Gentle Rain, Issue 4

Gentle Rain is a magazine about Hamburg. It looks at co-existence in urban space, portrays people in the city and shows how they live and work. We also make excursions into the creative habitats, urban enclaves and nearby retreats in and around the metropolis that is our home.

In this issue:
In 2050, cars are just fossils, climate change stopped, the seas are garbage-free again and discrimination is over. We live in cities that are green and healthy, we live as we please, and yet in a peaceful community. The new issue of gentle rain is serious on utopias. We asked transport planners and architects from Hamburg, Frankfurt and Copenhagen how the end of the car could become an opportunity for the city. How do we tackle climate change with sustainable mobility – and thus create room for new things in public space? We meet people who advocate cycling and a life that produces as little garbage as possible. Surprise: As far as the subject of consumption is concerned, the hip “Zero Waste Café” and the centuries-old “Eisenhandel Schüllenbach” are not too different ideologically. For ideally, change means freedom rather than prohibition. Instead of comfort and joie de vivre, only a few old certainties fall off tracks: The toughest rap today quite well comes from a woman – musician Eunique simply chews machismo away. And who said that you cannot choose your family? For many people of the gender queer Voguing community, their “house” is not just a dance clique, but also a living communion.