love, little miss where am I?

RIOT TOWN

2011-08-12T15:26:00.000+02:00

Midnight 10 August 2011

At 6pm today, I stood by my kitchen window and watched the deep breath in as London quietly prepared itself for another possible night of riots. By then I was tired of the anticipation and for a moment, I thought, 'Let them come.'

If they're coming this way, just be done with it. I don't want to keep checking twitter and facebook every 30 seconds, watching out for the ducked heads and covered faces of dangerous young kids passing by my bedroom window. The police sires and helicopters have been going all day. I'm tired of the same old reel sky news and the bbc are playing - and yet I can't switch them off. I can't stop listening and looking and trying to find out what's happening.

By 6pm, it'd been 24 hours with a knot in my stomach. Up the road, my local shopping centre was boarding up its windows and doors

The riots are scary because they are everywhere. My friend Venetia was in a cab last night and her driver told her that at that moment, there were 14 simultaneous riots happening across London. From the poor areas of Croyden and Hackney, to the prosperous Ealing and home of middle management, Clapham. Friends live above stores that were ransacked and gutted, and across the road from buildings that have been razed to the ground. People's homes have been burnt down. An old woman in Ealing woke up with looters in her bedroom, going through her belongings. A current viral sensation is a video of a looter helping up an innocent injured kid who has been knocked over in the rioting ruckus - getting him to his feet, then opening his rucksack and stealing his belongings. London is burning. Everywhere there are photos of kids in baggy sportswear and bandanas tied over their faces, hoods up, only their eyes showing - they're setting bins on fire and throwing bricks at police cars. South London gangs are calling truces with eachother in order to join forces in the riots and cause the maximum amount of damage possible.

I can't deny that the riots are scary. And that I have felt scared in their wake. But more than anything, more than I am scared or saddened; I am angry. I am so, so angry.

The riots broke out after a man was shot and killed by police in Tottenham (North London, shooting location was 3 minutes from my old apartment) and a peaceful march upon the Polica Station the next day descended into chaos. The tottenham riots, which blitzed the area all through saturday night, were mainly between the black youths of the area against the police force. While shocking and disturbing, there seemed a method to the madness. Kids vs Police over a death. Sunday brought more of the same, although to a slightly lesser degree and in different areas.

Monday though..... monday was when it exploded. Suddenly riots broke out all over London. Groups of kids started ransacking whole streets, breaking the windows of shops, stealing everything inside, then petrol bombing the building and watching them burn until they are hollow shells. Nothing related anymore to that guy in Tottenham, Mark Duggen, who pulled a gun on a cop and found himself shot twice - once fatally. By the time kids were clearing the bikes out of Halfords in Brixton and the trainers out of JD Sports in Clapham,it had nothing to do with a man in North London who died. It had everything to do with greed and some of the most flagrant lack of respect I have ever seen.

Two teenage girls were interviewed on BBC this morning, drunk on rose wine they'd looted from a local store, claiming the riots were 'fun' and 'hope they'd happen again tonight'.

When asked why the riots were happening, they said, 'It's the goverments fault..... I don't know.... The Conservatives. I forget who it is. I don't know.'

When asked why they were rioting and looting in their own area, knocking off their local people they said,

'It's the rich people. The people that got businesses, and that's why this is all happening, becuase of the rich people. So we're just showing the rich people we can do what we want.'

This is taking place near a string of gutted and ruined stores, including corner stores and off licences - little independently owned shops that have nothing to do with tories or so called rich people.

What is most apparent is the blinding stupidity of the rioters. One looter in Clapham answered a reporter's question of 'what are you doing?' with the mind bogglingly moronic response 'getting our taxes back, innit.' Another was arrested stealing from Currys, an electronics store. The exact same store that she worked at.

People were walking through the broken glass windows of Debenhams and scooping up armfuls of clothes. Clearing shelves in off licences of their bottles of rum and vodka. Most imporantly though, everyone got a new pair of trainers and a new phone. They are ripping our city apart for trainers and phones.

The media is desperately scrambling to use the 'disenfranchised youth' angle. Everyone wants to blame the poverty, the budget cuts, the poor, poor neglected youth of England. Glenda Jackson, the Hampstead/Kilburn MP, said it best: 'Don't give credence to the argument that these are deprived children, they all ahve Blackberries.'

Most people involved in teh riots are teens. A shocking 50% of arrests yesterday were people born after 1991. The youngest charged is 11 years old. These riots have been organsied primarily on BBM and twitter - smart phone apps. These children say they are fighting 'government, tories, rich people, i don't know' - But here in lies the core of my fury - How many starving third world revolutionaries are parading around with Blackberries, organising riots on BBM to steal trainers?

There is no sense. They are not fighting for a cause. They are rioting to riot. They have found an excuse to go out and wreck havoc, do whatever they want. Some snotty nose little shit in a hood and his tshirt pulled up over his nose and sunglasses on, just said on the news, 'I'm doing this because I can. Because tonight the police can't do anything to me.'

He was clutching a bottle of rum. He had fat fingers and a young voice. He couldn't have been more than 16.

The go-to line of 'retaliating against the goverment' makes my blood boil. By no means am I the biggest fan of the Conservative government, but what is there to rally so hard against? Our free health care? Our easily manipulated benefits system? I don't agree with many of the budget cuts that this government has made, but I also don't believe in the benefits system that has existed in England for so long. The Conservative government has made it much harder to 'sign on' - ie, receive the dole/jobseekers allowance. And so it should. Why, if you are physically able and mentally capable, should you not work? Why should people who do work have to pay tax in order to fund your arse sitting, tv watching, criminally lazy lifestyle?

As I said,by and large I don't agree with the cuts - I think they've made many many wrong decisions with regard to them. For instance, disability benefits are almost impossible to get nowadays, even when people are really, legitimately ill and actually cannot work. My friend Nathalie is going through a bit of a benefits battle after several rounds of chemo left her constantly ill. One of these bouts of sickness landed her in the hospital with a heart infection, where a viral infection went undetected, and left her paralysed from the waist down. Not long after she was declared a paraplaegic, her local council sent her a letter stating they were slashing her benefits as she could not prove she was 'unfit for work.' They also refused to contribute to a stairlift (her flat is on the 1st floor of a walk up) or pay for her to move. This meant she was unable to elave her house for months unless she was physically carried down the stairs - until some very kind people raised money for her and bought her a stairlift. She is managing to get back on benefits - which she should have as she is physically unable to work - but it has been a long and hard road.

And yet she has never once incited a riot, thrown a petrol bomb, looted a store. Her problems cannot be fixed by stolen trainers and phones and flatscreen tvs.

What is it they are rioting for?

I keep thinking this, over and over again:

184 MILLION Africans suffer from malnutrition. THAT is a tragedy.

15 MILLION African children have been orphaned by AIDS. THAT is a tragedy.

Every 4 seconds a child dies from aids/poverty. THAT IS A TRAGEDY.

Having to work, to hold down a job, in order to buy yourself new trainers and phones and flatscreen tvs IS NOT A TRAGEDY.

Get off the dole. Take some accountability for your life.

I am so angry I can barely organise thoughts in my head. More than I am scared and more than I am confused and more than I am sad - I am angry.

There have however, in teh wake of all this destruction, been moments of quite incredible hope. Last night The Ledbury, a 2 star Michelen restaurant in Notting Hill, was attacked by the mob. Rioters smashed the windows and bombarded in, taking jewellery and wallets from the diners. The kitchen staff retaliated and fought of the mob with rolling pins, pots and chefs knives. They then hurried them down to the cellar until things calmed down, giving them cognac and champagne.

Kingsland Road in Dalston was not hit at all last night, despite gangs splashing up on both sides of the long road that reaches from Tottenham on one end to Shoreditch on the other. THe turkish shop owners (of which there are many - given the high saturation of turkish owned shops on the stretch) stood out in front of their stores, arm to arm, all the way down the road, refusing to let anyone near their shops. They called their friends and those friends called their friends and any gangs who approached Kingsland Road dispersed quickly at the sight of The Turkish Grocery Army.

This afternoon you couldn't see Clapham Junction for the hoards of people with brooms, black bags and gloves. It looked like the whole of Clapham came out to help clean up the streets. Tonight there are hundreds of Sikh men in Southall, guarding their temple and the streets - creating a presence to safeguard their community.

And my personal favourite, my absolute best, is that there was some footage last night of a street in Ealing that had been absolutely pillaged. Well... almost absolutely. Standing between some barren electrical stores and cleared out clothes shops, there was a waterstones, England's biggest chain of bookstores, left completely untouched.

Today there was a sign in the window of that Waterstones.

WE ARE STAYING OPEN. IF THEY STEAL OUR BOOKS, THEY MIGHT LEARN SOMETHING.

