Beasts of Berlin

Miss Trouble and I spent the weekend taking in the glorious view of the 8th Wonder of the modern World; the indecently hot specimens of man that inhabit this city, hereafter known as BEASTS OF BERLIN (I am going to do my utmost to not succumb to the obvious but hideous abbreviation of BOBs)
Beasts of Berlins are everywhere. They are on the U-Bahn, they are smoking cigarettes outside skate shops, they are sporting coifs and reading newspapers, they are walking their ridiculously well groomed horse sized dogs. The thing with international boy spotting is that is allows you the freedom to spot without prejudice. It is as if the language barrier negates the other hurdles that stop you if you were in London. Beasts wearing wet weather drimacs when it is not raining? Still a beast! Construction beast with dirty boots and an actual hammer in his pocket? Still a beast! Beast making out with another beast at a cafe on Simon-Dach-Strasse? Two beasts for the price of one! Beast of Berlin spotting can be a full time activity. On Sunday Laura, our new best friend Andi (the cutest gay Austrian you’re ever likely to meet) and I spent the whole day beast spotting and drinking Dju Dju passionfruit beer. It was a day well spent.

Along with a pastime that I am sure will get me through many long days in Berlin, I have discovered my new favourite spot. And this spot might vie for my favourite spot anywhere; any city, any country. Bold, I hear you say. But hear me out. It’s a wine bar in Prenzlauer Berg that is decked out in the mismatched couches and mustard lamp shades of a DDR nursing home that were thrown out after reunification when East Berlin went corporate and got its very own IKEA. It’s great. You walk in and pay 2 Euros and for your 2 Euros you are given a wine glass and free reign of the 25 or so bottles of red wine, white wine, rose and prosecco on the bar. It’s a tasting bar, so they say, and they have some really really excellent wines. Some incredibly delicious German reds that I was blown away by and some good French wines too. The dude working behind the bar/free booze table was really knowledgeable about the wines (which I loved) and spoke impeccable English (which I loved even more) and corrected my pronunciation of my German S’s (which I did not love quite so much.) So after you taste a few glasses of wine you take up a seat somewhere and hang out and you are free to go up to the table and help yourself to whatever you like, as often as you like. And then, as you leave, you simply leave some money in a jar by the door. As much or as little as you like. Just something to show your ‘appreciation for the evening’ as my wine pouring friend called it. I am in love with that place. I see its olive green and burnt orange plaid sofas in my dreams. Oh, and furthermore, the clientele? BEASTS!

Did I say Nico was dead to me?

Because I didn't mean it. I really didn't. I was having a bad weekend, that's all. He was having a... well, he was having a a worse one. But I'm very happy to say that he is third on the grid for tomorrow's night race. But the rest of the grid... the rest of the grid IS dead to me. That's right, I'm looking at you Button. And Kimi, you too. And don't even get me started on Reubens. His quali was screwed anyway because of his gearbox penalty. And yet, he still felt the need to drive like a cowboy and fuck it up for everyone else. By everyone else I mean Nico. Wasn't I clear before? The rest of that grid IS DEAD TO ME.

Anyway. I am about to head to the airport to pick up Laura Trouble, who is visiting for a few days. Expect stories. I'm sure they will be good ones.

(Oh. And Shell, I said it last race, I'll say it this one too..... Fisichella should not be allowed to drive a red car.)

Heidi Klum is talking shit

I haven't heard one, not ONE person say 'Auf Wiedersehen'
It's all about the casual 'Tschuss!' with an undeniably high pitched inflection.
You'd probably get smacked if you tried that 'Auf Wiedersehen' shit here. And then overcharged. Because you are clearly a tourist.

I live in fear of formal.... I didn't bring the shoes for it anyway.

Be still my beating heart....

Oxfam is dead to me. No longer am I a sucker for the blue signs of Cancer Research or the overpriced goods at Sue Ryder. The Notting Hill Trust and the suspiciously new looking homeware in their windows can jump. I'm over Barnados and The British Red Cross and Trinity Hospice. Don't misunderstand me, Germany is not causing me to do something so crazy as buy previously unworn clothes. Rather, I have found the mother of all second hand shops.

