February 2012
1 post
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Tumblr collaborations
It’s been a while since I have posted anything on this blog. I will get round it, particularly this week when I have a couple of deadlines looming and I’m being lulled by the sweet siren calls of procrastination. In the meantime I’ve been moonlighting for …Wins The Internet, a site cowritten with two far wittier friends. If anything you should check out their posts.
January 2012
2 posts
“Inspired” by Apple: Some limericks about SOPA →
inspiredbyapple:
There once was an bill called SOPA; which resulted in blackouts all over. Wikipedia went down*, making school kids frown in the US, Oz and Europa.
The bill’s meant to target “rogue sites” but it’s drafted so widely it might catch others which play by the rules so they may be closed in the dead of…
December 2011
1 post
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Hashtag Dystopia
Few things can make me as misanthropic as the recurrent popularity of doomsday druids. These days, it seems, slapping “dystopia” on anything automatically furnishes every old rant with deep social commentary and perennial fears towards ongoing technological progress masquerades as shocking incisive reflections. And the more apocalyptic their visions, the shallower they become. I call it...
November 2011
1 post
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Post-Rant
This uninformed rant was inspired by a recent visit to ‘Postmodernism: Style and Subversion 1970-1990’ at the V&A Museum. What follows is an attempt to articulate my misgivings about Postmodernism, understood by few and used by many, with a brief description of its predecessor Modernism, in the hope that a comparison between the two might sharpen the edges of blurry Postmodernism.
The more I...
September 2011
1 post
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It's Grim Up North
I finally got round to watching The Killing (or Fobrydelsen, to use the original title), which most English viewers will by now know actually translates to “the crime”. And for somebody so fond of Scandinavian crime as me, it was positively - cliché alert - criminal that I had yet to be acquainted with Sarah Lund’s splendid collection of knitwear. When it was originally screened back in Denmark I...
June 2011
2 posts
5 tags
Beards, Brows and Procrastination
Today was one of those muggy languid days that compels you to dramatically lower your standards to reap a sense of achievement, any achievement, at the end of it. Or dispose of standards altogether. In this way such mundane pedestrian activities such as cheese eating, wall staring or even hand-eye coordination will seem like a veritable tour de force.
Speaking of which, I was browsing GQ...
3 tags
My Imaginary Berlin
Berlin is now part of my imaginary landscape, joining Copenhagen, but not London, which once more becomes my home. And as much as I like Berlin, I must admit, that I occasionally prefer its imaginary, more malleable counterpart. An imaginary city is a thing of beauty, built on fragmented, diffused, sunny memories filtered through the prism of nostalgia. Like an old faded overexposed photograph....
April 2011
4 posts
And another book quote...
Once you decide to leave, you view a city through an entirely different lens. The simplest of actions, actions you have repeated one hundred, maybe a thousand, times swell in significance since each time may now be the last: the last time you buy bread at the bakery, the last time you ride on the U-Bahn Line 2, the last time you get your boots fixed at the cobbler, the last time you go to the...
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How to Speak and Write Postmodern
First, you need to remember that plainly expressed language is out of the question. It is too realist, modernist and obvious. Postmodern language requires that one uses play, parody and indeterminacy as critical techniques to point this out. Often this is quite a difficult requirement, so obscurity is a well-acknowledged substitute. For example, let’s imagine you want to say something...
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Desperately Seeking Berlin
Spring has finally arrived in Berlin and the city’s veritable army of urban bohemians and perpetually-broke Mac owners have colonised terraces and parks, all airing their totally unique and identically cropped leather jackets. Individualism never looked so uniform. These very public displays of mainstream disaffection occasionally make me wonder whether I am the only Mitte resident under 30 that...
The Romantics: Wagner, Techno and Additive-Free...
What do Wagner, techno and American Spirit tobacco have in common? Apart from the fact that they should all come with a health warning. Their continued popularity and appeal throughout the years flies in the face of logic, defies all explanation. It has been taunting my - admittedly scant - rational self for some time. Where is this famed Teutonic rationale? And why would it willingly subject...
