'I don't know why I think this,' wrote my brother in an e mail the other day, 'but I have the impression that you are about to leave Berlin. Is that true
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Also, this time I want to move from the 'museum' area to the 'vital' area before it's too late. For instance, I lived for two years in Paris in Montmartre, but found that the area I really liked was the Vietnamese town in the 13th arrondissement. But I left Paris before getting it together to move there. My last Paris address was 13, Place du Tertre, a completely Disneyfied museum-like place atop the hill near Sacre Coeur. Isn't the Karl-Marx-Allee also a kind of museum? What the Place du Tertre is to the myth of Picasso, the Karl-Marx-Allee is to the myth of Stalin.
Re: japan chinaimomusOctober 24 2004, 12:16:45 UTC
Damn! I cannot believe that there's a chance you'll play in Beijing just after I've left the city. It seems I keep missing your shows around the world (Lisbon, Berlin, Edinburgh..). I have a funny feeling I've got to start booking my flights according to your schedule, Nick.
Kreuzberg/ParismckenzeeOctober 24 2004, 05:44:29 UTC
Yesterday I wandered though the Passage Brady in the 10e. Lots of little Indian groceries, restaurants and a surprising collection of very cheap barbershops.
A couple of days ago I found the tiny Japanese area in Paris and bought a huge daikon. There is something about the emigré neighborhoods in big cities. The culture is concentrated and distilled.
Before moving to France, I had lived in Oakland, California, on the border between Chinatown and the Arab quarter. My building was filled with Caucasian Muslims, mixed Asian families and Rastas. It had a rhythm.
I spent a month this summer living with a friend in Kreuzberg. the rest of Berlin was okay, I guess. and I could see some of the appeal of Friedrichsheim and Prenzlauerberg, but I think Kreuzberg is my current favorte place ever. I may have to move there, too.
it's not just what it is-- it's how it smells. and it's how cheaply you can get fresh tomatoes at the street market if you're willing to go in the late afternoon. and it's the eclectic approach to merchandise in the Turkish shops, and the sense at night that there aren't really parties per se, as in the rest of the city, because there's no real need to localize and stratify the nightlife...
Europe's demographic problems are probably irreversible, even if there were a major turnaround and more 'vital' nations like Turkey entered the EU, which is by no means certain to happen. There's also a cultural climate here in relation to work, which is basically, why bother? Let's do less. This has its good side: the defeat of the work ethic, an emphasis on cultural activities and quality of life, environmentalism. Sometimes I get frustrated with it, though
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Comments 32
(Sorry, just talking to myself, please ignore...)
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florian
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Rosa.
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A couple of days ago I found the tiny Japanese area in Paris and bought a huge daikon. There is something about the emigré neighborhoods in big cities. The culture is concentrated and distilled.
Before moving to France, I had lived in Oakland, California, on the border between Chinatown and the Arab quarter. My building was filled with Caucasian Muslims, mixed Asian families and Rastas. It had a rhythm.
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it's not just what it is-- it's how it smells. and it's how cheaply you can get fresh tomatoes at the street market if you're willing to go in the late afternoon. and it's the eclectic approach to merchandise in the Turkish shops, and the sense at night that there aren't really parties per se, as in the rest of the city, because there's no real need to localize and stratify the nightlife...
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Lotsa good info related to this topic can be found here:
http://www.worldchanging.com/
Cheers,
Neil
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http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/001376.html
Neil
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What a wonderful sentence. I would add (and I think you'd agree) that this observation goes for American cities as well...
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