That's right. That is a five storey building dedicated solely to the sale of second hand goods. Clothes, shoes, books, ceramic monstrosities that are no one really know what to do with, electric beaters, skinny grey ties made of leather, lampshades, 500 piece puzzles with only 324 pieces in the box, mdf side cabinets, ddr era knitted shirts, croquet sets, tea pots, skateboards and more leather clothing (and I do not mean simply jackets and coats, but shirts, skirts, trousers and SHORTS) than should live under one roof. It's unbelievable.
Some things are are amazing. I bought a little blue blazer from the kids section for a steal. It's not for a kid by the way. It's for me. It's all part of my plan to be as stylish as the average 6 year old in Friedrichshain.

Some things however..... well, they veer off the path of amazing and into the land of 'That is plain goddamn scary.'
Case in point:

It's also where painfully hideous wedding dresses go to die:
(Isn't that the saddest thing you've ever seen?)

As I understand it, Humana (as the shop is called) is a charity that helps poor starving Africans. On their website, when enticing you with the lure of cut price already used and possibly broken goods, they actually say, "And don’t forget: you’re not only doing something good for yourself, but with every purchase you are helping others."

Help an African indeed.

The Pork Shank Redemption

As a self-confessed foodie and let’s face it, gourmet snob, life on the cheap is not always kind to me. Don’t get me wrong, I can work a bowl of rice with the best of them but when you find yourself standing in the aisles of your local discount supermarket and having the whole ‘meat tonight vs a week of rice and maybe, maybe some vegetables’ debate, well, a little bit of that gourmet foodie dies inside. Now I’m a girl who could happily live in the Serrano Ham hanging section in Brindisa. I’ve made it my business to discover the best burger in London (I still hold steady on the Sam’s Brasserie horseradish laden patty followed by The Electric’s cheeseburger and Battersea's Butcher & Grill's fries-on-the-side-less offering.) I’ve eaten nothing but truffle stuffed brie for two days, passing even on the crackers as to not dilute the incredible flavour of mouldy milk and if w're honest about it, fungus. But that’s how I roll. I like food. And I like people who like food.
I’m also the kind of girl who will walk instead of take a bus to better afford good food in London. I will walk an extra mile in five inch heels, because I know that if I walk that mile and then another and then another, I will eventually have saved enough money to go to Borough Market and splurge on Morels. Or raclette. Or a £10 pack of chorizo. There was a Lidl near enough where I lived in London and I would walk the long way around the block to get to where I was going in order to not pass it. That is how much of a fucking food snob I am. There is nothing redeeming about an 18 pack of Wagon Wheels for 39p. Nothing.

But in Berlin... Well... Let’s just say things are different here. There is a LIDL (the mother superior of white trash grocery establishments) next door to my house. And that is where I shop. Now, there are other options. There is a Netto down the street and an Aldi a few blocks away. But nothing, nothing can beat lidl for sheer value and shame. They sell yogurt in 5litre buckets. BUCKETS. With handles. It’s fucking horrible. Anyway, there’s no sense in trying to get around it. I’m living on the cheap and living on the cheap in Germany entails shopping trips to Lidl. What’s a girl to do? If ever I am in the shop and a food related panic attack threatens to floor me, I run quickly to the meat fridges. There, I can pass hours. There’s more speck and leberkaese and sausages than I can shake a ham hock at. When all else is lost, the meat fridges make me very, very happy. The other day I spent so long standing at them that the security guard started circling me like a shark. He’d make an appearance every 2 minutes or so, always poking his head out from a different aisle, to check if I was still standing there, staring at the meat. I imagine he thought I was just waiting to make a break for it, 12 pounds of eisbein stuffed under my shirt. after all, what sort of person hangs out in the meat aisle?

