What I've been up to lately...

It's been a long time since I've written, because my class came to an end on Thursday, and before that I was busy with... something? The past few days have been a bit of a blur. Wednesday we had a class pizza party at Die Zwölf Apostel, a restaurant underneath the S-Bahn Bogen right by the Pergammon Museum. On Friday I went to the Berlinische Gallerie to see the John Heartfield exhibit finally... it was really cool, but the rest of the museum was a bit of a letdown. Then that evening Yukako and I went all the way to Potsdam to see a silent film from 1919 called "Unheimliche Geschichten". We got a bit lost trying to get there, ended up walking through a garden colony, seeing a wedding reception, and walking through the woods, but we finally arrived, and even on time. Then on Saturday I saw a photography exhibit of all of the photos the German stock exchange has purchased over the past 10 years, which was really cool. Then I got a text message from Lilo, so I went to her apartment for coffee, which turned into dinner at a cute Italian restaurant on Kollwitzplatz. And on Sunday Yukako and I went to the Tierpark, which is the former East Berlin zoo (not to be confused with Zoologischer Garten, which has Knut the polar bear). It had the cutest baby animals!!! Almost every third animal had babies born this spring, and we basically fell in love with all of the baby wildcats. Then this morning I had breakfast with Lilo, because she was leaving for Zingst today, and I won't get to see her again before I leave. Ok, I should head out, because this place is about to close!

Fete de la Musique

The communist apartments at Frankfurter Tor, close to the used book store I went to Sunday morning before...
...meeting Yukako for Curry Wurst at Konnopke's Imbiss, the most famous Curry Wurst in all of Berlin.  It was good, but really, it was just a hot dog covered in ketchup--I had heard it was spicy, but it was really just a bratwurst with a dusting of completely non-spicy curry powder.  Oh well, can't go wrong with a hot dog
After that we went to the Kultur Brauerei, which was having a Mode Markt, or a fashion market.  We saw some really eccentric hats--things you'd need to pin into your hair to have them stay on--strange clothing, and some cute, but expensive accessories. 
On Sunday we went to the Fete de la Musique, a free concert with probably 20 different locations across Berlin.  We were at the AnnaBlumeSoWohlAlsAuchZumDrittenMannBuhne, which was basically just at Kollwitz Platz.  We were too far away to get any pictures of the first band, Element of Crime, but this was the second band, Virginia Jetzt, who I also saw at the Immergut Festival back in 2006.  

The singer was pretty hot, but the sun was shining in his eyes the whole time, and he was kind of squinty.  

No time...

Our 15 minute break was cut down to 15 minutes, so unfortunately I don't have enough time to write anything interesting... a classmate decided to make her 5-10 minute oral report at least 40 minutes long... ugh... 

Going to Yukako's tonight to hopefully watch a movie, since the one we wanted to see in the theater is 2 hours long and doesn't start until 10:15 pm.  Going to dinner at Lilo's tomorrow.

Demonstration

Today, as I was heading to class, I was surprised to see the tram almost ready to leave, although it was 3 minutes early.  Rushing to jump into the door, I was relieved to have caught it.  At the next stop, though, the display read that another M1 was coming in 3 minutes... strange, the trams normally aren't late.  Then, two stops later, the driver announces that he is taking the same route the 12 tram takes, because there are people demonstrating from Alexanderplatz to who knows where... and then I remember seeing flyers around Friedrichstrasse mentioning that students were demonstrating against tuition (students in Berlin currently do not pay any tuition, just a little bit of money for their semester transportation pass).  So at that point, I got off the tram, walked a stop to U-Bhf Rosenthaler Platz, and took the U8 one stop to the Goethe Institute... now I'm interested in seeing how many people show up to class late, or not at all.  Luckily I knew what the guy was saying, and I also know the subway system like the back of my hand, but if I had just arrived here and had not so great German, I'd have been so lost... 

Last night I went out with Yukako for sushi and drinks afterwards...  I can tell that I haven't drank in a while, because two cocktails totally did me in.  I slept until 10 am, and therefore wasn't able to go grocery shopping... so now all I have for dinner is onions... lol.  Ugh, class is starting in a few... got to go!

Fassbinder

Not too much going on right now... I came slightly early to check out a film by Fassbinder from the surly librarian, that I want to use during my oral report next week.  I knew there was more than one German language version, so I wanted to make sure it had the beginning that I had seen.  Other than that, my day consisted of showering and reading a little bit of the Fassbinder biography I bought from Dussmann the other day.  Well, class starts in 5 min, so I should get going...

Chemnitz

My weekend in Chemnitz was a lot of fun.  Clemens and Steffi’s apartment was really nice.  On Saturday we walked around a little bit, then went to the Schlossteich and went on a boat ride in a pedal boat swan and saw lots of cute baby ducks learning how to dive underwater.  Then we stopped and had a light lunch at a restaurant on the river, and then back to their apartment, where we watched “Burn After Reading”, and the 2^nd and 3^rd “Godfather” movies, which was a bit confusing, because I have only seen the last 10 minutes of the first one, but it was out of the rental place.  We had our “Mafia” themed party with spaghetti and meatballs, tiramisu, Italian chocolate cake, and lots of wine…

Then on Sunday we had brunch at the Brauhaus right across from the Rathaus… it was really nice and delicious.  They had pineapple encrusted in caramelized sugar, which was sooooo yummy.  Then we went to the zoo, where the first thing we saw was two lions… mating.  The zoo had lots of creepy monkeys, dwarf hippopotami, and even a petting zoo with some hilarious goats.  The rest of the afternoon we spent lying around the apartment. Clemens and Steffi had sunburns, and we were all tired from being in the sun all day.  Then I had to go back to Berlin… I got back to my apartment around 11:45, I think, and now I’ve been scrambling to do a million things before going to class today, like laundry and grocery shopping.  And now I need to head back to class, because I might actually be late getting back (I walked to Starbucks during our 30 minute break to grab coffee).

The "Schloss" at the Schlossteich, which is really a monastery. 
Karl-Marx's head.
Enten!
Flamingos at the zoo.

Pfau!

Eisbär

I got to hear a great song today as part of a classmate’s oral presentation on Die Neue Deutsche Welle, a musical movement from the 70s and 80s (with such bands as Nena, Falco, and Kraftwerk).  Here were the lyrics to the song she played:

Ich möchte ein Eisbär sein,

im kalten Polar,

dann musste ich nicht mehr schreien

all das wär so klar.

Eisbären mussen nie weinen.

 

[I’d like to be a polar bear

in the cold arctic

then I wouldn’t have to yell anymore

all of that would be so clear

polar bears never have to cry]

And all of that was set to synthesizers… I guess I just love it when Germans take themselves really seriously and then they go make a song like this… 

Well, not much else has really been going on outside of class, homework, and reading.  That will all change this weekend when I go to Chemnitz to visit Stefanie and Clemens—they’re possibly having a Mafia themed party—what that entails, I don’t exactly know, but a party sounds great right about now.