Give or take the occasional World War, the Germans are a fairly laid-back bunch who like nothing more than to sit around all day sipping coffee with friends and loved ones once a week. Add to that a propensity for religious traditions and you’ve got yourself one hell of a problem if you want to go shopping anywhere in the country on a Sunday. If you do get caught out whilst in Hanover and need things like shoelaces or tampons then the Promenade im Hauptbahnhof that runs through the central train station is the only place in the city where you’ll have any luck. The shops here open at different hours, roughly between 09:00 and 22:00, and offer a choice of goods from health food to stationary to shoes to baby food to the aforementioned tampons.