Anyway, it’s a good thing I love German food. I’m not supposed to eat vinegar, but honestly I’ll give up wheat AND sugar AND milk AND wine before vinegar. Vinegar is oddly essential. It’s the Kevin Bacon of food stuffs. It’s in everything, you just don’t realise it. And if I hadn’t already made peace with the fact that I would not live a vinegarless life, then Berlin would have made me do it. Becuase, holy hell. Everything is pickled. I’m okay with that. I love pickled things. Onions, Gherkins, Cabbage, Fish. You pickle it I’ll eat it. And tonight, I ate a fully pickled meal. It being Sunday, I decided to treat myself to a knife and fork meal. Knife and fork meals are sadly rare when living on the cheap, particularly alone. There is nothing frugal about the use of a steak knife on a 200gram rump. It’s more egg fried rice and risotto and miso soup. But tonight, I made eisbein served with sauerkraut and gherkins. Holy Hell. The deliciousness of ham hocks is sometimes too much for me to bear. And a surprisingly affordable meal too, because unlike in England, ham hocks are readily available here. God knows where they all disappear to in the UK, because we’ve previously had a hard time getting hold of them for the German GPs. Anyway, they’re everywhere here. And I mean everywhere. The other night I went into a late night convenience store, the kind that you can buy single beers or packs of cigarettes or a litre of milk from at 3 in the morning and at the back of the shop, next to the chocolate milk and energy drinks, a pile of vacuum packed eisbein. And really, Lidl or no Lidl, that might be enough for the foodie in me. To live in a city where you can buy Eisbein at 3 in the morning.

Home is where the race day buffet is...

I should have known that when I left London and my beloved Race Days five races before the best season ever ends, the F1 gods would not smile kindly upon me. I told myself it would be alright, that I was pretty safe in Germany, F1 wise. How wrong I was.
I should have known off the bat that things were not going to go my way after I arrived at my new abode and found it without a TV. Now, I wouldn’t usually care. Sitcoms dubbed into German, game shows and 11pm soft porn (cue Pablo Francisco's "Ya wanna see?!" gag) are not that high up on my list of priorities, but Sunday afternoon race viewing most certainly is. Anyhow, finding myself without a TV, I decided to be proactive and scour the internet for F1 viewing spots. I even posted a message on forums intended for English speakers in Berlin, asking where one might be able to view the race. The recommendations that I got back were not all that helpful, suggesting bars in Spandau. That’s akin to asking where to go watch a race in London and someone giving you the name of a nice little spot they know in Surrey. Anyway, I decided not to venture to Spandau. I figured, how hard could it be? This is GERMANY after all. There are five German racers on that grid. One German team. 8 German engines. The greatest race driver of all time is German. Obviously this is a sport that must have some semblance of a following in this major city. So on Saturday morning I venture out to find a bar or coffee shop, or fuck it, even a kebab joint screening the qualifying. Now, everywhere seems to have TVs, but no ones interested in the F1. So I walk and I walk and ask around and look in places and walk some more and ask some more and eventually, dejected, tired, a little sad, I give up and think that if I race home I can probably catch Quali 2 & 3 on some dodgy streaming website. But as I turn into my street, I see something that I havne’t seen before. On the corner there is a little shop, black out windows and those cheap Chinese flashing signs boasting OPEN and 24 HOURS! and there it is.TOTES SPORTS BETTING SHOP.
I actually OMGed. As in, “O.M.G.” As in, I have no full words for this moment. So I go into the shop/cafe/bar. It was like something out of Guy Ritchie movie, but instead of East London it was East Berlin and instead of crack heads and gangsters there were loads of Chinese men and instead of being run by a funny motherfucker with a cockney accent it was run by two young Turkish dudes and instead of everyone sitting with their papers betting on horses.... actually that part was exactly the same. All the Chinese men were watching the 10 or so TVs and betting on horses.. And I’m pretty sure that whoever owns that place ransacked an office to do it, because there were blue carpet tiles underfoot and tables that I can only describe as desks. Anyway, one of the young turks speaks English and happily puts on the qualifying for me. So that’s where I watch it, just me, drinking a beer, watching one TV surrounded by Friedrichshain’s Chinese betting population. So qualifying ends and while I’m happy to have found spot I can call my own on race weekends to come, I’m a little upset because the Brawns aren’t exactly where I would like them and Hamilton is on pole and Nico, in an embaressing 18th place, is dead to me. But still, I wave goodbye to the dudes behind the counter and say, “See you tomorrow for the race.”
And the nice English speaking man says, “Yes, see you tomorrow.” and I leave.
On Sunday morning I wake pretty excited. It’s race day. I love race day. I try not to think about how in London Shelley is probably preparing an Italian feast so delicious it would make Giorgio Locatelli weep and that Kyle and Amy are on their way through to Chiswick to eat that delicious feast. At least, I tell myself, I don’t have to see Paul gloat at McLaren’s fine showing. It’s cool, I’m going to go drink beer for breakfast in a betting shop. So I go. And horror of horrors, my English speaking compadre is not there. I try in my rudimentary German to ask his friend to put the race on for me, thinking he would remember me from yesterday (I had this crazy notion I would be pretty memorable. Female. Not Chinese. Motor Sport fan. But apparently not.) Eventually I understood that he was telling me that he could not turn even one of the TVs onto the race, as there was some German football match that was far more important. We had an awkward half german, half English argument for about three or four minutes when I realised that I wasn’t going to win and not only was I not going to win, if I carried on at this losing battle I was going to miss the start of the race. So I literally sprinted back to my apartment and started searching the internet for a live stream of the race. Knowing the race was about to begin, I called Robin in a panic and insist that he commentate the start of the race to me. Which, like my own personal Murray Walker, he did. That’s love.
Anyway, I did eventually find a website that had a bad live feed and german commentary, and from there I watched the race, huddled over my laptop, alone in Germany.
I’m starting preparations now for the Singapore GP next Sunday. Karmic retribution for leaving London Race Days or not, I refuse to be shown up by the F1 gods again. Wasn't that poor showing by Williams punishment enough?