As i type this there are riots in Manchester, Liverpool and Birmingham. It's like a ghost town outside my window, save for the constant wail of sirens. I don't know where they are going. London is eerily quiet right now. I think we're all still waiting for something else to happen, but if it does, I hope to be near a Turksih shop, or a Sikh temple, or in the cellar of a Michelin starred restaurant drinking champagne. Or in a Waterstones.

...and this is where we live now....

2011-01-28T14:57:00.003+01:00

I’ve been quiet. To this land of the internet, as good as dead. It’s a combination of tiredness and a distinct lack of connectivity; mostly I have been siphoning any leftover filaments of energy I have crawling into bed with my boy – or lying with my legs across his lap watching made for TV murder mysteries, tracing his prominent eyebrows with the soft pads of my thumbs. I’d go so far as to say I’d spend all of my free time with him, doing whatever mundane task the day required of us, just sitting on a bus getting to wherever it is that we need to go. But in truth, buses make him edgy, and it’s an often arduous task simply travelling as a pair. His shoulders hunch up as if poised on the precipice of battle, his eyes dart toward the footfall of strangers every time the doors open. At first, I found this attitude odd, but with time and a shift in residence I’ve come to realise it’s not so much nature as nurture. It is, as much as anything, a South London thing. Defining personality by geography, as if gleaning personal insight by reading the A-Z.

South London is ugly. From the false hope of the south bank of the Thames, the beautifully lit Royal Albert Hall and the lights on the bridges, the city slopes down into a wasteland of fried chicken shops, clothing stores selling itchy, alien coloured polyester, signs boasting ‘EVERYTHING £5!!!’, mobile phone stores, their windows garishly lit with Chinese LED signs, ‘OPEN TIL LATE’ ‘PHONE UNBLOCKING DONE HERE’, pink plastic diamond encrusted iphone covers hanging in their windows. All goods on sale, everything displayed. Even the crackheads and whores (or as is common, crackwhores) find little reason to hide themselves south of the river. They press themselves up outside 24hour minicab offices, drinking Super Tennants, selling their wares, themselves, as if Peking ducks in restaurant windows on the streets of hungry Beijing.
There’s a peculiarity built into the South London demeanour; an out and out aggression, a sort of spit and snarl that acts as a precursor to every sentence, every action. You hear it all the time, it saturates the already damp air. The 188 bus runs from central Russell Square to southerly Greenwich. An accidental misstep, the result of the jerking bus plucking your centre of gravity like a reverberating chord, will in Bloomsbury be met with a staid lack of acknowledgement or a polite grimace. But by the time the bus starts its path down Tower Bridge Road into Bermondsey, the same action will be met with a small snap at best, an onslaught of abuse at worst. I ride the bus trying to fit my whole self into a space too small to physically inhabit, hearing the hard wet slapping sound, like heavy feet running on a pavement, of all those altercations taking place, . I sit at the back at the bus only when it’s empty, and when it’s full, as near to the doors as possible. If it is ever me that stands on someone’s foot, my elbow digging into someone’s back, I feel my North of the River, privileged upbringing spill out of me like sick. “Sorry, I’m so sorry.”

“Tsss...” The low hiss and growl of Bermondsey. “Fucking mug.”

This South London is new to me. Sure, I lived in Battersea for a substantial time and yes, it is an area that exists on the southern bank of the river, but one can scarcely call it South London. I loved Battersea, the park and the river and the crumbling mansions blocks on Albert Bridge Road, the poor man’s Chelsea, the beat up red merc with the soft top held together with duct tape. I live in South London now. Actual South London, proper South London, Pie and Mash and Millwall South London. I live just near the heart of the blue, near a 24hour supermarket big as an aeroplane hanger, on a noisy street that most Saturdays is peppered with riot vans and football violence. I guess, as it goes, I call South London home now. But when you come to the teeth and bones of it, truthfully I don’t like it much. Most of the time, I don’t like it at all.

I remember having a conversation with Shelley once, a million years ago, where I boldly proclaimed that I wouldn’t want to fly First Class once if I could never fly it again. What would be the point? Every trip after that I would only think of how things were just that much nicer on the other side of the curtain. Champagne before takeoff, real china, proper cutlery. The ability to breathe without tasting your neighbour’s sour recycled air. Ignorance, I told myself, was bliss. It was a silly teenage thing to say and I don’t agree now with my 16 year old self, but I can’t help but find a small nugget of truth in my juvenile petulance. There’s always a slight sad taste, like metal, when things aren’t as good as they used to be.
Don’t misunderstand me. I’m happier now than I was then. Personally, I’m in a better place. But in a bid for self preservation, I still avoid going anywhere near to Baker Street as far as I can help it.

Isithwalambiza

2010-07-30T00:17:00.001+02:00

There is this thing my brother does, his wife tells me, when she feels sick; he lies in bed next to her and massages her hands until she falls asleep. There is something about this that makes me ache a little bit inside. I can’t quite put my finger on it, I can't quite pinpoint the exact cause within the actions, but there is definitely something about it that makes me hurt in some hazy way, as if suffering from pains in a phantom limb. She feels sick a lot these days, waves of nausea rising in her at regular intervals. A few months ago we went to a spa and a praying mantis jumped on her cream towelling gown. The ladies massaging almond cream into our calves laughed and laughed as she tried to swat it away, telling her, “You know this means you will be pregnant soon. A Praying Mantis is always a baby.” And we in turn laughed at the quaintness of the folk lore, the fertility equivalent of ice cream leading to nightmares or playing with matches causing you to wet the bed. A month and a half later, my brother cleared his throat in that way he does when he has something of consequence to say, and told us, “So guys, a bit of news… Corlia is pregnant.” and then there was much hugging and congratulating and sly tears that leaked from the corners of our rapidly blinking eyes and Matthew hurrying to the freezer to retrieve the bottle of champagne he’d previously secretly stashed in order to quickly chill. As we sat and talked about it, laughing at the sheer absurdity of this age old occurrence that is completely and utterly miraculous with each happening, she said to me, “Remember the praying mantis?”

And now she suffers from morning sickness, that is really also afternoon sickness and night sickness and when she does, my brother lies in bed next to her and massages her hands until she falls asleep.

We went to the coast last week and at night, when I lay in bed down the hall from them and I could not sleep, I thought of who that house harboured. It was no longer just us; there was the tiny thumb sized (thumbnail sized?) human they are bringing into the world too. And I thought about how something was fundamentally changing. I can’t fully describe it, I’ve yet to find the words, but now when someone asks me what is happening, I want to say, “Everything. Everything is happening.”

LHR to JhB

2010-05-05T01:33:00.002+02:00

(a delayed post...)

The Evening Standard Final vendors and deadpan delivery piped through speakers on the Tube have stopped mocking me. No longer do I have to hear of ash clouds and airport closures – no, the skies have been declared open and one week late, to the minute, I boarded an aeroplane and skipped over the equator, to a Johannesburg I find unseasonably cold.
As is customary, the travelling itself was fine and the carrying of stuff was miserable. I opted for a wheelie bag this time as to not want to top myself by the time I arrived at Heathrow, but found my mood only marginally better than the last time I had to carry stuff. I bought books at the airport with grand plans to read on the plane, but as usual found myself napping on takeoff, eating the cheese and biscuits from the evening meal, watching a movie and then falling into restless slumber. The temperature on the plane was akin to high dry desert heat and it’s the first flight that I’ve ever managed to not shiver all the way through. On the flip side of that, my t-shirt was distinctly damp and I couldn’t help but think of those trips I used to take in the car when I was a kid, where I’d fall asleep and wake up with my face stuck to the leather seats. Needless to say, the glamour of travel has always been a near mythical beast. The best thing about the flight was managing to sleep through breakfast and thus escaping the waves of nausea those little tin foil boats of congealed egg and black pudding invariably inspire.

Highlights so far:
x1000 bottles of champagne.
Corlia and warwick’s birthday lunch at Nice in Parkhurst. A long lazy meal in beautiful surroundings, fillet steak, bone china tea cups, crystal flutes and cake, cake, cake.
Being woken up at 3am by the ruckus of the boys returning home and getting up to watch hours of shit TV with them.
Jacques de Savoy 2002 Cara
The frat house. I love these boys.

(A more up to date account to follow soon.)

In which I go FUCKIN' NOWHERE!

2010-04-17T11:03:00.002+02:00

There’s a great scene in the Boondock Saints, where a detective stands over the heavily bandaged and previously bleeding body of a dead Russian mobster and yells in his thick Boston accent, “He ain’t goin’ nowhere! He’s goin’ fuckin’ nowhere!” He leans down, “Where you goin’? Nowhere!!”

Right now, I should be in South Africa, eating a steak and drinking red wine from a glass the size of my head. Instead, I am in London. I was supposed to fly out on Thursday night but all the planes in the UK have been grounded. There’s a giant ash cloud floating somewhere above me, the spit and guts of some bad tempered volcano in Iceland. It was my birthday yesterday and I should’ve been home for it, but like Detective Greenly so eloquently put it, I’m goin’ fuckin’ nowhere.

