berlin schnell

It's Wednesday morning-ish in Berlin. We're finding it hard to get early starts here because it is cold and grey (high 40's, low 50's on a good day - sun for about 10 minutes every 24 hours). but the city is cool enough and proving itself a worthwhile, if slightly underwhelming, stop.

here's a quick post before we head out for a day of art galleries. and then it's halloween night ... so who knows what german weirdness we'll get into ...



there are a lot of vw campers here. I don't know if it's a hipster/hippie/squatter self-fulfilling thing (they have always imagined living in berlin and having a vw camper van, so they seek them out and maintain them) or if there really were/are just a lot of them around. made me think of a children's tv show character. as in, this guy could be the "thomas the train engine" (or whatever he's called) of germany.


we took a city bus line that is well-known to run by tourist sites - it's cheap and lower-profile than getting on a "CITY TOURS - THIS IS A BUS FULL OF TOURISTS!"-type thing.


I made ann get out here and take pictures at this ... large gate/symbol of reunifi...blahblahblah


a church. I like to believe that all the dirt is from the war. makes it more romantic than "wow, pollution is crazy."


ann was impressed by these Ishtar Gates at the Berlin House of Stolen Antiquities - I mean, Pergamon Museum.


We went to an art party in the heart of the East. This is me trying to look East German. It was all very Soviet-feeling outside and very cool kids-feeling inside. Did I mention I bought a new hat? I'm trying my best to fit in ... with 80-year-old East German men. The height of fashion!


There's a lot of graffiti in Berlin. A lot. And most of it is this bad.


Jason - the Smart cars got even smaller! Here's Ann standing next to one so that you can gauge the scale. Note to those who don't know her: Ann is giant-sized.


The Germans can design-fetishize ANYTHING. Here, a window display of little Mead notebooks (the ones they sell at drugstores for 50 cents in America) and small metal binder clips. Yes, binder clips.


We went to a Turkish market on a canal near Kreuzberg. There's a big Turkish population here ("here" being Berlin). There's also a big white swan population here ("here" being in this photo).


Ann having a religious moment eating a spinach pie-sort-of-thing in naan-like turkish flatbread.



Me (in 60 years, apparently) eating a potato one. So good.


I enjoy playing a game I invented called "Hipster or Eastern European in the '80s?" More on this later. (This picture is of a hipster vintage store here.)


For my vegetarian friends: Captain Tofu's Ocean Fingers. Wanna lick the Cap'n's fingers?


Dinner last night. The bread here is hearty. The cheese is strong and crumbly. The salami ... well, let's just say I'm still getting used to eating meat.
-k