Many areas in our region are still unspoilt or have been successfully restored to their natural state. Of the ten ecologically healthiest regions in Germany, eight are in Lower Saxony. The capercaillie again performs its courtship display in the Harz Mountains; and salmon now feel at home again in our river Oste – so clean is the naturally cloudy river I can see through my study’s lattice windows.
You may know that you can get really sharp, coloured satellite photographs of Germany and its individual states. I once bought such a poster of Lower Saxony from my trusted bookseller in Hemmoor. By the way, since that time I sometimes feel I’m being watched – especially after hearing that American reconnaissance spacecraft can zoom in onto individual houses, even onto individual people. Can you see the medium-sized, medium-blond guy standing or sitting on the dike of the Oste near river-kilometre 94 at sunset? That’s me!
The river in front of me flows with leisurely flourishes towards the Elbe – like a Volga for beginners. And if you watch it flowing for long enough, you become pretty relaxed, even in hectic times. Some people even think of things that help them earn their living while sitting and thinking on the dike. There are lots of journalists, book writers and newspaper people roosting in our area, well spread out and mostly in thatched cottages.
They have moved to this area from Hamburg or even from Berlin, because they share a basic taste: they all love the uncluttered, broad horizon, the immense sky with the summer cumulus clouds, the dramatic sunsets on a clear winter day, the leisurely ebb and flow of the tides and the seasons. “Country” magazine once called the Lower Elbe region the “North German Media Landscape”, because of its many prominent and not-so-prominent immigrants.
The boss of the “Spiegel” news magazine, Stefan Aust, for example, runs his own horse-breeding stud near Lamstedt – preparing himself mentally for the next editors’ conference. At weekends, Klaus Liedke, editor-in-chief of the German “National Geographic”, races over his apple orchard near Grossenwörden on the seat of his lawnmower, while next door, Fee Zschocke, a contributor to the women’s magazine “Brigitte” for many years, has a magnificent barn owl under her roof. By the way, a stork once sat on the gable of my house for a whole night – and a few days later my daughter Eva was born.
