My first 45 minutes - Write-Up

In the afternoon (ca. 3.45 - 8pm) on Saturday, July 31st, I made my first visit to Hans Albers Platz. Here's a summary of the impressions that I got in the first 45 minutes already:

I get of the subway station Reeperbahn around 3.45pm. Compared to a saturday evening when the platform is crowded with partying people, there isn't much going on. Everything is really quiet. An add for condoms strikes me as I come up the escalator. Of course, they need them here. When I take the turn towards Hans Albers Platz, the place almost looks like it is closed down for the day only to reopen in the evening when it gets busier here again and the place is filled with people.


The weather is cloudy and windy. Empty beer benches and the smell of spilled beer and other stuff everywhere. Punk rock music coming from some basement. I haven't had any lunch yet, so I go to a pizza place called Pizzeria Alt-Hamburg (Old Hamburg) and order two tiny ones about the size of my hand for 2,50 euros each.

The woman at the stand is rather obese and makes the pizzas with her rough hands in a big stone oven behind her. She looks like she's been through a lot in her life - and the pizza place, I notice, is also a proper restaurant with a very lowbrow tavern and hotel attached to it: The Hotel Alt-Hamburg . There are still signs there, where the rates for the night are written out in deutschmarks, which in all of Germany you can only still see in places that have been closed for at least a decade. Two (what I believe are) Russians - somewhere from Eastern Europe, I'm sure - are ahead of me ordering their pizzas. I don't actually understand what they are saying, but they appear to be having a good time. While I'm having my pizza, I hear the occasional airplane fly by and the whole place at this time of day feels kind of deserted and unfamiliar. Most of the time, I've been here during the night, partying myself. So, it's quite unusual sitting here, sober (to be honest ;) ) and observing everything, which is hard to do to begin with, because every once in a while I catch myself wandering in my mind and daydreaming. I tell myself to try and focus on what is happening right in front of my eyes. The Russians are sitting at a beer table next to me and a pigeon is landing there as well. I think they are starting to talk about the bird. It finds some pizza crumbs and flies away again. The occasional group of tourists walks by and stops at the statue of Hans Albers, a famous German actor and icon of Hamburg - an old woman with a white rucksack and blue hair strikes me the most.

I take a stroll around the place. There are pictures of Hans Albers everywhere and many places are named after him, too, like for example Hans Albers Hotel Hans Albers Klause (a tavern) or a place called La Paloma, named after the famous song.


I count four pubs. There's one where a bunch of English guys are sitting outside having a beer, an old man is with them, bald, looking like a skinhead. There's a steak house and the Quer club and Mary Lou's Cult Bar on the other side. All the places are either closed or open but empty. Overall, I can count the amount of people there with the fingers of one hand at this time of the day. People are mainly passing through only to get to the shops, restaurants, strip clubs or the subway station at the Reeperbahn. A constant noise of cars driving by coming from that direction.

After a while, I sit down on a big cement block and just look around. A red pillow is lying around somewhere with a half-empty cup right next to it. I try to imagine what other people see or where they go and get the idea of making character profiles of everyone I believe is interesting. I take photos and notes of the people and what they look like. I also think about the Hotel Alt-Hamburg and decide that on my next stay in Hamburg at the end of August I need to stay there for at least a night or two. There is music coming from a bar now, ambulance sirens and people talking in English, others in Polish or Russian. There is an old man talking to a quite neat-looking Asian couple. She shakes her head and the old man spreads his arms, probably saying 'sorry' to her, then she joins her waiting boyfriend/husband and they leave.

A tourist group is walking by, the leader being a small muscular bald guy with a tan, sunglasses and a moustache. When I ask one of the tourists who he is, he shows me a flyer with a link to website: www.inkasso-henry.de! Inkasso Henry turns out is a famous Reeperbahn icon, who calls himself the 'longest-serving porter in Hamburg'. He talks to the group of about 40 people about Hans Albers being 'an old friend of his' and that he once was sitting in Hans' lab when he was a little kid. I need to check him out more.

A man, around sixty years old I'd say with jeans, a black leather vest and a black cowboy hat walks by. I call him 'cowboy' immediately. He doesn't quite fit in here as a cowboy and reminds me of other cowboy characters in films that don't quite fit in - like the one in David Lynch's Mulholland Drive and there's also one in a film called The Big Empty played by Sean Bean. I look at my cell and see that it is 4.30pm now. Only 45 minutes have passed since I've come here. If this is what happens in 45 minutes, then how many impressions am I going to have during the course of at least five days? Amazing! This exercise is getting real fun...