For the uninitiated "Hamburg On a Rainy Day" is a song I wrote and it appears in my first collection of demos entitled "Songs I Wish I Could Remember".  So this isn’t really a story that I’m writing here but rather an explanation to a part of the song - the part that uses the German word 'Wattenläuper' (pronounced vatten-loy-per). The text in part reads thus:

Hamburg on a rainy night, wattenläuper calls to warm a dismal night, when the candle lights, it's right for you tonight...

So what is a Wattenläuper? Why is the night dismal? Why is a candle lit? Has the electricity gone? Has he got no coins for the meter or has he not payed the bill? All will be revealed. Well simply put, Wattenläuper is a liqueur and apparantly you can only buy it in the north of Germany, although you can order some and they will send it by post. Not sure if they can send it to ireland. Anyway, you definitely can’t buy it over the counter in the south of Germany. And I know, because I’ve looked. I even went into a shop that claimed to stock any liqueur from Deutschland, maybe Europe if not the entire inhabited earth. So excitedly, I went in. “Wattenläuper?" said the dear lady "Err... yes, yes I know it. Ermm... (pretending to look very carefully at an empty space on the shelf she happened to find) I think we’re just out at the moment. Try again next week. We have a delivery next Friday.” I went back next Friday but “the van broke down”. I went back several Fridays after that. She hid when she saw me coming so I put her out of her misery. I just didn’t go again. Anyway, on the back of said bottle is the story of the wattenläuper. It’s in German. Google translator is a knockout tool these days so strictly speaking you don’t need my help but I’ll tell you anyway what the whole thing is about. Besides, Google translator won’t help you if you don’t own a bottle. The story is written on a label pasted on the back. Besides, stick with me and I’ll give you useful additional information that will be of great help should you ever visit that part of Germany.

Ok, so first up is the word 'Watten' or 'Watt' that appears in the word. The north German coastline is pretty much divided into two parts, each on either side of that part of Germany that sticks out at the top, north of Hamburg, and adjoins Denmark. On the right hand side is the Baltic Sea which the Germans call the Ostsee (meaning East sea). You might think that the waters to the left of the peninsula would logically be called the Westsee in German (which would mean West Sea) but it isn’t. It’s called the Nordsee, which as you may probably guess means the North Sea. As these waters do indeed go quite northwards up as far as the eastern side of the British Isles and beyond, it makes sense really. Together with my family we have made several holidays up there, specifically in a small place called Büsum. It’s extremely healthy. The air and breeze are what your lungs need for a good old clean out. The fish is fresh, so fish restaurants are plentiful and excellent, and I found a place where they sell a good draught Guinness. Not to be taken for granted in Germany. First of all not all personnel know how to pour a Guinness correctly for one thing, but one Irish landlord told me that due to miles and miles of travel over road, river and rail, pipe-cleaning laws, and a host of other excuses, the Guinness on the continent is not as good as it is on mainland Ireland. No idea, he may be telling the truth, but I have had a good pint of Guinness at 'Mike’s Pub' in Lindau, 'The Dubliner' in Heidelberg and the one I’m referring to, in Büsum, North Germany. So a good pint is possible. The pub I’m referring to is called ‘Kleiner Biersalon’ which would translate as Small Beer Saloon. It’s a strange pub to be honest. If you google it and look at the pictures you’ll see what I mean. You follow the sign and it leads you into an arcade which you kind of expect to be closed at night. Well all the shops inside are so I guess when they’re all locked up they throw them the keys and let them lock up when they're finished. When we visited it last it was just me and the missus without the kids who had, by this time, fled the nest. The girls were already in Ireland and our eldest was married and living, without Wattenläuper, with his missus nowhere near the north of Germany. He would not be persuaded to move there to become our supplier. They had other plans. So. There was a small break in the Covid-19 restrictions which were in effect at the time. And I guess because he had the arcade to himself in the evenings the owner of the 'Kleiner Biersalon' was able to spread the tables out which he did. I suppose if it hadn’t have been for the restrictions forcing you to sit still at your table you could have walked around with pint in hand and done a bit of window shopping. It doesn’t really have a pub atmosphere as such but it’s a good pint just the same. I’m not knocking it at all by the way, I really didn’t drink a better pint of Guinness up there than theirs. Anyway, what was I talking about? Oh yes, the Watt or Wattenleben.

