Hannover Weekend

This weekend we stayed home, but did a lot. Friday night we were invited to join some International Women's Association members for Scottish country dance. They rent a small gym and do mostly ceilidh dances, such as "Strip the Willow" and "Gay Gordons," the easier dances that are common at any Scottish dance. A little chaotic, but fun. Afterwards, we ate tapas and talked outside at a sidewalk café, enjoying the long evening and lovely weather. Yes, it's finally summer here.

Saturday our friend Norbert from Bielefeld met our train with his canoe on top of his car for a spur-of-the-moment, there's-actually-not-a-cloud-in-the-sky outing on the Steinhuder Meer, a large, shallow lake to the west. We paddled out around a small artificial island. It looked like a perfect grassy picnic spot, but we didn't want to pay the landing fee, so we ate our picnic in our canoe in the shade on the backside of the island before being shooed away by the guard. The weather forecast predicted a windy day, not ideal for canoeing, but there was almost no wind. Still life with motionless sailboats. I had put in my swimsuit, then taken it out again, thinking that the chance of it being warm enough to swim was almost nil, and then put it back in again at the last minute on my grandmother's principle that no Siwash should ever go anywhere without a swimsuit. So Rich and Norbert dropped me off for a swim while they paddled around the badeinsel (swimming island) before we put the canoe back on the car. Norbert dropped us at the train and we changed into clean clothes in the toilet in the train to go straight to a Chinese-German Dragonboat festival at our church.

Jie invited us because we speak English, and she said that some of the Chinese spoke English better than German. Since we now have a Chinese daughter-in-law, we are eager to learn as much as we can about China. There are lots of Chinese married to Germans in the Hannover area, and they get together 3 times a year to celebrate Chinese festivals. Our church was hosting this time. We gathered at 4:00 for coffee and cake, there was a brief gugin (Chinese zither) performance, a few songs in Chinese, a short Andacht (devotion, in German translated into Chinese), and a potluck with a curious mix of Chinese and German food. A German cheese plate next to a plate of zongzi, sticky rice wrapped in lotus leaves. Someone's daughter wore a dirndl. The point of the get-together was mostly to speak Chinese with friends, but I spoke English with someone who runs a Chinese language school here. She immigrated to New Zealand, where she got a degree in teaching English as a second language, got married in New York to a German, and now lives here. Globalization means more inter-cultural marriages and more bilingual and trilingual children. Her son George speaks German, Chinese, and English.

Sundays now we are almost always biking to church. Such a pleasure to bike through the forest and along the canal. In Hannover, there's almost always something happening. On the way home, we walked our bikes through a festival along the Lister Meile, a hipster part of town equivalent to Silver Lake in L.A., although much denser. We stopped briefly to hear he bands at two of the three stages: a German band playing country western music and a choir dressed in sailor's costumes singing Sloop John B in German (!).

Country Western Band, Lister Meile-Fest

Shanty Choir Singing Sloop John B in German with Accordion

 

After a hasty lunch, we met Peter, Regina, and their daughter to walk over to an open house to see the new turbine at Enercity. Peter is a water engineer for this local energy company and thought if we went, he could convince his wife and daughter that it actually would be interesting. There was a long line, about a 45-minute wait. I'm not sure that that many Americans would stand in such a long line to see a turbine, but Germans like technology. While Peter and Rich waited in line, I got to try a communal bike and a Segway obstacle course, while Peter's daughter got her face painted and tried bungee jumping.

Bicycle Parking Jam outside of Enercity Open House

Segway Obstacle Course

Old Turbine

 

Rich looking at cables

Enercity Towers

One thing that was just plain silly. Enercity needed to build a new boiler, but, because these towers are protected under historic preservation laws, they needed to fit it into one of the existing 1961 towers. 

While we were standing in line, Peter told us a good joke. There is a lot of fluff from the cotton trees floating in the air + small gnats. If I sing while I ride, they fly into my mouth. Anyway, how do you tell a friendly bike rider? By the gnats in his teeth.

Peter, Regina, and their daughter came for tea and then we rushed off to a choir/recorder concert Sunday night.

 

Raggio di Sol Renaissance and Early Baroque Choir with Recorders