I don’t usually get too riled up either way when it comes to my trips back and forth and all over. I don’t get all that excited when I am heading off somewhere, just as I don’t get teary at airports when I leave. I don’t get excited when I book tickets, I don’t count down in calendars. I don’t pack a week before. I wake up on the day of travel, sort my luggage out, get a train to get to my plane to fly off to wherever it is I am going. It’s just easier that way. I just go. However, this time was a little different. Maybe it’s because I haven’t seen my Mom, Dad, Brother & Sister for a few months more than I’d like. Maybe it’s because we’ve been dealing with some pretty hectic family stuff over the last few months, almost all of which I’ve had to do remotely. Meltdowns over electronic devices are hard to contain; the constant crashing of the latest (shitty) version Skype and repeated lapses in cell phone signal makes for frustrating communication. Needless to say, there is a dire need for some face time with the family and sentences that run on without long radio silences. Maybe it’s that I moved out of my last permanent residence in February and have been house sitting since then and my sense of permanence has become permeable once again – I ache for roots. So for the first time in god knows how long or how many trips, three days before I was due to fly off and away, I packed my bags. I sorted my goods into essential and non essential items, hauling the non essentials up precarious ladders into dusty loft spaces, cob webs tickling my nose, the groaning beams sounding like ghosts, scaring me more than I knew they should’ve.

On Thursday morning I woke up ready to fly the same route I’ve done countless times. And then, at 9am, my sister called me. “Have you seen the news? You need to check your flight, there’s volcanic ash in British Airspace.” What followed was a flurry of phone calls between South Africa and England, The SAA help desk and constantly checking for updates online. No one was saying anything. I was still holding onto the hope that I would be able to fly or at worst, be delayed for a few hours. I went to go and say goodbye to Laura at her shop up the road and on my way back, stopped to by something to eat. I looked at the time on my phone. 13:01. SAA said that they would release a statement at 1pm, finalising their flight plans for the day. 13:01. I dialled their number, now imprinted in my brain. An automated voice service crackled across the line “Due to the volcanic eruption in Iceland, all SAA flights departing London today, the 15^th of April, have been canceled. We apologise for the inconvenience.” And I don’t know if it was because I was dead set on being home for my birthday, or the fact that I was slightly shaky with hunger and had an express train of PMS related hormones bulleting through my body, but I just burst into tears; big, shaky, hiccupping tears, right there, in the sandwich aisle of Marks & Spencer.

I did what anyone in my position would do. I went home, ate a sandwich, picked up my bags and went to Shelley and Paul’s house in Chiswick. When in doubt, go to Chiswick. This is a failsafe option that has saved me many, many times. Sad? Go to Chiswick. Drunk at 4am and unable to get into your house? Go to Chiswick. State of occasional pseudo homelessness? Chiswick. Hungry? Chiswick. Lonely? Chiswick. So when I found out that my flights home was canceled and I was in crying in the sandwich aisle territory, I knew I needed to go to Chiswick.

The birthday that I had planned fell by the wayside, and instead it was that I woke up in Shelley and Paul’s spare room with the phantom beast that is the occasional April sunshine streaming in through the windows. Lunch was a cheeseburger at Sam’s Brasserie, quite commonly known to the very best burger to the found in London. In the evening, Magpie traipsed through to Chiswick bearing gifts of Falke tights and Mac eyeliner and we went to Sam’s (again, sometimes once a day isn’t enough) and drank rhubarb cocktails and Sgroppinos and ate plates of cheese and helpings of lamb koftas with harissa yoghurt. It wasn’t a total bust. In fact, it actually turned out to be a really good day.

I’ve rebooked my ticket twice and at the moment I plan to be flying out on Sunday night, but as it stands the Volcano continues to spit up into the sky and the wind continues to blow over England and since I’m quite safely out of the crying in the sandwich aisle territory, I’m not holding my breath. I doubt the airports will open by then. I hope to fly sometime in the next week. But until then.... I’m going fucking nowhere.

An almost oops....

2010-03-22T14:08:00.006+01:00

I am currently house sitting a large abode in Muswell Hill for a journalist that I am currently working with, a well established woman in the food and travel arenas hereafter only ever referred to as 'EE' (El Eccentrico)
EE has jetted off to Barbados where stories await her, and in her absence I am to make sure that the dog is walked and fed (insert snotty 'Eloise can't look after a living creature' joke here. Because that hasn't gotten tired. At all.) and that the house basically remains in one piece. Today, after walking the dog (Insert another joke. Go on. I'm loving it. Eye roll.) I got home and made my way into my bedroom. And there was the distinct smell of something burning. Panic ensued.
Okay, let's backtrack a second here.....
Today is the second day of Spring. The sky is blue, the sun is shining. Sure, it's cold, but this is England and we take what we can get. So in a fit of spring madness, I flung open my blinds (Can one fling open roller blinds? Can blinds be flung? 'I rolled up my blinds with enthusiasm' doesn't have the same ring.....anyway....) and threw open the window (I am almost certain one can throw open a window. It has a certain 'Sound of Music' feel about it.) and let the sun shine in. (Cue background music from Hair) Then I took the dog for the walk. The sun continued to shine. I got back. There was burning. Are we all up to speed?
So, I frantically searched all the plug points in the room to check that I did not have an electrical fire on my hands. And I didn't. Couldn't find a thing. I was perplexed. I sat down at this very computer to check that the charger hadn't blown (again) and as I reached around to the back of it, I caught a distinct whiff of smoke and then saw a thin stream of it rising, like some ethereal totem pole of doom. Something sparkled. The sun momentarily blinded me.
Oh fuck.
The glass paperweight on the desk had caught a beam of light, and like a magnifying lens, had concentrated the rays into one incredibly hot spot. The stack of paper that it was holding down, was now smouldering, a fiery ring spreading underneath it. OH fuck fuck fuck. Please, oh please, do not let me get caught in some situation where I inadvertently burn this house down.

Anyway. I put it out. I shut the blind. I put the paperweight in a drawer. That thing is a goddamn fire hazard.

Miserablism and absolutely nothing for those not automotively* inclined

2010-03-11T00:12:00.003+01:00

Miserablism, that rough tongued sonofabitch, has set up home amongst my insides. It’s my own fault really. I did a Bad Thing. Bad things often lead to similar nauseating circumstances, but I must confess I did not think that the Mother of the Blueness would have come to stay for quite so long. I thought I could be done with it, that I could shrug and duck my head and it would, if not be forgotten, at least not be spoken of. No such luck. Having said that, while the repercussions of the Bad Thing have been further reaching and more damaging than I initially thought possible, this overwhelming sense of sickness does have some glimmer of hope on the horizon. Sadly, I do not speak of some sort of time travel where I can go and undo the Bad Thing. No, this is far more selfish. (One would think, after the aforementioned Bad Thing, I would seek to be less selfish. But apparently my fallibility remains wholly intact, and I do not.) Instead, I speak of the holy grail of distractions. The one thing absolutely guaranteed to hold my attention in such a way that I do not dwell quite so obsessively on this wrong that I cannot right.

That’s right. I speak of the return of the season.

It’s F1 time again and I can assertively say that it’s with a momentous sigh of relief that the cars have been unveiled, the teams announced and the drivers decided. There are big changes this year. Huge. Drivers are all over the place. Great teams no longer exist. This is also true for shit teams. Old teams of legendary status have returned. Richard Branson has poured an incredible amount of money onto the grid in what I can only foresee to be a massive hydraulically challenged waste of time. World Champion Button (or, to quote Shelley, ‘Stitch, Button, whatever that guy’s name is’) has moved to McLaren (the world’s most morally bankrupt team) to partner with Hamilton. Remember the last time McLaren signed a World Champion to drive with Lewis? Remember how well that went? I expect a similar scene. I am on the edge of my seat about it. Toys will be thrown. Tantrums will take place. Expect two very stroppy British World Champions any day now. Ayrton Senna’s nephew makes his debut. Alonso, the severely browed Spaniard, has scooted EVERYONE’S favourite party boy Kimi out of his Ferrari seat and into WRC. Does this mean I will start watching WRC? I don’t have time for this shit. Really. I’m not ruling it out though. In matters such as these, I am easily swayed. The new Renault looks like a giant, aerodynamically inclined bumblebee. The new Lotus livery is lovely, it’s been too long since there was racing green on the track. Rubens didn’t retire. Irritating. The good news is that I doubt the Williams will be fighting at the front, so we won’t have to see him cry too much on the podium. New boys are everywhere. Kobayashi got a drive with Sauber. He is insane and I like it. I am excited to see that crazy, brilliant Jap fuck with everyone’s races. (Well, not everyone. When he gets in the way of you know who I will be fuming.) No more refuelling. Pit stops down to 3 seconds. THREE SECONDS. Renault has said in practise they can change the tyres in under that, but we’ll see what happens. Test drivers back on the grid. That preemie beast, Alguersuari, he who cannot finish a race for love nor money, is back in the Torro Rosso. Vettel’s neck is thicker than ever. His head is in danger of looking like a baseball on a tree stump.

