Hanging with Matthew

I have mentioned it before, but there is another stipi at my school from Victoria - Matthew. He's pretty cool. Anyway, one Thursday we were able to hang out after school, because we both have several free periods at the end of Thurdays, perfect for going into town and back before dinner. So after our day had finished Matthew's stipi Erik dropped us off at the train station and pointed us in the right direction, then it was up to us to find our way there and back. It was pretty easy though, only having to change once (we almost didn't get off - whoops). I had a curfew of 10 o’clock (which is 22:00 Germany time), but Matthew had a curfew of 6:00, so we only had a couple of hours as the train trip back is longer than half an hour. We still had a lot of fun. We were planning on going straight to the Weihnachtsmarkt at the Rathaus - the council building, because that is apparently the best Christmas market in Hamburg, but the stop we got off was several blocks from the Rathaus, so we visited a couple of other markets along the way. We also went down to the harbour, and looked out onto the beautiful water, while eating some yummy pastry ball things we got at the market - I can't for the life of me remember the name of it, but they had a slight orangy taste and were served covered in icing sugar - yum! On the way to the Rathaus markets I had the great honour of passing through the 'Europa Passage', which is a big shopping centre. It's not that impressive, but when Matthew came into town with his family they made a big deal out of it, and so he did the same for me. It was quite funny just walking through, literally 10 meters from one entrance to another. We eventually got to the Rathaus markets, despite our detourm and they really were quite impressive, especially the entrance arch. Soon it was time to get to the train station though, so we had to pull ourselves from all of the different stalls selling delicious sweets, sausages, and homemade wares to rush through the streets of Hamburg and find the station. On the way though we realised we still had another half an hour till the train, so when we passed the impressive building that was Starbucks, we dropped in for a coffee (and free wifi). Although I don’t drink coffee much (especially the fake syrupy stuff Starbucks sells) I thought I would try some Christmas coffee. I ended up buying the toffee-nut latte, which the best coffee I have ever tasted, but it was interesting! Apparently Matthew is a difficult name to understand for Germans, as unlike me my fellow Aussie didn't decided to give a nickname and received a coffee for Basti. The Starbucks building itself was cool, as it looked like a mini Greek temple, complete with columns. We ended up getting on the train in time after our coffee break, and I felt quite accomplished getting to my stop after navigating a foreign train system. I ended up walking home from the station, and although it was kind of freaky in the dark (dark at 5:30 - I’m having serious UV deprivation), it was still really pretty to see all of the gemütlich Christmas lights and the stars. I ended up getting home much earlier than 10 o'clock like I was expecting, but had a great day and was able to see more of the beautiful city that is Hamburg, my home for the next couple of months.