Goodbye to Berlin
Der Neue Jugend von Deutschland sind so schön, es ist schwer für mich über diese Schrift zu konzentrieren...
But I will, for ich habe so viel thingies to impartay, many relating to aforementioned schön-ness.
Sonntag - muchly uneventful smoothum journey - thanking Stelios really and his chin as anything udder may haff bin toughle-ruffle on Patriq. Our travelling companion was not nine years old, he was the child of a nu-mohawk. He became known as Hedgehog. When in German passport control, we saw in him the brief consideration of pushing in, and thought "Hedgehog, no. Come on, don't let us down. We need an idealised stranger, help us out here." As if
INERT GASSES OF THOUGHT had wofted into his brain from our collective imaginings, he obeyed us and stepped back in line! Or maybe twas the brickjawed immovability of passport checker lady. More stereotypically stern Teutonic femininity awaited us at ze airport S Bahn - me and a fat short back and sides greasy centre parting Lesben eventually come to a ticket/platform/departure time understanding despite our limited grasps of each others'....
languages.
Little mehr to tell on dis day udder dan when already being seen to by another waitress in restaurant, hovering one approaches and responds with "WHAT?" when tell her we are ok. There was also one of those boys hatched from a Kinder egg on the train.
Montag - a day in mein fave district of Berlin, Prenzlauer (Prenz'l) Berg. It is not even the slightest bit like Chorlton, Fallowfield and the Northern Quarter rolled into one, but if a Nazi put a Luger to your head and ordered you to give a Mancunian equivalent, that's what you'd describe it as. Loadsa apartments with flowery balconies in tall 19th century (?) buildings with grand facades, cafes, bars,cafe-bars, record shops, clothes shops and a schwul scene so 'integrated' the only hint we got war ein hugely tall drag-queen-punk-fetish type man with a tiny dog on a lead which had been strategically shaved and dyed peach.
Lots of youngies here and also rich 20s-30s liberally types, but what can ya do. The odd anarchist too for a bit of MSG-gasp flavour. Most were from Past Times (like if anarchists opened a shop of the same name as that Middle England Nostalgia one in St Ann's Square) but one at the U Bahn station later in the week was bizarrely hot excluding his haircut. Jingled roond many U and S Bahn stations komm to think - mit money collection.
For the Cause or fallen on Hard Times (doo doo doo-doo DOOOO...)
Hier was where I bought a winter coat which rendered me budget-conscious for the resta the week, indeed i came back with mebbe 3 Euros to mein Name. Still, did not prevent cafe-scoffage on regular basis as planned. Hier also a super record shop mit friendly owner who delightment at our Mancunian roots - he a Joy Division and early Fall fan. Apparently The Fall haff a cult following in Berlin, which endears both them and the city to me even more.
Wir machen use of the scorchio weather which is to continue throughout week to lounge in a Prenzl'berg park, yielding triple-nipple remarkabilities of Communist observatory orb, hilarious skinny old man in a thong, and hulking topless blonde muscle bois in front of our bench while slim cute topless boy gets straddled by his girlf behind. Also here, (Rob's words) a Giant Stalinist Brass Head, oder Socialist Realist sculpture.
having never been to Netto in Britain i canny vouch fer wharrit's it like hier, but in Deutschland es ist wunderbar! Plenty of good quality yum for not very many pennies...Had to snaffle in room though, silent hostility of backpackers in communal kitchen implied multitude of unspoken unknown rulebreaking.
Dienstag - Kaffe und Kuchen in the park near the Berliner Dom give way to watching sweet young skinny workboy driving a JCB along the riverbank, give way to the collection of Roman market gates, Babylonian forts and Greek temples and statues being rivalled if not exceeded in awe-inspiration and beauty by our fellow boy-company in there. Poss highest concentration of holiday apart fae Prenzlberg and Alexanderplatz.
"In Berlin, by the Wall..." #1 --------> we found the bits near our hostel and a huge Rusty Metal railway bridge which had obv been disconnected when the wall was put up, something which puts the severity of the act into immediate perspective. On one side tho we saw new track and a train whizzed past just as we noticed.
Want delish affordable Middle Eastern food in Berlin? Fanou's, Brunnenstrasse
Then Bar-failure turned up book-success, sort of. Two had vanished, only existing in guidebook potentia, whilst we interrupted a spoken-word at another. On way home we stumble across anarchist bookshop on Invalidenstrasse.
Mittwoch - Osterdeutsch day. U Bahn nach Friedrichschain, a grimly attractive former Communist industrial area with amazing bridge-views now getting cafe-bar nightlifed up. Walked along the Karl Marx Allee, what the American guide book sneeringly referred to as 'Communism's answer to the Champs d'Elysses'. Yes, yes, whatever.