March 2011
2 posts
3 tags
I Am Now Integrated
If I’m sounding a tad more Teutonic today it’s because I recently - and rather unsuspectingly - took part in an integration ceremony. I have now an urge to barbecue nine months of the year and buy jars of Nutella large enough to hold all my written correspondence with German bureaucracy. Other side effects include worsening of pre-existing syntactic complications, also commonly known as the...
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Always the Exophone, Never the Ex-phoney
I’m writing you this letter to tell you I’m on my way
I’m coming home
And nothing, nothing, nothing can’t get in my way
Babe, I’ve changed…
– Goldhawk Road, Tina Dico
Some time ago I was labelled fat-skinny by Grazia, a rigorous publication with impeccable scientific credentials, and a respected authority on nutrition and €4,000 must-have ostrich bags. Now, I would never normally...
February 2011
3 posts
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I Think, Therefore I Am (German)
In a day and age when professional alarmists fret about the dumbing down of humankind - because all medieval peasants were avid readers of the Literary Review - it is reassuring to know that thinking is positively thriving in at least one country. Germany is rather fond of pondering, dissecting, mulling, musing, ruminating and other mental gymnastics. Germany has been the main exporter of dry...
Latest report from Google Analytics: To the person who stumbled across my blog after entering “annoying answers” - Today is your lucky day! To the one who typed “goat cheese incontinence” - Please keep searching.
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German Dentistry and the Rant-Free Live
Søren Kirkegaard, Danish philosopher and all-round cravat aficionado, once claimed that a bad conscience can make life more interesting. Which is why I avoid New Year’s Resolutions like I should have avoided that last Jägermeister shot. And yet I have recently been troubled by this - universally shared - tendency to furiously pound on my keyboard only when my sarcasm levels are reaching critical...
December 2010
2 posts
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Berlin's Monokulti
If you live in Berlin or were even planning to, you’ll be aware that the city is a veritable melting pot of cultures, a modern day Alexandria. Or so you keep hearing. Kotbusser Tor is a delta into which many a meandering and permanently plastered Erasmus student has converged. It is not the Nile, but they’re certainly in denial. You see, Kreuzberg is multikulti, if your idea of a transcultural...
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Berlin Related Books
In my blog I often poke fun at my current host city, which I would also do if I were still back in London, but, to Berliner’s misfortune, I started my public whining career in the Prussian capital. If you’ve occasionally laughed or curled your toes with embarrassing self-awareness at my gripes and complaints, I recommend you the book “Ich werde ein Berliner” by Wash Echte, the anonymous author...
October 2010
7 posts
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A Year Onwards
I am the passenger and I ride and I ride I ride through the city’s backsides I see the stars come out of the sky Yeah, the bright and hollow sky You know it looks so good tonight
So today I woke up nursing a hangover - not that this is unusual for a Sunday - and realised that on this date, a year ago, I arrived in Berlin. That’s all I’m able to muster really, because...
4 tags
Containing Gentrification Banksy Style
So, apparently this anti-gentrification movement called Hedonism International is sending its members to view flats in Berlin’s most sought-after areas posing as would-be tenants. Once there, they strip off and prance around with only a Mickey Mouse mask to cover their identities, and with slogans such as “too expensive” or “rip off” painted on their birthday...
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You know you’re in Prenzlauer Berg/Mitte…
When a loud bespectacled American enters the joint where you’re having lunch and asks very loudly whether they still have Pitfall, orders a Bionade (they don’t sell Club-Mate) and loudly proceeds to play it while you’re trying to eat your puerco especial. Retro games, you say? Wow! Edgy! Wasn’t wearing an Atari vintage t-shirt. Loser.
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Defending the Germans
It is no coincidence - and a testament to the political importance of history in Germany- that both former West German chancellor Helmut Kohl and former East German boss Walter Ulbricht were self-appointed historians by profession.
Time Out Berlin Guide 2009 Edition
I’ve lived in Germany for almost a year now and this is only the second post in which I use the N-word, or Nazis as they call...
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One of my favourite quotes...
“Sylvia Plath - interesting poetess whose tragic suicide was misinterpreted as romantic by the college girl mentality.” Woody Allen in Annie Hall (1977)
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Ye Olde Amsterdam: The Capital of Daltonism
Fair burghers of Berlin! Harken to this humble harbinger! When people say that Berlin reminds them of NYC during the 80s, it might not *necessarily* be meant as a compliment. Well, I got your attention now, but don’t shoot the messenger and all that jazz. Anyway, I’m back in the Prussian capital after spending a few days swishing through the Schengen area - no passports, only euros -...