So. To the beach in Büsum (pronounced Burr-zum by the way). When the tide recedes, the resulting beach is called Watt. The Germans pronounce it ‘vat’ by the way. This kind of wet muddy/sandy expanse is teaming with life which they call in German 'Wattenleben' (watt life), a kind of ecosystem gifted to the marine life of the north sea. They say you should walk barefoot on it as the minerals it contains are healthy for your feet, bloodstream et al. So that's what we would do. Often. Anyway, to the story on the back of the bottle.

The story goes that many, many moons ago in 1763 (which, at the time of writing is approximately 3144.2 of them), a ship ran aground on the north sea coast. For some reason the personnel  were unable to get off the ship. There they were, stranded until waters high enough and powerful enough arrived to wash them back to sea. Some Wattenläuper, that is, a man who would walk daily on the Watt, probably barefoot, came across the stranded throng. Apparantly he has a name: Hinerk Ohm Hinz. I mean, what a cool name to have! I’d read the name Hinerk Ohm Hinz once before and thought it was perhaps just a unit of electricity or the name of an island off the coast of Vietnam. I was very much mistaken. So anyway, they begged him to help them as food on board was all out. So each day for three weeks, until the coming of the great wave, the Wattenläuper, aka Hinerk Ohn Hinz, would bring them what they needed to survive. Somehow they knew three weeks later that the wave was on its’ way so they said their goodbyes and, as a parting expression of gratitude, gave him the secret recipe to some liqueur that was highly popular among the hearties on board. He did the right thing. He brewed it, bottled it, drank it, drank some more and sold what was left. The resulting drink has since been brewed in large quantities, marketed and sold to all who drank it and loved it. Apparantly Hinerk Ohn Hinz was a forefather of the present distillery owners. Cool. 

I have to say we miss it. Whenever we visited north Germany we would load the car up with Wattenläuper. Luckily we never left the country with it. Heaven knows what they would have said at customs and excise. Sometimes good friends and family would get a bottle if they behaved themselves and what was left would last us a few years. We would only drink it on special occasions like Mondays to Sundays and bank holidays. It’s enjoyed like one would enjoy an ouzo which you would usually drink after a big meal. Unless of course you lived in Greece in which case you would drink an ouzo at breakfast time and simply fill the glass up again when it was empty. Like the Irish do with tea. 

So the line that a ‘wattenläuper calls to warm a dismal night’ is not encouraging a turning to the bottle, but rather refers to having a good friend who keeps you going until you are once again able to charter the fiscal turbulent waters of life that we all, day by day, have to navigate through. It’s a rocky life isn’t it? So we all need a Wattenläuper of some sort in life.

Fun fact #1. When I recorded the song my wife sent a copy of the CD up to the brewery that make the stuff. She thought they might enjoy the thought that their tipple had appeared in a song written by some huge megastar. Perhaps they would expect their sales to treble overnight and therefore might send us a free bottle! Sure enough we got a nice letter back from them along with said bottle and two Wattenläuper glasses like the one you see on the picture below left. So if ever you’re in northern Germany and you want to do me a good deed, get me a bottle of Wattenläuper. Oh, and get one for yourself. You won’t regret it. And I’ll give you a free CD or two. I’ll even sign it if you like. Don't forget to pronounce it right, "Eine (Eye-na) Flasche (Flasher) Wattenläuper (Vatten-loy-per) bitte (bitter)." Lovely jubbly.

Fun fact #2. I entered the song in the UK Songwriting Contest and it reached the semi- final in the Adult Contemporary section. There's the proof. (below right).