The second day of protests broke out, Friday, on which I walked over 50 km.
Friday
Morning - Block G20 - A good idea with a fast end
Friday morning there were different meeting places for different actions. An alliance had called for the port to be blocked, and another to block the city of Hamburg. There were peaceful colorful protestors. At the meeting point we went to, many people came. It was planned to block the city. But after a few meters, we were stopped. Surprise, the robocops are back. Directly, they separated the protestors. Before we were well over 1000 people, now only 50. We could not make much more, we were afraid of attacks by the police.
After a few hours we met other colorful groups, including musicians. Together, a seat blockade should take place at a large crossroads. But then the usual game. As soon as the demonstrators were at the crossroads, the water cannons and truncheons came and threatened with escalation if the crossroads were not cleared immediately. So all failed the crossroads, the repression was too strong.
During this morning, thousands of people were on the road in small groups. But what was the focus on the media? On a small group of mummies, who lit nearly all cars in a street. Compared to the thousands of peaceful people who were on the road, the few guys playing with fire were really a minority. Small car lighting is, of course, a very questionable action. But the psychological effect was strong. The whole sky over Hamburg was wrapped in black smoke clouds. What must the presidents have thought of, which at this time were just going to the conference? I think the symbolic sign was clear: no one here has a buck on you and your outdated, authoritarian policy. Even if the method is more than to questionable, as I said. But also the thousands of peaceful people who were on the road had a small success, they were able to delay the course of the conference. Trump, for example, came too late because of all the people on the streets.
Noon - Lies by the police and increased press censorship
The noon went astonishingly quiet. It was time at the Internet to look at what the outside world actually reported. On Twitter suddenly appeared photos of transport armies of the Bundeswehr in Hamburg. Basically, national defense missions inside are indeed not legal. On request the police said , that would be a coincidence and had nothing to do with G20. Twenty minutes later, however, Spiegel Online reported that the Bundeswehr had confirmed to them that they were supporting the use of police. The police is lying. Well, nothing is new. In addition, more and more statements were published by journalists who were deprived of their accreditation without justification. Of course these were the critical journalists. There was also a growing number of journalists whose freedom of the press was threatened by the police.
Afternoon - Block G20 2.0 - New violence escalation
At 3 pm, a new protest should be launched. This time in the direction of Elbphilharmonie - the place where the presidents should spend the evening. Everyone waited an hour and the protest did not go. The police had their problems again and delayed everything. After an hour or so, the protest started moving by itself. Of course this ended in direct attacks by the police, the protest was against their will. So the now well-known pictures played again. At a point where the spontaneous protest reached the fish market, it was attacked with water cannons. They sprayed a mixture of water and tear gas. Many people fled and had to flee over a wall again. The water canon was also spraying on the fleeing demonstrators, so there were 11 seriously injured all at once, as the demonstrators were injected from the wall. The whole protest, like the previous day, broke up in the area of the fish market and the demonstrators went to the Schanzenviertel.
Evening - Autonomous area in the Schanzenviertel
Let's do a quick check. Peaceful demonstrators have been attacked countless times by the police. The police lied. The press was increasingly censored. The focus of the still active press lay on a minority of violent demonstrators. The atmosphere was really turned into pure hatred. Thus, some mocked barricades began to be built. The first ones were made of building fences, then later burning. Barricades, defended with stones and bottles, burned in almost all accesses to the Schanzenviertel. But what did it look like in the Schanzenviertel itself? The press wrote of civil war. But a walk through the Schanzenviertel gave a completely different picture. There was no more police standing on the other side of the barricades. People suddenly smiled again. Many sat in the streets and made music. The restaurants and pubs were open and crowded. Even children were on the road. The mood outside the barricades was really cool.
But at nightfall came various looting. Two of them I could see in part. The people who plundered there were for the most part quite different from those of the protests. Especially puberty youths who saw the opportunity to get a lot for nothing.
Then the information was gathered that armed special units of the police would soon arrive with machine guns. We had enough and left. Later, we learned from journalists who were threatened with weapons by the police during the eviction, or even got attacked.
This is a Gif I made at the protests