And then there’s Merc GP.

Oh Mercedes. I want to weep with joy when I see you. Ross Brawn, the strategic genius. The return of Schumacher. And of course, be still my wildly beating heart, Nico Rosberg. I’m pleased to report that Nico has been kicking ass and taking names (that’s right, I went there) in winter testing and I do believe that the 2010/2011 season will be that of his inaugural grand prix win. I am willing to put money on it. I really am. I’m not prone to gambling, I’m just THAT confident. For those Schumacher haters out there (and you know who you are) I am not saying that this team is without fault. I mean, did you SEE the press pictures? Tragic. But let’s be honest. They are a formidable team. There was a lot of shoulder shrugging and confused looks when Button was looking to leave his world championship winning team at the end of last season and it was only when the rumours of a Merc buyout surfaced that the whisperings of an all German team were heard. The rumour mill was pretty spot on and the return of Schumacher has caused much consternation amongst those who care about these particular cars. Will he still be great? Can he do it? Is he too old? I’m not sure really. He’s a fiercely competitive driver who has not yet stopped looking for occasions to go as fast as possible. And let's face it. He is SCHUMACHER. The Mercedes engines, last year at least, were unsurpassed. Brawn in a genius. And Nico.... well, we all know how I feel about that beast. So a German team running German engines with German drivers it is then. I just hope this doesn’t go the same way the last time the Germans attempted world domination.

From now until November, I am no longer available on Sundays. Not even to talk on the phone. That is unless you’re calling to talk about the illegal overtaking on corner 9.

*I am fully aware of automotively’s meagre credentials as a bona-fide word. In this particular instance, I don’t care.

An open letter to my sister

2010-02-22T03:47:00.003+01:00

Dear Corlia

It started with long winded emails that invariably described in unnecessarily loquacious detail the exceptional turn of a hair pin bend in a winding road in yet another far off place that I had gone to; another place to lay my hat in some vague attempt to find my home. You said, 'Write this stuff online.' So I did. And so, sometimes when I am somewhere between here and there, I write down small bits and pieces of my fragmented days; the funnier things, the things that don't tell too much about the long and lonely hours and the gaps in time and the large cold question mark that follows me to bed, sleeps with me like a lover, its cold bones pressing along my spine. I am the small spoon to my own self doubt.

You said, write it online. So I did. As if I were telling you the story. Just like all those emails I'd written you. But it's not quite the same. My computer is a battered piece of weathered goods and if it weren't for my withering detest for the carrying of stuff, I'd get my typewriter out of storage and work on that instead. There is also the small issue of being unable to source ribbon for the antique. The last time I wrote on it my prose was blind embossed into the page. I prefer letters, real ones, written on paper, sealed with wax. They are tangible. Handwritten letters, like typewritten prose, exist in a way these words on these screens do not. If it exists on paper, I treat it differently. I am a fastidious writer. But I don't consider this real writing, this internet thing. I leave spelling mistakes as is. Grammatical errors. Missing words stay lost, clumsy sentences continue to clunk along, tripping over their heavy feet. I'd prefer the paper mail and wax seals, but in truth I am not a particularly dedicated letter writer. I begin with the best of intentions, but after several courses of correspondence, I find my dedication flags, and the one week response rate slows to two then three then a sluggish four and soon the letter and the blank paper and the unaddressed envelopes and my very intent is buried under a pile of debris on my desk.

So it seems that no means of correspondence suits me quite completely, but we continue in whatever form of it we can lay our hands on. These are the breaks when you live across oceans from your family. On a Monday, I'll send you an email. You'll catch me on skype for four minutes three days later. Sometime before the weekend, I'd get a facebook message from you. I'll respond in a text message. So many words that don't exist. No typewritten letters, the x always a little low on the line, on ivory coloured linen paper. No wax seals or personalised stationary or calling cards.

In some ways though, these words that don't exist do have their benefits. The ability to instantly connect. The way that when I'm walking down the street in some dilapidated European city and see a foreign language magazine in a newsagent with a brooding australian actor looking painfully serious on the cover I can pull out my phone and send you a quick message and within a few minutes you'll be agreeing with me that the beast does indeed belong on the list of those whom get their dark shipped all the way in. And so it will be, momentarily at least, that I don't feel we are quite so far apart as we really are. And then there is the way that I can write a letter like this one, and put it up here, in the space where words don't really exist.

This is the way it is for us. Everyday I make a choice, and that choice leaves me with phones and wires and cables and screens and shitty wifi connection. And that's the way it is. Those are the breaks. But I wonder if one day I'll be able to write small notes, in quink, on thick linen folded cards, my initials embossed subtly in the corner and drop them through your front door when I am passing through the neighbourhood and find you're not home. Or send you handwritten invitations to dinner, or thank you cards. I wonder if we'd live close enough that these words that don't exist ceased to be, and instead it would be my looped handwriting in a day planner and a glass of wine and something tangible, and I'd say, "Let me tell you about this thing I saw today...."

And I don't know if that's how it will ever be... But I hope so.

Fashion Reich

2010-02-17T01:38:00.002+01:00

My guide to vintage shopping in Berlin, as featured in the lovely, shiny, press your face to the pages glossy magazine Black Book.

The Impoverished Writer's Survival Kit

2010-02-04T16:57:00.005+01:00

My cousin Shanna is a rock star. I went to go have a glass of wine with her last night and she presented me with this:

Which I opened, to find this:

"It's your survival kit," she told me. "as it's only a matter of time before you run off to some far away city and can't afford to eat.... again."
In the little suitcase (which, by the way, belonged to her as a pre schooler and I have coveted since we were 5 years old) was some Sanctuary bath soak and body butter

a bar of micky mouse soap

a nail file and band aids

an easy open tin of baked beans

for which this fold up spoon was provided

and naturally, a packet of rice.

No writer can ever be without a pocket sized bottle of whiskey, complete with teeny tiny hip flask.

For when I am in need of something sweet, there are shortcake biscuits on hand

and bite sized rolls of sweets

Just because I will not always be in a position to drink Chateau Lafite, does not mean that my carry on wine stopper should be anything less than crystal

and obviously I will need to keep a bottle opener at hand for when I need to open beers. (You know, when the crystal stopper is in the in the Lafite.

And of course, a lighter with which to light my Marlboro Reds.

and most importantly, the piece de resistance of the writer's survival kit, as rice, whiskey, body butter and biscuits can only get one so far......
my beloved moleskin notebooks

As I said, my cousin is a rock star.
Thanks Shan. YOU ARE THE BEST.

(there was also a tiny bag of chocolate coins. I must confess I molested those before I even found my camera. But know, they existed.)

An unexpected continuation of The Saga of The Black Leather Mini Skirt

2010-01-30T13:41:00.003+01:00

The trouble with fashion is that certain pieces don’t always translate. The smooth long vowels of one language become jarred and awkward in another setting, and soon enough all that was great about a certain thing gets lost in what comes from being a slightly different you, in a very different place. As someone who moves around a fair amount, I am very aware of this. The yards of brown string and wooden beads, while perfectly fitting on a Kenyan beach, will lose any appeal under a grey London sky. London shoes are not Berlin shoes. A Parisian outfit in Cape Town will suddenly look overdone. And I know this. I really do. Which is why The Skirt has taken to a shelf since my return to London. In Berlin, The Skirt was in its element. It was a perfect piece. It solved all of my skirt dilemmas. I was absolutely content in my skirt wearing. Oh, how I loved that skirt. However, when I got back to London, something about The Skirt wasn’t quite right. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but something certainly was amiss. Some days I would put the skirt on, um and ah, and invariably, just before leaving the house, throw on an alternate leg covering instead. Needless to say, The Skirt hasn’t exactly been on centre stage since its Berlin heyday.

But last night, that all changed. I decided I was going to embrace the long lost love of said skirt. I wore it to work. Obviously, as it a SMALL skirt, made of LEATHER, one walks a fine line with it. Things that are not recommended as a pairing, unless Eastern Bloc Prostitute is the look one is trying to achieve: Stilettos, very low cut tops, extremely tight tops, any other form of leather clothing (not shoes, read: bustier, jacket, waistcoat, etc.) In light of this, I wore my skirt with a pair of light beige ankle boots, an oversized sailor striped t-shirt and my customary top knot. It’s a casual look. IT WAS CASUAL. Anyhow, happy enough that my skirt was back in the game, I picked up my record case, donned my fur coat and headed out the door. Now, in retrospect maybe the fur wasn’t the best idea, sartorially speaking. Maybe, when the casual sailor shirt was hidden under the hip length fur, the look was decidedly less..... dare I say casual again? But it was cold and it’s my warmest coat, so I wore it.

