Going HAM

Apparently there was some sort of war going on in Hamburg - between the police and the protesters. We didn’t see any. There were a lot of people sitting around and littering like bastards, and there were a lot of police. But no clear evidence of fire bombing or violent looting. The protests were clearly happening somewhere else: thankfully for us. As it turned out, the entire country’s police (15,000 of them) converged on Hamburg, shooting water at people, throwing gas and generally stopping people from peacefully protesting. We saw a few people arrested – outnumbered vastly by the police, but generally there was no war that we could see. Walking around, the locals clearly did have a thing against Trump (see picture.) There was even a model of Trump’s head speared onto the railing of a flat’s balcony that we passed. Our hotel was in the centre of town (near the main station) but thankfully none of the protesters did a sit-in by the front door. We could enter unmolested, and visit our room at any point – which had a corridor, a toilet/shower and two bunk beds. Lovely. Not too pretentious or crowded with furniture. We went out most of the time of course. Sometimes on the way back the taxis would not drive us all the way, so we had to make the rest of the way on the trains, which were clean and punctual and had all the knobs and whistles on and would pick you up and drop you off without any fuss. One morning we went paint-balling, where you would shoot your friends in the face (covered by a helmet) which was most satisfying. Strangely being shot in the arse was the most painful of all, and maybe the most humiliating. There were a number of rooms where you could shoot at each other joyfully, sticking to the painted floors, the painted walls and the painted obstacles. I was given a special helmet because I wear glasses, but combined with my sweat and my surprisingly hot breath, it steamed up the helmet so I couldn’t see anything. Apart from this it was great fun. I don’t know how proper soldiers do it though. Afterward we had a BBQ. And had a few beers. That set the tone really. But thank god there was no David Hasslehoff music.