bremen

I met up with Anais (remember her from pictures at the Kroth's house?) in Bremen on Friday afternoon. Bremen is more popularly home to some fairytale musicians: rooster on top of a cat on top of a dog on top of a donkey. Only after our trip did I realize that there was a statue of these Bremen musicians right around where we were; bummer!

We spent the afternoon walking around the Markplatz, an expansive park along the river, and narrow streets.Meet Roland, Bremen's protector Babies!
It was also the first of May, Labor Day. There were a lot of demonstrations and festivals during the day. Apparently, law enforcement must stay alert, especially in the evening and night when it becomes rowdy. Anais noticed many Polezei around town and I couldn't help but take pictures of socialist banners, which were quite prevalent. I was happy to get out of Berlin, where protesters (sometimes anarchists) are absolutely insane. Some kids in my program said they saw heavily armed police forces and herds of people fighting, throwing stones, and starting fires through various districts in Berlin. The demonstrations went on all night, more often extremists fighting amongst themselves... so yeah... Bremen was quite calm.We had to catch a train to Hamburg in the evening and there were a couple hours to spare. We sat outside the cafe at the bottom of the windmill to converse and have some beverages.