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The Berlin Integration Test!
So next month I’m doing this so-called “Orientierungskurs” as part of my language course. For those not plugged into the matrix that is the Volkshochschule (like any other institution, the Volkshochschule heavily favours green for all decorative purposes), an Orientierungskurs provides students with a grounding in German history and politics. The participants do not only become “oriented” but...
September 2010
2 posts
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On Compounds
Some German words are so long that they have a perspective […] These things are not words, they are alphabetical processions. And they are not rare; one can open a German newspaper at any time and see them marching majestically across the page, - and if he has any imagination he can see the banners and hear the music too. They impart a martial thrill to the meekest subject. I take a...
One my favourite corners...
Copenhagen’s Botanical Garden in Autumn
One of the greenhouses
An LSD plant. Apparently
The only residents who can afford to live round this neck of the woods!
August 2010
8 posts
2 tags
Birthday in Berlin
Last week I turned 29, and thanks to the modern wonder that is Facebook’s Birthdays app, a few people wanted to know if I had any grand designs for marking my losing battle against entropy. I didn’t. There’s a worrying lack of grand designs in my life that I compensate for with last minute planning, and if this fails, with generous amounts of alcohol. I have also been known to combine...
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Why Feminism is still relevant and Germaine Greer...
All political movements are like this — we are in the right, everyone else is in the wrong. The people on our own side who disagree with us are heretics, and they start becoming enemies. With it comes an absolute conviction of your own moral superiority. There’s oversimplification in everything, and a terror of flexibility.
Doris Lessing
Sometime ago I came across an article that...
3 tags
Teufelsberg: A Metaphor for Something
Last Tuesday we went to Teufelsberg, which means Devil’s Mountain, located in the district of Wilmersdorf, north of the Grunewald forest. Teufelsberg is not only a hill, but also a giant metaphor, although like many other Berlin landmarks, it’s not clear what it is meant to illustrate. The 80 metre high hill, found in the former British sector, towers over its flat Brandenburg surroundings. It’s...
I picked out the most annoying answers...
I am Charlotte Roche Take Ich werde ein Berliner today! Created with Rum and Monkey’s Personality Test Generator.
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The Rant about "los Progres"
[…]It is Spain’s idiosyncrasies which make it such a fascinating place, both to study and visit. Much the same could be said of Britain, France, Germany and Italy. Each, thankfully, has its own identity. And what the Spanish, in their enthusiasm for ‘Europe’, perhaps overlook is that to be true to themselves they may need to be different from others. For me at least, the new Spain will have...
Die kleine Raupe Nimmersatt
He’s a hungry hungry caterpillar!
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A Homage to S-Bahn Man
Yesterday I was on my way to Teufelsberg, yet another of Berlin’s Cold War relics I hope I’ll have time to post on soon. Anyway, I was following the same route as the narrator from the Book of Clouds, except that she gets off at Savignyplatz, and I was reminded of the following passage:
“As for the S-Bahn, it too was a wondrous thing, especially its elevated routes, and during each ride I’d...
3 tags
Another quote...
There are moments in Berlin night life when it would be nice be a native English speaker, just to be able to appreciate all the nuances. Like when a Swede and a Spaniard who have just met in Watergate and shared a taxi to Alexanderplatz talk about how great they think Berlin is: ‘I fucking love this city.’ Or shortly afterwards in the lift when a Dutch guy who lives in London gets talking to a...
July 2010
9 posts
3 tags
A Living Fossil
This is a South American Lungfish. To the untrained eye it might resemble an eel, but make no mistake, you’re looking at a living fossil. These guys have been around since the dinosaurs. Lungfish - named after the lungs that enable them to breathe air - might not have built great civilisations or lead interesting social lives, but they have successfully been failing to do this for the last...
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The Natural History Museum/ Das Museum für...
Today I finally managed to make it to the Natural History Museum. It has been too hot until now, and the building, like many others in Berlin, has no air conditioning. It was already quite toasty inside, and I did not want to wander into the “Evolution in Action” room to encounter a sign reading “You’re not it. All the successfully evolving Berliners are at the...
