A visit to Hamburg

The Hamburgers' Homecoming

Last weekend we made a quick trip back to Hamburg, the birthplace of three-fifths of our family. Anna and I tried to be patient as Jost, Hannes, and Lara got all teary-eyed at being back in their old stomping ground.

We visited the tiny apartment where we lived when Lara was born, and stood under the gnarled old tree that dropped an apple on her forehead as we carried her inside for the first time. We pointed at the balcony where fat little Hannes used to play in his sand box and call out strange German-American greetings to passersby. Oh, am I happy not to be living in that cramped space anymore with a baby and a toddler!

A gray winter scene outside our last apartment in Hamburg

We played tourist down at the immense harbor with its huge container ships, and ate lunch at an old harbor pub that looked as if Captain Ahab should have been sitting around smoking his pipe with the other whalers in some dark smoky corner.

A view of the harbor

At the Hamburger Dom, a sprawling amusement park that comes to Hamburg twice a year, we rode the Riesenrad (ferris wheel) with Jost’s mother and tried to ignore our frozen noses as we admired the view of the city at night.

Amo Heidi, Anna, and Hannes in his burka on the Riesenrad

And to top it all off, we had a lovely Advent coffee with Jost’s mother, brother, 87-year-old great aunt Tante Ilse, and her daughter Gela, a full family reunion of Jost's maternal side of the family. It was fun to see the children be able to communicate freely with their German relatives for the first time in their lives.