Say my name, say my name

Hello there,

lots of progress has been made since the last post, but before we get into the nitty and gritty of things, pretty before/after pictures and such, a little explanation about the name of the bus and blog first.

All house buses in New Zealand have names, some clever, most of them cheesy, so we started discussing a name for ours. This is like naming your child, so it’s not an endeavour lightheartedly taken. ‘The Road Home’ was featuring for a while, but somehow it didn’t feel personal enough.

Back when we were living in Hamburg, one day we were walking along the Landungsbrücken, when a street name sign jumped out at us, and a decision was made there and then: “Große Freiheit”. Reasonably cheesy, considering it’s one of the more touristy places in Hamburg, known as the street where The Beatles became famous. Reasonably obscure though if, just for fun, you try and google the name (and that ‘ß’ letter is definitely weird). Interestingly, mostly red light district references come up for that, and not pictures of open roads, rolling hills and wind in your hair. I love it though, as it connects back to the place I’m from and the city I often miss.

We deemed traveling around New Zealand with a big “Große Freiheit” in the front would feel weird though, so we tried translating it. After some soul searching I came up with the name “Liberty the Great”, which sounds much better than, say “Humongous Freedom” or even “Taking the liberty”, and is also giving a nod to the very gifted singer “Emmy the Great”, so that was settled.

“Liberty the Great” will hopefully see the light of day on the front of our bus in beautiful script soon. Hannah noticed some pretty sign writing in the area and we may be able to track that person down.

“Große Feiheit” will be stuck somewhere in the front there too, but smaller and inconspicuously placed. Oh, it will be groß!