Berlin: The Plenty and the Good

After the jump: Berlin remains a great city, and I am glad I got to stay in it, hooray for Berlin!

Silhouette in the sky on a long walk to my flat from Museuminsel. Art being everywhere? That is a neat thing about Berlin!

As I said in my last post, the good times in Berlin were far greater than the frustrations, and even as I ground my teeth and kicked like a frustrated man-child (…ladies!) I kept telling friends “But the city is still great, it’s my own stuff that’s the problem.” What did I love? Let’s do a rundown!

1. All those glorious routines. Berlin’s long history, the pattern of rebuilding after WWII, and the occupation of East Berlin left the city without any real “center,” albeit there are some Platzen that are more hub-like than others. But the great outgrowth of this history is the kiez system. Essentially a sub-neighborhood, the kiez may be as small as a couple of blocks, but basically it comprises an area where everything you need is right there: grocery, bakery, a few miscellaneous shops, a park (more on that later), cafes, bars. It both allows for superb local routines and a sense of community that develops quickly. The ladies at the corner bakery got to know me early on, enough to know that when I showed up I was going to order a different kind of bread and a new sweet pastry every time… along with a spritzkuche, cos I’m not an idiot.

Not my kiez, but this li'l mini-truck made me extremely happy even before I found out that a pupper was lurking behind it and wanted to say hello before I could go on my way! Aw pups.

2. Green space! Something I didn’t realize until I moved to Jamaica Plain (though I noticed it somewhat last summer) is how much access to day-to-day green space matters to me, trees in particular. And Berlin is gloriously strewn with shady trees, lining its streets as well as its many parks. My host told me it is in fact the greenest city in Europe, enough so that every resident has the equivalent of his (spacious) studio apartment in green space.

Lots of park photos to choose from, between the airfield-turned-park to bunkers and radio towers now become green spaces, but I'll go with this shot from my neighborhood park, just a hop away from its fairy tale fountain, and one of many sites with summer dance classes going. Cities! Green spaces! Magic! Buttons!

3. Culture! As with last year, I arrived at the tail end of the theatre season, and so really only got out to see the Deutschestheater’s Ubu. But unlike last year, I decided to try on the museums for size, thanks to the Staatlichesmuseen Jahreskart, an annual membership to over a dozen state museums around the city. As a student, at €25, this is a great deal, not just in terms of price-per-museum, but in changing your relationship to the museums in question. It was fantastic, halfway through a visit to the Hamburger Bahnhof (the modern art museum, with a great collection of Warhols, Rauschenbergs and Lichtensteins) that I was worn out, and could just loop back another afternoon when I felt fresher. Since it’s the rare museum that can get you through their whole collection without total exhaustion (shout out to Louisiana!) this is a godsend.

Rauschenberg is one of those artists who appeals to me on a pre-literate level, and probably I'll never fully disconnect his work from the context in which I first encountered it. But it was fantastic to encounter his work here (Pompidou in Paris also has some great pieces) with a surprisingly relaxed-for-Germany policy around photography.

 4. A PAL. My last full day in the city, my host Brian got back from his summer directing gig, and we spent an afternoon snacking and wandering around the city. Brian’s a tour guide when he’s not directing, and getting an evening sneaking behind the scenes and checking out spots I would never have found on my own was magical… but the real treat was getting to chat at length with a pal about just about everything under the sun. The big takeaway from this summer has been what a social creature I am, something I don’t always remember to tend to, but this day was far and away the best of the month.

Abandoned dance hall from the 1920s now made into a spectacularly atmospheric candle-lit restaurant? This is not bad! If anything it's good!

It wasn’t the wall-to-wall excitement of last summer’s trip – the dissertation focus, persistent rain and logistical headaches ensured that – but I am still grateful for the time. And as Brian suggested during our ambling, a postdoc could give me another chance to dig my teeth in. I’d take a flier on that, cap.