{"id":8193,"date":"2026-07-03T20:25:23","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T20:25:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/zjunk.net\/blog\/?p=8193"},"modified":"2026-07-05T18:39:22","modified_gmt":"2026-07-05T18:39:22","slug":"hanging-out-in-hamburg-ottensen-friday-july-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zjunk.net\/blog\/index.php\/2026\/07\/03\/hanging-out-in-hamburg-ottensen-friday-july-3\/","title":{"rendered":"Hanging out in Hamburg-Ottensen: Friday, July 3"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This was another low-key day (we are trying to wind down a bit during our last days here, especially with a few Big Events coming up this weekend before we leave here), with Andrea and Peter both busy and us with just one thing to fit in: lunch with a friend across town. So we decided to walk the 5 km (3 m) to the Alster lake from Andrea and Peter’s home, which we’ve done before, because it is such a nice route along the Wandse creek. It was overcast, cool, and a bit windy, but we enjoyed the walk along the creek, the various bridges across it, some of which are major traffic arteries but did not impede our progress, because there were either underpasses or pedestrian traffic lights. We’ve taken pictures on this walk before, but here are a few more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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I especially liked this willow on our walk along the Wandse<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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This “maze” is actually a “fish ladder” (Fischtreppe) which enables fish to get upstream to spawn in spite of the human-made dams that prevented this. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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View of the Au\u00dfenalster where the Wandse empties into it. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

We then took a bus and the S-Bahn to Altona, to meet our friend Ameet at the little Armenian restaurant that he raved about when we met him last year. At the time, he had just moved to Hamburg from the States and loved it. Since then, he’s moved to a lovely old-fashioned apartment directly above that restaurant and loves living here even more. After a delicious Armenian lunch (I had a lamb kebab with fried potatoes, which was delicious, he showed us his apartment. I loved classic “Dielenboden”–no-frills hardwood floors made out of large wooden planks the double-doors between what used to be the living room and the dining room, and the stucco on the high ceilings that had been painted over so many times that there was no way to tell what the original shapes were (flowers, leaves?). But by far my favorite part were the art nouveau tiles in the building’s entryway. We all agreed that he was very lucky to end up with such a great apartment, in a wonderful, lively part of town where real people just lie their lives, as Andrea put it. We had coffee in a little bakery that sold more bread than fancy cakes (we had a cardamom roll that was very yummy), and we checked out a laundromat that becomes a disco every night! Although on the edge of gentrification, Ottensen in Altona doesn’t feel like it’s gentrified. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Ameet and I with our Armenian meals at Jerewan Grill in Ottensen. Yummy. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Glorious tiles from the early twentieth century<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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The famous Laundrette and Bar (check out the bar sign in the shape of a washing machine), outside and<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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And the view on the inside. The folding table gets removed at night to make room for a dance floor. The DJ is above the washers and dryers, which all have the names of rock and pop stars.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

After Ameet walked us back to the Altona train station, we headed back to Andrea and Peter’s home–Mark directly, and I with a quick stop to buy the ingredients for fajitas. While I put away groceries and prepped food, Mark was a work-related zoom call. Peter came home around 6–he’d been at a protest gathering downtown, which in spite of only having been in the making for a couple of days, had about 2,000-3,000 participants protesting an impending sweeping tax, retirement, and health care reform that would dial back some key protections for citizens. Andrea was home from work at about 7, and we all had fajitas and some “boughten” cookies and chocolate for dessert. We watched a wonderful and silly movie, “Sheep Detectives,” to wrap up the day. Our first movie since we flew over here! <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This was another low-key day (we are trying to wind down a bit during our last days here, especially with a few Big Events coming up this weekend before we leave here), with Andrea and Peter both busy and us with just one thing to fit in: lunch with a friend across town. So we … Continue reading “Hanging out in Hamburg-Ottensen: Friday, July 3”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8193","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-2026-vienna","category-photos"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zjunk.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8193","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zjunk.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zjunk.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zjunk.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/25"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zjunk.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8193"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/zjunk.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8193\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8257,"href":"https:\/\/zjunk.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8193\/revisions\/8257"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zjunk.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8193"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zjunk.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8193"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zjunk.net\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8193"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}