On my way to the bus stop, an SUV that was driving by slowed down and pulled up next to me. In the style of every bad film noir movie ever made, the driver’s window slid ominously down. In the car, two huge Russians leered at me. In Russian, they had a brief exchange. The driver leaned out of the window, his one arm reaching toward me. His lip curled. And then he asked the question that no girl ever, ever ever ever wants to be asked.
‘How Much?’
I literally stopped walking I was so shocked. Appalled even. Insulted. And a bit hurt. I could do nothing but gape. I didn’t even have a caustic remark, not even an acrid sound to defend myself. A few days ago, when I was having a particularly trying day, a drunk man on the tube made a snotty comment about my top knot, likening it to a pineapple on my head, and I actually hissed at him. What I would’ve given just then to find within myself the sharp, snake like sound that would be an all encompassing portrayal of my reaction to the question, the hiss that would not only say, ‘No, I am not a prostitute’ but would also convey the sentiments of ‘Fuck You Very Much.’ But no. There was no sound in me. Instead, I shut my mouth that had previously fallen agape, gave the driver a withering look and shook my head in bewilderment, mostly to myself. And on I continued to work, every so often looking down at The Skirt and berating its existence. ‘I thought we were in this together.’ I told it. ‘How can you betray me like that?’ And ‘It’s all your fault you know. If I had just left you at home and worn one of your more sensible wardrobe buddies that never would’ve happened.’ The Skirt said nothing. It didn’t even try and defend itself. So as far as it all goes, I don’t know if London is ready for The Skirt. Maybe it’s a Berlin thing after all.

Later that night, when I told Laura the story, in all the horror of being so easily mistaken for a prostitute, she linked her arm around my waist and rested her head on my shoulder. “On the bright side,” she said, “you look so hot that they wanted to pay to have sex with you.”

In which a hotel bar is the order of the day

2010-01-26T13:27:00.003+01:00

I could spend hours sitting in the perpetual dusky twilight of a hotel bar. I love hotel bars, good hotel bars, fancy ones with monogrammed coasters and deep buttoned sofas and flocked wallpaper and ancient books and cocktail menus and wine lists thick and heavy; weighty tomes. I love the dark light that seems to live in them, the palpable air, the rows and rows of single malts, the steady hum of the day passing unbeknownst to the quiet souls within it. Yesterday, Tam and I, in celebration of her birthday, spent much of the afternoon nestled in the nook of one, glasses of red wine winking up at us in the moody light.

First, we went for lunch at Kitchen W8 – a superb pick of Tam’s that did not disappoint. I had a rib eye so meltingly tender and utterly delicious it made me re-evaluate my whole ‘last meal on earth’ dinner plan all over again, and go back to the original menu, of which steak was the star of the show. There was also the added benefit of after having felt a bit peaky and somewhat wan for the last few weeks, the steak made me feel as if I had mainlined iron. Lunch was long and leisurely and there were guest appearances by chanterelles and wild mushroom foam, foie gras mousse, Roast John Dory and dark chocolate truffles. After lunch, we took a stroll up High Street Kensington, popping into a shoe store so that Tam could purchase a pair of lovely tan brogues and I could stroke the soft leather of as many pairs of boots as possible without being frogmarched from the shop by world weary shop assistants, desperate for a commission and tired of the sighs and gasps and lip quivers of terminal window shoppers, such as myself. As we exited she shop, we partook in a bit of Chelsea beast spotting (yes, you, in the grey jumper. I’m talking about you.) and made our way to The Gore.

The Gore is a small hotel moments away from Hyde Park, hidden inconspicuously down a very Kensington looking street without much to-do. Through the austere stone pillars, typical of the area, a little bit of wood paneled heaven awaits. The Gore is opulent, but not ostentatious. There are huge gold gilt mirrors, oils of not entirely attractive women hang proudly on the wood paneled walls, elaborately carved staircases lead, white rabbit like, up tantalising plush red stairs. There are bronzed bits and pieces all over the place, soft carpets underfoot, wrought iron candelabras that wouldn’t look out of place in a medieval castle, and beams of coloured light that peek through the stained glass windows. Quite simply, old world charm personified. After seeing pictures of The Gore on the Lisa Borgnes Giramonti’s breathtaking blog, A Bloomsbury life, I knew that the bar and I simply had to get acquainted. Oh, and how we did. Tam and I ordered a bottle of Pinot Noir and reclined into the oddly deep leather armchairs and sat for hours and hours and talked and joked and laughed, and spent the afternoon in the comfortable confines of the chasm of time that exists solely in hotel bars.

A Moveable Feast

2010-01-24T20:41:00.009+01:00

A long overdue photo post. Think of this as a quick tutorial in how every day can be turned into an event that uses food as its focal point.

To begin with, there is the casual sunday lunch, with a bit of ferocious car related debate and the customary Brawn/Ferrari/McLaren stand off.

Sometimes, Shelley makes us mussels. Pots and pots of steaming mussels in a deliciously hot, fragrant winey soupy base, begging for thick hunks of baguette to mop it up.

Which we enjoy with fine wine......

and dispose of our shells responsibly.

And then, sometimes we celebrate Christmas in November
And so begins the season for mince pies in cloches shone to a christmas bauble shine

with multiple servings of spiced pear bellinis, of course,

and scoring pig fat to create masses of crackling of crisped to perfection. Which goes nicely with

slow roast pork. Once again, courtesy of the dab hand of Shelley, culinary genius.

Sometimes (not often, but sometimes) we eschew linen and clean lines for fun tables, complete with board games, jenga and DIY decorate place mats.

And wipe the mess from smashing food into our faces with polka dot napkins.

Occasionally, I bake my body weight in Christmas Cookieswith these happy little cookie cutters

until I've made mountains of gingerbread trees

and spicy love hearts.

Reverting to type
we shrugged off the circus colours of Christmas in November and went for white tulips, linen and candles for Christmas Eve dinner.

We picked succulent roast marrow from the bone.

And made crockery and cutlery pirate flags.

In the aftermath of Christmas, when we were enraptured with playing with our presents, Shelley shared her white alba truffle with us
Which was heaven on a white plate.

And then, I retreated back up to the great white north, to The Hale
where Tamaryn's birthday dinner looked like this.

And this.

And this.

A heart two sizes too small

2010-01-06T00:58:00.003+01:00

Whatever the New Year equivalent of the Grinch is, I fear that is who I find myself in the likeness of this new year. I must confess that the general joviality a fresh set of calendar pages has brought to most has passed me by and I feel tattered, weathered and downtrodden, as if still languishing in the last of the so called ‘Nasties.’ There seems to be a certain hubbub in the general population, the shedding of a decade’s worth of misery in lieu of embracing an air of impending prosperity. I read it put best today, in an article reporting the significant increase in like for like winter sales figures for London this year verse last year, saying that after nearly two years of recession Londoners were determined to enjoy themselves at the sales; they called it ‘frugality fatigue.’ It does seem that way, that the general populace has en masse decided the recession is over, that bankers shall stop jumping out of windows, bonuses shall return, champagne shall flow through the city streets, there will be riches, bespoke suits, Louboutins and cocaine for all! And it seems to be regardless of the fact that no one is shopping with wads of cash. No, it’s all on credit, the very thing that got us into this mess in the first place. Utter, depressing delusion. Just because we want something, does not mean it will simply BE. If that were the case, I would be typing this with a pair of Acne Atacoma wedges on my feet. And it does not stop there. How apt that this is the week the world’s tallest (and possibly most pointless) skyscraper opens? The Burj Dubai is a 206 floor hotel/apartment/office/parking/shopping space. Of that, 160 floors are habitable. It’s 828 metres high and its interior covers just over 3.5 MILLION square feet. Because that’s what Dubai needs. More empty spaces it can’t fill. It’s a state $100 000 000 000 in debt.That’s one hundred billion US dollars. BILLION. As of October 2009, 1 in 4 homes was vacant due to oversupply. Similar figures applied to offices. That’s before the Burj Dubia spat its 3.5 million square feet into the mix. Obviously I’m fully aware that the initial conception of the Burj happened long before this economic hiccup we are experiencing came to fruition. Back when the Burj began construction, Lehman’s had a gainfully employed workforce and people trusted Bernard Maddoff with their money. Remember all that time ago?