Whatever you do, don't buy a cream Mercedes

Cream Mercedes-Benz are the standard Berlin taxi. Honestly. The way we have black cabs in London is the way the Berliners (jam doughnuts for an unforunate translation) roll with their cream Mercs. And it's not an attractive cream either, not an eggshell or ivory, but a dirty cream, very DDR goverment issue weizenenmiel (that's flour to you English speakers). anyway, don't get a cream merc unless you want to look like cab driver from Berlin.

So it's been a week in Berlin. So far i love it, but it's a scary kind of city. I don't know if it's just my area or in fact, just East Berlin, but it's the way i imagine some sort of post apocalyptic world to be, one where all the humans that remain live in huge squats with flags over the windows and loud electronic music reverberating through the walls and have millions of dogs and tattoos. In Friederichshain there is literally a tattoo parlour on every block. I am not exaggerating. Having said that, it's an odd mix because I live in really nice block with carpets on the stairs and young families with mothers wearing clothes that look like they were bought from Shoon and i won't lie to you, I've spied some vegan footwear. Directly next to my apartment block is a baby wear store stocking some pretty cute tiny clothes and next to that is a graffitti store, that sells skate shoes, RUN DMC shirts and more cans of spray paint in every imaginable colour than i have ever seen. So berlin is nothing if not a city of contradictions.

Two things that we have here in abundance: dogs and children. Millions of dogs and children. I sometimes feel a bit awkward walking around without one or the other, as seems to be customary on the streets here. I go out so boldly with nothing more than a bag when clearly the fashion accessory of choice is one that breathes. Oh Berlin. You astound me. (a side note, how paris is known as the City of Dog Shit and Berlin has managed to pass under the radar and not take over that title is mind boggling. Berlin kicks Paris's clean street ass dogshit wise. It's a freaking minefield out there.) I find myself giggling often as I walk past the city's million or so dogs. I always think of Brad Pitt in Snatch, 'D'ya like DAGS?'

And children. My word. So many children. And they all seem to ride bikes. Honestly, two year olds dodging the dog shit on their trikes. For the most part the children are unbearably stylish. Today i actually caught myself being actively jealous of a baby's flat cap. The kid couldn't even sit up by himself in his pram but he was rocking a tweed flat cap with such style it hurt to look directly at it. I've actually seen loads of babies in flat caps. Parents, where do you buy these things?! Who makes them?! The most stylish person i saw today was a six year old boy. he was wearing jeans, blue plimsolls, a white t-shirt and a red and white neck scarf. (!!!) His mother (guilty of a vegan footwear crime) couldn't have been less stylish, which leads me to believe that the tike dressed himself in that awesome get up. If I ever have children, i'm coming to berlin to have them. Because every child deserves to grow up looking that cool.