On Saturday we went to Luneburg, which is a small city between Hannover and Hamburg. The occasion was the Hansetage festival, where our friend Kaska's Polish folk dance group was performing. Kaska's husband Thorsten drove us - me, Brian, and our friends Ed and Serena - to Luneburg for the day. On the way there, Serena and Ed (who are also Americans) used the opportunity to ask Thorsten (who is German) every burning question they had about Germany. We talked about German politics, American politics, immigration, dubbed movies, health care, unemployment benefits, and hookers. That's right, hookers. We saw several 1980s era campers on the side of the road with a red heart and the words "sexy girls" painted on the door. Thorsten explained that in the campers prostitutes were hanging out and waiting for business. This prompted more discussion on the legality of prostitution in Germany and other countries. We encouraged Serena to hop out and ask the girls directly, but she wouldn't do it.
Hansetage is a festival celebrating Luneburg's years in the medieval Hanseatic trading league. There were all kinds of people wandering around in tights and other historical costumes, and we got to see the middle ages-era crane lift some barrels up from the river onto the shore. The crane works when a man walks inside a big wheel, which pulls a chain, which moves the pulley. It's sort of like a human hamster wheel. Luneburg has a lot of pretty historic buildings and tall churches, which shows you that cities in the Hanseatic league were wealthy enough to build up fancy cities and preserve them over the years. It also shows you that those buildings were not blown up in World War 2.
The Polish dancers stole the show. They were smiling and spinning and singing and pretending to blow a huge wooden horn. They definitely looked better and had more fun than the frumpy, old, unattractive German folk dancers. I am not sure what that means about the merits of Polish culture versus German culture... but I will let you ponder it.
On the way home, we discussed colonialism, racism, and hookers yet again. It was a good day.
Here are some photos:
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| Polonia E.V. folkloric dance group |
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| Helenka and her future dance partner |
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| Kaska talking with one of the other folk dancers |
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| Thorsten and me in front of the crane, at the Luneburg harbor |
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| Charlotte, Kaska, and me |
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