Needless to say (....don’t you wish it had been?) I am late to the party of New Year cheer. It’s going around like a bad head cold and I do hope I am not immune to it. Being a Grinch is boring and does not make for pleasant dinner conversation. And so, as to not be the bearer of altogether bad tidings, I can say that it has not been all doom and gloom these first few days of the year. Shelley received a beautiful white truffle from Paul for Christmas and I was lucky (/sneaky) enough to be with her the night it was eaten, shaved in gorgeous pungent slivers over silky pasta. Walking up Regent Street, I was pulled by the hand up onto a platform to pose for a photo with one of the Hamley’s pirates, as my 30 odd strands of pearls apparently made me look a bit like ‘a very stylish treasure chest’. That’s a direct quote from the main pirate, who took his personal camera out of his inside pocket, handed it over to Pirate #2 and demand I have my photo taken with him. Followed almost directly by a small kerfuffle when some Japanese tourists who had been witness to the scene then thought I was famous. I giggled all the way to Liberty, where Magpie and I drank several cups of tea, admired other customer’s expensive handbags and even more expensive plastic surgery. This evening, Robin and I went to see La Boheme (my absolute favourite opera) at The Royal Opera House. And right now, its snowing.

A not altogether comprehensive festive season activities check list:

2009-12-30T20:48:00.003+01:00

Family Invasion.
Check.

Food prep in West London. 5 courses being prepared and 7 bottles of champagne consumed. First Bottle: Krug. Second bottle: Vintage Bollinger. Third Bottle: Ohlson de Fine MCC. Similar fashion to continue until all involved pass out drunk at 10pm; starchy fingers marking the sheets with potato dust.

Check.

Christmas Eve dinner party in formal wear with more champagne, roast marrow bone and tiny, perfect portions of confit duck shepherds pie. Unfortunate incident involving mulled wine reduction that looked like blood on the dessert plates. 100% my fault. I’ve been stripped of my pastry colours.

Check.

Vicious, brutal to the point of injury game of Yankee swap. Robin ended up with a maglite. Shelley got a Jamie Oliver cookbook. I was landed with a pink plastic shower cap in the shape of a pig. Gift FAIL.

Check.

Cheese scones on Christmas morning surrounded by cups of coffee, family and mountains on presents. End of the gift fail. Signature scent in pink box, rabbit hair oversized jerseys, zippo lighters, luxurious soft bed socks, Massimo Dutti sleep sets.
Check.

Christmas lunch at Kyle and Amy’s Christmas grotto of a living room. It was like a holly jolly santa ate too many Christmas cookies and exploded in there. In a nice way. Incredible gammon. Lots of wine. Feeling a bit sad about not being with my parents, brother and sister and upon (rather unexpectedly) seeing photos of them, bursting into floods of tears and dealing with an unattractive lip quiver for several hours. Followed by more wine.

Check.

Boxing day with puy lentils and pork chops, wine and old musicals. There was a lot of couching involved. See also: Sofa surfing, sloth, indolence. Inability to button up my Acne jeans.

Check.

Retreating to the countryside for the black hole between Christmas and New Years Eve. Marshmallow couches, listening to far too much Queen, drinking copious quantities of red wine and dancing to said music in the living room, rare roast rib of beef, The AGA, house shoes, teaching the parents about Jurassic 5.

Check.

All in all it was a festive season well spent. Tomorrow morning I must traipse back to London at a reasonable hour as I have a gig tomorrow night. And then, this year will be gone. See you all in 2010. xoxo

"When I am an old woman I shall wear purple with a red hat that doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me..."

2009-12-14T15:29:00.003+01:00

When I grow old, I want to be one of those fabulous old woman London seems to breed. You don’t see them as they age, as they grow into their eccentricities. It’s almost as if they exist only in old age, waiting under a rock until they turn 75 and then emerge, fully formed, clad in Chanel and politically incorrect luxurious furs.

They always seem to be wearing massive sunglasses and walking with their knees slightly bent and their backs poker straight, somewhere between the awkward stumble of a baby giraffe and the gait of a runway model. They wear massive amounts of make up, have perfectly manicured nails and drawn on eyebrows that arch oh so high, as if to signify that behind those sunglasses they are in a state of permanent surprise.

I have seen a few lately that have stuck in my mind. On High Street Kensington at 11 o’clock in the morning I saw a tiny woman dressed in ankle length black fur, her white hair in a tight French roll, her face hidden two black Jackie O saucers. She walked slowly, with purpose, toward the red stand alone letter box next to the church and upon arriving at it, dipped a diamond encrusted hand into her quilted Chanel bag and retrieved a large white envelope. The address was written in elaborate curling calligraphy. I thought that the paper she used to write on probably cost more than my lunch that day. Dropping the letter into the box, she turned and made her way back along the road, into the maze of tree lined streets and opulent townhouses that define Kensington. As she walked away I noticed, on her feet, a pair of four inch black alligator skin boots.

On the bus, there was a statuesque woman carrying two Max Mara bags that would’ve crippled a lesser lady. She couldn't have been less that 80. She was rail thin but tall as an Amazonian, with long, rounded nails painted a pale gold and wore an outfit that consisted solely of shades of cream. As the journey went on and day quite quickly slipped away into the 4 o’clock nights of London winter, she removed her sunglasses and I noticed that she kept sneaking furtive glances at me from the corner of her perfectly made up eye. She was forming some decision about me in her mind, that much was clear, but I was unable to decipher if it was one I would find compliment in. As I stood to leave the bus, I made my way past her and saw her give me a small but distinct nod, as if she had come to the conclusion she found me acceptable. I self consciously touched my hair, fiddling with the loose top knot piled on top of my head. She caught my eye again and very quickly, closed her eyes and gave an imperceptible shake of her head, as if slapping my roving hand from my head. “Behave Eloise.” I dropped my hand. Apparently, if I want to grow up to shop at max mara and wear only cream, self conscious fidgeting must be left behind on the number 49 bus and not retrieved. Ever.

Going to Chiswick, I was sat next to an old woman who looked fit for a day of long walks in the Cotswolds. She was with who I can only deduce to be her granddaughter, who had clearly had enough of her company for one day. The granddaughter sat in stony silence, her arms folded across her chest, and fumed. The old woman, dressed in a knee length tweed skirt and a Barbour jacket, sat with her small shopping bag from a bespoke stationers and her handbag in her lap. She opened her purse and rifled though, pulling out a cream paper bag with old fashioned print on its crumpled front. She held the bag in one hand and with the other, wiggled her fingers over it, as if a top hat that a white rabbit was supposed to appear out of. She stretched out the opening of the bag and held it out to her granddaughter.
“Would you like a chocolate darling? I’ve got some rather good ones.”
Her voice was high and thin and clipped. It sounded like money and boarding schools for girls and long services in cold churches in the winter. The granddaughter, undeterred in her irritation, shook her head.
“Are you sure darling? They’re brandy truffles.”
The granddaughter shook her head again. Unruffled, the woman dipped a delicate hand into the bag and pulled out one dark truffle and popped it into her mouth. She gave a small shiver of satisfaction and closed the bag, dropping it back into her purse. Her granddaughter stood up and moved toward the door, where she stayed standing until she reached her station, a full two stops later.

Paris vs Berlin

2009-12-02T01:47:00.003+01:00

It’s a question I’ve had over and over in the last few months, “So, which did you prefer? Paris or Berlin?"

It’s on odd thing, the way those two seem to be, to most, the ultimate in atmospheric city competition and simply cannot co-exist in the intrepid wanderer’s heart. I find it particularly curious as when I returned from Shanghai, no one declared, “Shanghai or Hong Kong? You must choose!” Similarly, there has never been any need for me state a preference between Christchurch and Sydney or Champagne and Franschoek, Barcelona or Brooklyn. But having lived in both Paris and Berlin, it appears that I am meant to find myself drawn more toward one than the other.

One thing I have heard numerous times, without any prompting, “Berlin is so you! More so than Paris!” As if I had preceded this statement with some confession of how I was never really all that comfortable buying baguettes twice a day and eating figs for breakfast every morning. For the record, no such thing is true. The honest truth is that I love Paris. I loved it then, I love it now. I miss it. I often read apartment listings longingly, wiishing the pound to gain in strength against the now almighty euro and bid my return to My Beautiful Paris. But the statement, the casual brush off of “Berlin is so you, Paris isn’t” is such a sideswipe it has often left me reeling. How am I not Paris? Are my shoes not designer enough? A quick glance at my shelves proves otherwise, spotted: Gucci, Versace, McQueen, Louboutin, Gina, Giles Deacon, Pucci, etc. No, i think I own sufficient snobbish footwear to qualify to Paris. What is it then? Am I not elegant streets and window boxes and city beaches in July? Am I not sidewalk cafes and wine in the afternoon and hot, buttery garlicky escargots and silk scarves and Laduree and coral lipstick in the cracks of the mouths of the old women in their moth eaten furs on the threadbare carpets of the beautifully dilapidated tea salons, eating nicoise salads, feeding the hard boiled eggs to their dogs? How am I not Paris, as much as I am a bit of everywhere that that I have ever been?

