Hannover is a moderately large city that consists of industrialism, modern aspect, and old historical buildings and landmarks, all mixed together into one place. For starters, it is certainly well populated. Lucas and I went walking around the city center for hours today, and it was teaming with people, even just after midday, when you would think a lot of people would be working on a Friday. The city center had a lot to offer. Tons and tons of stores and restaurants to choose from, it reminded us a lot of the Essen city center. Even the general design aesthetics were similar. This is one reason though that also made us not like the city as much. In the case of Essen, we don’t enjoy how industrial it sometimes feels, and getting the same feelings from Hannover made it tough for us to enjoy it as much. In contrast to cities like Triberg, Garmisch-Partenkirchen, and even Frankfurt, it was just hard to feel any kind of unique culture to what we were seeing. The city is also not the cleanest, which again, reminds us of Essen a little too much.
Despite the looks, there is beauty and fun in the city to be seen and had. The city has some amazingly preserved landmarks and parks to see. One such landmark was an old church. It caught our attention as we turned a corner and saw this towering, soot black, church tower across the street. Upon exploring, we found that the church was missing any kind of ceiling. All that was left of it was this huge tower and the 4 walls of the church, which were slowly being taken over by green and crimson red ivy. Even the stain-glass windows were gone, leaving remnants of the stone arches that supported them behind. We found out the church was bombed during WWII, and this was all that was left of it. Being right in the middle of the city center, a modern/industrial area, might make you think the church was out of place, but on the contrary it somehow seemed to fit in. It was like its huge contrast to the surroundings helped pull you back to see the history of the town, which can sometimes be hard to see in cities that have changed a lot since the wars. Later on we also found another relic of a smaller church. Again, it was like the city was rebuilt around it, even its old cemetery was allowed to stay amongst the new modern shopping buildings. Have you ever seen a cemetery just out in the open of a major city? Yeah, us neither.
There are also newer buildings which don’t just reflect industrial design, but cooler modern and technological ideas. In fact one towering building we saw, Lucas originally didn’t even like. He thought it looked too incomplete and too careless, but upon closer inspection we found out it was an huge complex of offices, made all out of glass, with various geometrical shapes. Pyramids, cylinder bridgeways, and various sized rectangles stacked on top of each other, all with a lagoon of water sitting below making a kind of infinity pool that the offices could look down to. It was actually very, very, cool.
Lastly we stopped for a bite to eat, starting with ice cream, we then went to a restaurant we haven’t gone to in a while. Dean & David’s is the name. It is basically a salad restaurant, with your choice of around 10 different salads. It is more on the healthy side though. The fact that Lucas, who isn’t a huge salad person, really enjoys this place speaks for itself. It is just so very yummy. You wouldn’t think a salad would fill you up, but they somehow always give just enough, that even Lucas can start having trouble finishing it.
That’s all for this week. We hope you enjoy the video associated with this post, and that everyone is having a good day, wherever you might be!