to each other. The guy even wanted to protect the woman by jumping to a stand in front of her when I entered, even though I did a very humble entry.

alstair fireplay from Sean Con on Vimeo.

Alstair fireworks from Sean Con on Vimeo.