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Why is Berlin special?
Why is Berlin special? Certainly not for its beauty or its state of preservation. Berlin is fascinating rather, as a city of bold gestures and startling incongruities, of ferment and destruction. It is a city whose buildings, ruins, and voids groan under the burden of painful memories […] The concentration of troubling memories, physical destruction, and renewal has made Berliners, however...
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If the historical form of the city is to provide the standard, which of the many Berlin pasts is meant? Baroque or classical Berlin, Berlin from the time of unification or the chaotic Twenties, to say nothing of the insane building plans of the Nazi years?
Peter Schneider
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A Break from Berlin
As much as I have come to like my current host city, I need a break. Dr Johnson once famously - and a tad optimistically - claimed that if a man is tired of London, he’s tired of life. I’m tired of graffiti, which means I must be tired of Berlin. Actually I’m tired of people taking pictures of graffiti as if they were spontaneous acts of anarchy, and not a compulsory element of the urban...
4 tags
Counterculture
The fight for freedom is always easier than the practice of freedom
- Matjia Beckovic
A couple of days ago I was sitting in one of the city’s countless alternative cafes trying to cool myself down with copious amounts of chilled alcohol. The establishment, opposite a sushi bar and an overpriced organic supermarket, was run as a collective and prided itself on its left-leaning credentials....
6 tags
Firemen and Hot Weather Berlin Style
Sunday saw temperatures rising to 37º (close to 100 Fahrenheit). Those of us who hadn’t escaped to the lakes had no other option but to seek refuge in the shade, lay on our backs and gasp like an asthmatic pug. Even my deodorant, it seems, had left for cooler climes. We were walking back from Frühstück, hopping from shade to shade like a couple of sweaty ninjas, when we noticed a sudden shower...
6 tags
You know you’re in Prenzlauer Berg/Mitte…
When you spot a guy with the ubiquitous plastic rimmed frames and a t-shirt that proudly reads “Helvetica Neue”. Damn right, because Helvetica is for plebs, right? That is for people who still have an iPhone 3GS. Now, if you were really clever you would’ve had it printed in Arial. Bet you didn’t think of that! Except you probably wouldn’t have been able to tell them apart. I assume...
7 tags
The Lakes
In winter I get up at night And dress by yellow candle-light. In summer quite the other way I have to go to bed by day.
~Robert Louis Stevenson
Summer is finally here and Berliners celebrate this highly anticipated arrival by going to the lakes, where they commune with nature as only an urbanite can. Surrounded by other fellow seekers of the bucolic, beer in hand, they will once more reach...
June 2010
8 posts
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“I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I...”
– Douglas Adams (via theshalom)
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My least favourite German compound
Normally I love German’s ability to coin new words by sticking existing words together like Lego, but today I came across a rather cynical recent(ish) compound: Lebensabschnittspartner. Let me break it down for you. It consists of “Leben” (life) + “Abschnitt” (episode/period) + “Partner”. Given current divorce rates, I can understand the cynicism, and yet. Would you really like to be a...
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Quite Interesting: QI and The English Psyche
There is much pleasure to be gained from useless knowledge - Bertrand Russell
This original focus of this blog was going to be my experiences as a clueless yet endearing Ausländer as I bumbled my way through the German Hauptstadt. Yet my attention span has been known to resemble that of a CSI director, and I have occasionally been distracted by Scandinavian Gothic, coffee nomenclature and Frida...
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“Ironically, it was I, and not my German roommates, who suffered from that famous...”
– Amelia Atlas in n+1’s Berlin Trilogy, a worth-reading review of three books set in (and, more or less, about) the city. I’m definitely keen to read Book of Clouds, and I wish I could read enough German to make sense of Treffen sich zwei. (via blech)
9 tags
The Proto-Madonna
Sunday found me feeling more misanthropic than a tobacco lobbyist, my faith in humanity deflating faster than an overcooked soufflé, a really angry soufflé sputtering bits of cheese in sheer psychopathic rage. I had gone to Martin Gropious Bau to revisit the Olafur Eliason exhibtion - which deserves its own blog entry - only to be confronted with a long queue patiently waiting to get into the...