In Berlin, by the Wall #2 East Side Gallery ist longest stretch of Wall left up, along river tae prevent awkwardness. Given over to artists and also covered in more spontaneous graffiti art. Plenty of solemn poems, Pink Floyd lyrics and Ghandi quotes jostled for position against more irreverent and far funnier stuff such as 'Fuck off Nazi' and 'italian slut' followed by a phone number. Now, in the Volkspark am Friedrichschain, (gay cruising area and family park all in one) we see naked middle aged sunbather man letting his wares hang out. Eeh, it teks all the mystery away.
Imagine if ye can (zis is prob impossible unless ye saw him) david beckham if he was attractive, slim, dark, German and a bit camp and working as a waiter in a cafe in a park in Berlin. Awww.
Our Osterdeutsch experience (like the Jimi Hendrix Experience only greyer and funnier) continue on train to gigantic Treptower Park in search of the Soviet Memorial made from Hitler's chancellory marble to commemorate the dead Red Army liberators who are buried round it
.......fat squat miserable looking woman in denim and mullet, whoop<<<<
Failed to locate, later spotted in different place, higher place - top of Communist TV Tower, oder Orb on a 398metre Spike. Breathtaking.
Pizzawatch - when scarfing special offer Italian fare on Deansgateish-trendy street in centre, constant parade of cutes.
Donnerstag - U-bahn nach Nollendorf-platz we see STUNNER - tan buff long lashed intense eyed mohawk. This is our Western day and we begin it in right theme by walking past English expat-aristocrat-writer Isherwood's old lodgings in Schoneberg. He would've appreciated our u bahn spot. In fact he would have slept with him. Next we go to an opulent cafe done out in Viennese coffee house style, all gold curly stuff, mirrors and red leather banquettes. Substitute Enlightenment chit chat for the fat stomachs of the landed middle class/corpulent German businessmen reading what looked like a Telegraph-type paper in a sunny courtyard. A decadently good breakfast consisting of smoked ham and turkey, emmental, herby cream cheese, pate, brie, grapes, jam/butter and a variety of warm fresh bread rolls. This was accompanied by the best cappuccino i have ever had, literally. It erased the age-old divide between the wonderful smell of coffee and the taste always being disappointing. All for no more than the cost of a fry up and a drink in Trof, though the staff are nowhere near as pretty. In fact the waiter had a silent tantrum when we didn't tip him - he must grown greedy on a diet of them from the usual clientele, like a Jabba and Salacious Crumb type relationship.
Schoneberg is traditional-gay Berlin, and its shops mirror this in that they seem to consist of antiques, ex armywear and fetish stuff....
Continuing Western theme, we head up through the government district past Christian Democrat HQ mit election-day countdown and gigantic poster of their grotesque leader Angela Merkel (think German Thatcher). It's as horrifying as it sounds, and she stands a good chance of getting in with a motley bunch of Bavarian conservatives and pathetic liberals. If ever British liberals think they're different to the Right, they should look at coalition politics on the continent.
The Polizei make way for a huge motorcade with maximum beeping, possibly allowing us to say we saw Schroder.
Onward to Tiergarten, Berlin's Central Park and home of two gorgeous gayboys kissing in sunlight, being put off by yet another naked middle aged man. I have a wee in the bushes and hope i am not approached.
Then Reichstag, home of first unified Germany, Weimar politicians and a fire caused by the Nazis and blamed on the Left so as to gain dictatorial powers. It's once again seat of government after reunification and has got a big postmodern glass dome stuck on the top now which, though it's fun to go up, is unbearable in glaring sunrays and whose view can only be a disappointment after the TV Tower. Two nice metrosexual German jocks though. A little maus scampers through the park nearby.
Defeated by fate; by this point exhaustion - desperato findus the New National gallery with dada surrealism etc take AGESSSSSSS to locate then CLOSEDDDDDDDDDDD!!!!
Rewarded by fate; adorable BMX bois outside it in courtyard doing their stuff, two pretty vested bois with the most perfectly muscled torsos imaginable appear, one takes a run up and does mid air somersault off a wall, landing perfectly while other looks on.
We about to drag selves zu haus, on way thru business district we spot a Dunkin' Donuts, that contemporary literary metaphor for Western consumerism which ironically hasn't taken hold in Britain. Look at each other, unthinkingly realise that what we need to cure our malaise is to eat pink-tasting donuts and drink a huge paper cup of instant cwoffee enriched with liberal slugs of milk and refined sugar for EXACTLY the same price as it would've cost to get into New National Gallery! Except we were undercharged by the greatest perfection of this moment - our host Matthias. I love Matthias. A great big nervous gentle German hunk who you can imagine being hugged by his grandma.
tae finish wid a flourish, we return to Prenzl'berg reawakened with 3.5 boy/coffee energy and settle into loafing to a soundtrack of very good german electronica at bar Wohnzimmer, painted gold, lit dimly and furnished mit type of furniture you'd expect in French palaces.