I don’t feel that I’ve gone anywhere and not taken something from it. It’s true I may not be Paris through and through, because I am also a little bit cold Methode Cap Classique in Robertson’s thundering rain, Shark Kites in Shanghai’s night sky, Milk Dumplings in Ningbo’s private dining halls, the thrill of cyclone in Coney Island and eating pizza at 5am in New York’s Lower East Side and Tuscany’s tiny passage ways and kid sized cars. I’m at least a fraction watermelon cocktails and blown out tyres under brutal Spanish sun and a tiny bit of those little pewter coloured pottery bowls bought on the side of the road in Swaziland, and just a hint of the Mozambique sunrise and a whiff of the dhows and dawas in Mombassa. A little bit British, a good handful of African red earth and the smell of gum trees and petrol and spice and hair cream and Zam-Buk.

How am I not one place as much as anywhere I have been?

And how am I so Berlin? How am I Berlin more so than anywhere else?

Berlin is a confused city. It bears its scars. It is, in my opinion, the only major western city that would do something like leave the bombed out spire of the Kaiser Wilhelm Church as is and make no attempt to mask it, rather to preserve it as a testament to loss. Berlin makes no qualms of its scars, its past. They are plain enough to see. As if finding shame in its past would equate a dismissal of its self, its bones. Berlin has long lived under a fragmented rule. It has been pulled apart by separate governing states. It has been burned. It has been bombed. It has been literally divided in thought and process and physicality. And even now, its identity is being forged. Even now, all these years after the war and the wall. Berlin is still learning how to be. It’s no wonder it is such a haven for the worlds poets, punks and general lost souls. At least in Berlin, you are always almost in sync with a city struggling to find its way, stumbling over its own feet, just as you are.

So maybe, in this way, I am Berlin. Fragmented. Stateless. Divided.

So... Where were we? Ah. Yes. The Hale.

2009-11-29T02:02:00.003+01:00

I love and fear this area equally. I hate the way when people ask where I am living my reply generally elicits one of two responses:

1) Where?

2) What the fuck? That is the GHETTO!

Needless to say, I am fully aware of the ghetto status of the area in which I find my lovely abode. JFK told me only last week he is not allowed to ever return to the Hale due to a (if I remember correctly, which I may not) minor incident involving a crow bar. Colour me shocked. Last night, as I was getting ready for work, I heard the distinct rapid fire wall of sound that can only come from one of two things: multiple cars backfiring multiple times, or a small but very real shoot out. I chose to believe the former, but did not leave my house for an hour just to be safe, thus making me slightly late for work.
Having said that, the people I live with prove to be lovelier by the day, and my female housemate, S, is an incredible cook. I worship slash hate this. I am utterly perplexed by being the vastly inferior cook in my living area. (This obviously excludes the family I have lived with, as we all know that we, as a family, know how to use a pan/wok/grill/pizza oven/braising dish etc. No offense intended to absolutely anybody.) But trust me, when you wake up hungover at one in the afternoon, and your housemate is cooking something that smells AMAZING and then dishes you up a king sized portion of astoundingly delicious Japanese curry with sticky rice, you too will gloss over possible gunfire.

Anyway, I thought this juxtaposition of adoration/fear called for a little round of LOVE/HATE:

Things I love about London:

Love:
Saturday night dinners with friends I have not seen for far, far too long.
Included picturesque French brasserie in Chelsea, tiny tables in little nooks and crannys, windows that steamed up and glass that dripped with condensation as it poured with November rain outside. Champagne in unbearably elegant flutes, steak and burgers, red wine in glasses big as calabashes. Regaling hilarious stories from Berlin, hearing fantastic stories of her oh so famous employers, laughing till blue in the face about all the things that have happened since we last saw each other.

Afternoon shopping with my cousin
Trawling the shops with SS with the sole mission of finding her the perfect party dress for the damn near upon us end of year party season. Nipping into coffee shops that smell of cinnamon and spice and emerging onto the street with steaming vanilla lattes (hers) and soya milk hot chocolates (mine.) Finding the most perfect Ben De Lisi floor length number for her. Eating sushi on a park bench in Kensington, watching the flower sellers sell their pink hued cabbage roses.

Hate:
The suspect grease stains on the glass partitions on the tube and windows on the bus.
Note to EVERYONE who takes public transport. Please please please DO NOT put your filthy, grease covered, product slicked head on any glass surface. It’s revolting. I am getting a crick in the neck from trying to move my head as far as physically possible from the offending surface whilst remaining in my seat. (This is London. Bar a very old person or pregnant woman, you simply don’t give one of those bad boys up.)

Speeding Buses that hurtle around corners in the rain
Walking home this evening from my fantastic dinner, I berated myself for absentmindedly leaving my umbrella at home for the second day in a row. It was purely accidental both times. I changed bags and failed to see the little thing fall on the floor. Big Mistake. As I neared my street, the rain that was already in steady, constant pouring mode, gave way for the briefest of moments, as if taking a deep breath in, before gushing down in such force, with such ferocity, I was momentarily blinded. I quickened my step and was happy to feel, a mere few more moments later, than the rain had eased, and was back to its steady only halfway bad downpour. As I resumed a normal pace, an out of service bus came hurtling around the corner (the driver clearly a speed freak, both chemical and physical) at an alarming pace. As the aberrant bus passed me at his criminal speed, the rain that had collected in the road, found its way under the wheels, which in turn found its way, rather majestically, think – into a thick curtain, no, wall, of spray, that seemed to reach 10 ft high into the sky, linger for a beautiful moment, and then hit me, the full length of me, at a force so high it could have been measured on the Richter scale. Two thoughts sped through my mind. One was of the Guinness ads with the surfing and the horses that appear out of the waves. The other was, OH DEAR GOD. MY PUCCI SHOES!

Cold, soaked and as shallow as ever.

The Problem with Bickenhall

2009-11-21T11:41:00.004+01:00

Bickenhall was a palace. It was the big daddy of apartments, a Londoners hard wood floored wet dream. It was the first apartment I lived in, in London and the single longest stretch I have ever stayed in one house. The ceilings were high. The rooms were many. (bed: five. bath: five. sitting: two.) A red bricked mansion block minutes from baker st tube station with blue doors and carpeted halls and brass buttons that were buffed to a reflective shine daily and 24 hour porters and walls that could talk. Bickenhall was perfect. It was property heaven. It was also home. It was my happy place. The open plan kitchen with its 16 seater table and all the wine we drank and the copious quantities of Rand Bar Special are some of my best memories. I loved Bickenhall.

The problem with Bickenhall is that It has ruined real estate for me. Never again has a ceiling been quite high enough, a room airy enough, a kitchen well enough equipped. Bickenhall is my one true love. And as such, no where else has ever really managed to match up. Sure, there have been flirtations. I’ve dabbled in other houses, other places. I’ve casually encountered a few, embarked on serious relationships with others. But I’ve never loved anywhere like I loved Bickenhall. There was Bond Street and it’s dim sum smell, the late night restaurant refuse collection and never being bale to sleep through the night. There was Chiswick and its trek to transport and the delicious nearness of the river. There was Paris #1, my tiny apartment in the 13^th with the death trap spiral staircase. Battersea, the apartment with my fantastic neighbours and the park and bouef bourgingon every week; coupled with the Italians, a difficult bunch of people with whom I had a difficult relationship and thus, I became increasingly difficult myself as time progressed; as if it were all directly proportional and as the year went on we all just became more and more unbearable. Paris #2, the converted artist’s studio in the 10^th with the mint green smeg fridge and blue floors and ball and claw bath and antique radiators and jungle courtyard, the most picture perfect place I have ever called my home. York mans, the fire place and hallway long enough to do cartwheels in. Berlin, huge, firewood smell, 16 chairs, uncomfortable bed, several chaise lounges.

I hate house hunting. Silly really, as I seem to spend an incredible amount of time dedicated to the pursuit of it. I have a lot of awful house hunting stories that involve dogs, Nigerian scam artists, Eton boys with framed Wu Tang posters and other atrocities. This time, however, I seem to have skipped past the crazies and flea infested cess pits and have landed myself a new spot in a lovely warehouse in North London. And when is say North London, I mean, NORTH. It’s practically the great white north up here. If you’re a Hotspurs fan then come stay with me, because I am now a resident of The Hale. My new abode is a warehouse that makes its living by being a working photographic studio in the day. This morning, on the way to wash my face and brush my teeth, I crossed paths with a wafer thin girl who was half way through the make up process. She was a sad clown. But only on the left side of her face. The space is large and lovely and the floors are black and it’s double volume and the two people I live with seem very nice (and not crazy or ridiculous about labelling food and marking levels on milk bottles with a marker pen) and I think I just might like it here in The Hale...

