This past weekend was pretty lousy, weather-wise -- except for an extended shopping trip on Saturday, we mostly stayed at home and listened to the pounding rain and powerful wind beating against our roof for hours.
On Sunday night, when the weather slackened, we braved a trip to the Hamburger DOM, a giant carnival that's held three times a year -- and, according to legend, has been going on in one form or another for the past 670 years, more or less. It might not have been raining, but it was still pretty cold, so we didn't stay for long.
On the U-Bahn ride back, we rode in one of the newer cars, equipped with "Infoscreens" that rotate between news, short cartoons, ads, and station announcements. During the local news portion, our Infoscreen announced that the St. Pauli Fishmarket was flooded. Hey, that's where I work!
Actually, occasional flooding isn't a big surprise for people who live and work in buildings down by the river. Each building has a set of waterproof metal doors; all of the ground-level windows either have their own metal shutters, or they're made out of really thick glass. (Our offices are on the fourth floor, so it's not like we have to worry about being flooded out directly ...)
The first time I came to live in Hamburg, in February 2000, there was a flood on my first day in the office. Once the floodwaters started picking up, one of my co-workers realized that he'd left his bike locked up in the bike area out front (which was in a depression to start with), and that it was now in belly-high-and-rising water. He ran outside, stripped down, and waded in to rescue his bike. Everyone was leaning out of the windows, watching his progress -- there was chanting as he made the attempt, and cheers as he successfully rolled the bike away. Nobody stayed late that day -- we all had to wade out.
Hopefully I don't get a free day by virtue of flood today; it didn't rain much last night, and there's no new news in the online papers this morning, so I think we'll be okay. Still, I think I'll bring a camera (the old one) along to work, in case there are any dramatic-floodwaters scenes to be had . . .
Posted by Kevin at March 22, 2004 08:32 AM