Freitag - Kreuzberg 61, pancakes and ever present wasps. Not very exciting, u bahned wrong way but rewarded by cute Turkish gayboys who were doing the unthinkable and wearing white trousers well. Kreuzberg 36 - home of turkish Berlin and the last remnants of 1980s anarchist squatters and their assorted bars. It's trumped up as a place to go, but as manc equiv, imagine Rusholme if it actually was in any way threatening like snobs and paranoid middle class people make it out to be. The atmosphere was all wrong, felt like was trespassing in a class tourist type way. Got out quick.
Next stop Jewish Museum - the Holocaust bit in the permanent exhibit was nothing like as harrowing compared with the temporary one. About the firm who built the ovens for the SS to use in Buchenwald and Auschwitz, it rammed home the banality of evil message excellently. When read testimonies from people who'd hidden them to be found in years to come, knowing that they would die horribly - took a while to get composure back.
Permanent exhib was more a gigantic diluted history of Jews in Europe/Germany right from ancient times to present day. It included a circumcision bench/tools and a portrait of the founder of modern fish sciences.
Prenzl'berg beckoned, and delivered more cheap delish Middle Eastern food from a different cafe. Our table gave a view of the Kulturbraueri that all of young and beautiful Berlin were gradually gravitating toward. On view of bass drum being carried in, realised twas gig, tho didnt work out who. Pooed in shelf toilet in a joint i didnt buy anything in, my first (hopefully only) experience of doing so. When i first entered the cubicle there was a layer of brown water on the shelf bit from the previous occupant. i would have turned on my heel had i not been so desperate. On way to Wohnzimmer we see two fat american men with their trousers belted round their tits, talking in as loud a voice as they can manage. Stereotypes, sigh. White Russians and Tequila Sunrises, mmm.
At some point today, a group of schoolchildren were herded onto u bahn and counted in twos by their teachers in exactly the same way as you see here. as it set off, they all screeched like mark e smith at the same instant, prompting me, patriq and the lady opposite to suppress hysteria.
Samstag - breakfast in Strandbad Mitte, a beach themed liberally hangout whose interpretation of an English breakfast included amongst other things olives and grapefruit - amusing yet tasty. Patriq develops crush on the waiter, i appreciate but save mine for the strapping 3.5 red t shirt boy at the fleamarket opposite the Pergamon. He diligently flicks through obscure old books, photos and postcards, carefully selecting what takes his fancy and smiling heartmeltingly as he pays the old lady. Later he meets up with friends in a music shop on Friedrichstrasse, aww.
Finally 'did' the touristy Unter den Linden, spotting a wiry studious cute boy that we'd seen in jewish museum day before. Another long-overdue - we went to the actual Alexanderplatz as every time we've u bahned past there's been a monopoly of beauties. The square didn't disappoint and i'll let patriq detail it more fully as he's so understandably hung up on it.
On the U bahn we encountered the only London Underground-type crush of the holiday, but we were surrounded by boys who were humourously and surreptitiously inspecting each others' trainers.
Last evening in Prenzl'berg doesn't disappoint.
Sonntag #2 - our last day we have the Platonic form of the breakfasts we have become used to - they're big on all you can eat sunday brunch buffets. Unarguably good. Sadly we canny linger as airport check in beckons. Missed opp on u bahn to ask a pretty boy "Spielst du deine Gitarre in eine Band?"
Memories of bustling airport check in process include a sweaty farty smell in the air, which i think is the definitive aroma of faint panic and disgruntlement. Once through the trauma and into the departure lounge, we sit next to Simon-Stubbs-if-he-was-German - it makes it all ok. Until........
He gets on same bus from airport as us and strikes up spontaneous lively conversation with another German boy. So he would have responded if we'd only...! Suddenly the sentiment of Virgin Eleousa rises as a lump in my throat and I curse the British educational establishment for its failure to start teaching me other languages earlier as is done by schools on the continent. Once again pragmatism ('but everyone else speaks English') conceals the real ideological reason (arrogance and imperialism) which caused the situation in the first place.
So not ende on bad note, I affirm Berlin as a centre of coolness, culture, fantastic atmosphere and on al evel with Manchester in the beautiful boy stakes. Might go and check Easyjet for more flights...