However. This place is GHETTO. I couldn’t be more ghetto if I moved to Braamfontein. The Studio is on an industrial estate. Our warehouse is guarded by a metal gate I need two hands and my full body weight to open, kept shut with a padlock so big if used in a fight it would qualify as assault with a deadly weapon. The Hale is hardcore. The local store is a Lidl. It’s a bit of Berlin nostalgia. Only pricier. There are 24hr cab joints, Brazilian grocery stores and men in white vans everywhere. I am bringing back the canvas bag as my Paddington is not making a post midnight appearance in this area. From now on, I’ll carry my keys and phone in my pocket. No drunken 4am teetering on sky high stilettos, fumbling to find locks to fit the keys in my hand. Please. 'Wits about one' springs to mind.

It seems that as the years go on, I find myself moving further and further from the centre of London. I’m now here, at The Studio, in The Hale. Zone 3 people. Zone 3. Somewhere, 2004 Eloise is dying a slow, screaming death. At this rate I'll be moving to a little secluded spot in The Cotswolds sometime in 2014.

So here I am. In the hale. And I like it. I mean, it’s no Bickenhall... But then again, nothing is.

A brief summation of the return home and the other transportation means that followed

2009-11-16T15:20:00.006+01:00

As expected, the journey was somewhat okay and the carrying of things was miserable. I returned to London to find it pissing down with rain. Caught an easybus back to the city (as I think we can all agree that Stansted is by no means London proper) and was sat behind a newly reunited couple who were so ecstatic to see each other that their 90 minutes make out session gave way to frequent groans best not aired in public and bouts of fervent dry humping. It was decidedly awful and I had to get the hell away from them and change my seat 30 minutes into the journey, which proved tricky when being driven down the motorway at breakneck speed in a vehicle with an alarmingly high centre of gravity and a cackling, mad Polish driver at the wheel. Anyway, arrived back in town, dropped my bags off, put on a pair of decent shoes and went to work. Electricity Showrooms has a light up dance floor that I love more than one really should love a dance floor and in all honesty it's a fun, easy set..... despite being a sometimes lengthy 6 hours long. Saturday was a similar scene. Only this time, on the way to work, somewhere near Elephant and Castle the bus driver took a wrong turn. Yes. A bus. Took a wrong turn. The bus driver, quick to realise his mistake, rectified the situation by doing a hair raising three point turn on a none too wide side street and emerged (miraculously) unscathed on the correct route.

Miss Trouble and I played at Catch on Saturday night (which, we realised, is our longest standing residency - the best part of FIVE YEARS) where it was full to the brim of Shoreditch tourists, hipsters and hipster tourists. Catch is a bit of an endearing disaster that somehow keeps itself alive and packed to the gills every night despite mediocre alcohol, awful DJ equipment that frequently fucks out mid set and a very bizarre dance floor/bar set up. Every time I play there I veer wildly between love and loathe, and at least once a set I decide I am going to pack it in; that the stupid equipment that scratches my cds, the needles that lose grip and skate across my vinyl if people jump really hard next to the booth (Beastie boys is dangerous territory here), the almost criminally low pay and the ever dwindling alcohol allowance can go fuck themselves. But then, somehow, I never do. I don't know if it's the weird people who come and shake your hand at the end of the set, or the kids who get so excited when they hear certain song they leap onto the guard rails and dance, one foot on a table, one foot one a rail, several feet up in the air, or the fact that after 5 years and a lot of moving around, it's pretty much the closest to a living room I have. So Catch happened. As it always does.

I then waited for the night bus. For an hour. In the rain.

When it arrived, someone had vomited on the floor.

Oh London.

Bye Bye Berlin

2009-11-12T23:04:00.003+01:00

Thanks for the drinks. For the broken boots, the skirt, the crumple effect outside Zozoville after too much jagermeister. Thanks for the smell of firewood in the morning and the way the air bites my fingers and cheeks and nose, the long wide roads, the masses of greenery I didn’t expect you to have. Thanks for the cupcakes, the spaetzle, the brunches, the late night burgers, the art, the races, the beer, Habarmayer, soup bundles, massive scarves, the beautiful people, the tram, the apartment big enough to do cartwheels in. And the bookshops. Did I mention the bookshops? And for the dogs I don’t even like, the tiny children peddling furiously on the tiny bicycles, the rigorous recycling routine, the clinking, The Big Pink, the visitors, the heavenly food halls, the fall of the wall. Not to forget the toasters and old army boots and soft toys hanging from the windows of the squats and all the green hair in Friedrichshain. The punks and vegan shoe criminals, the beasts, DDR era style, woven polo shirts, the love graffiti. 2am beer runs, Turkish shops, tiny glasses of hot black tea while waiting for falafel, the free wine bar, the Bronx accent, the big boots on the u-bahn, the wet mist. And for the smell of the air as you near Winter.

Thanks Berlin. You’ve been kind to me. I’ll come see you again soon.

Berlin's illustrious October showing

2009-11-12T02:38:00.001+01:00

You can have a little look see at October in Berlin over here.

Pink Noise

2009-11-12T00:42:00.005+01:00

I am in love. It might be infatuation and honestly I know I won’t be able to differentiate one from the other for a good few weeks yet, but right now it feels like love. Oh calm yourselves. (That means you Corlia.) I have not been swept up in a whirlwind romance with a starving German artist by the name of Anders that will result in my abandonment of imminent travel plans and elopement to Dusseldorf. No, I’m in love with ‘A Brief History of Love’ by The Big Pink. It’s a near perfect wall of sound, an aural onslaught that keeps me pushing play, repeat, listen to end, rewind, play, repeat, ad infinitum. Since I saw them at Lido a few weeks ago, I’ve been unable to do much else but listen to their astonishing debut album. Or, more accurately, I’ve been unable to do much WITHOUT listening to their astonishing debut album. I listen to it when I’m on the train. I listen to it when I’m drying my hair, applying Chanel liquid eyeliner, safety pinning broken boots closed. It’s walking, eating, writing, drinking music. I can’t guarantee you’ll like it... But if you do like it, chances are you’ll love it.

Velvet is quite possibly the best song of the year (a lofty title I have not bestowed upon a song since the pop masterpiece of Muse’s 2006 Supermassive Black Hole - the band they are currently supporting on a massive arena tour) Other worthy mentions are Countdown from Ten and Too Young to Love. Hold me back. It's a bit dance floor. A bit maudlin. A bit heartbreaking. And a lot loud. This is what music should be.

Buy the record. Beg. Steal. Borrow. Do it.

Oh, and for those of you so inclined (as I am,) lead singer Robbie Furze is a stone cold beast.

Dylan Moran + Germany = a good time

2009-11-11T14:33:00.001+01:00

This part is the same as it's ever been...

2009-11-10T22:44:00.003+01:00

I am dreading my departure from Berlin. Nothing emotional here, I swear, I am simply dreading the actual act of having to move my things into a two canvas receptacles and carry them, bag lady style, onto several modes of transport. My current estimation, barring any unforeseen S-Bahn nightmares, stands at 5: U-Bahn, S-Bahn, Plane, Bus and then Taxi. The last two should read Easyjet shuttle bus and then big red TFL Bus but I know that by the time I arrive at Victoria I will be flirting with losing my will to live and will in all probability cave and get a taxi.

I am sad to be leaving but in all honesty I make it my business to leave places. I never want to go, but I always do. I try not to dwell on it too much, I just up and leave. It’s quite possibly both the best and worst thing about me. So even if I am not all that keen on departing my current location, I always enjoy where I am going next. And so I continue doing it, this ridiculous cycle that appears to have no end in sight. Anymore, it’s the bit in-between I don’t love. It’s not the flying, which I am fine with. It’s not even the airports, the waiting, the queues, the ridiculously overpriced and always horrific coffee. No. It’s the carrying stuff. I hate carrying stuff. It’s awkward and heavy and it makes my shoulders hurt and then my jacket twists around and gets caught in my bag strap and I start to overheat and berate myself for not working out, for not being more physically capable of the stupid act, and then my hands will hurts and there is always a point, somewhere along the line, where I just want to drop my bags, drop myself onto them, put my head in my hands and have a small but distinct weep. Nothing too dramatic. No ugly cry face and heaving sobs, my hat falling forwards off my head and my knees giving out under me and the ensuing human crumple effect. No, something dignified. A single glistening tear, a shuddering breath. You know. That sort of thing.

Anyway, like most horrendous tasks, it’s always best to keep an idea of your end goal in mind. A bit of motivation, the carrot on a string, if you will. So, with my return to London and the hell it will take to get there, my carrot on a string (read: cupcake) list goes something like this:
(please note I am excluding people as if I start naming names, or not naming them, as the case might be, I am asking for trouble.)

Good Glassware
My apartment in Berlin, while huge and fantastic, is where ugly shit has come to die. It’s oddly laid out, strangely furnished (did I fail to mention previously this apartment has no dining table but an inexplicable 16 chairs? SIXTEEN!) and the cutlery, crockery and general kitchen items leave much to be desired. I am a bit of a glass snob and like my wine glasses big as bell jars and so thin that the tap of a fingernail at the wrong angle results in rogue cracks and broken stems. In Berlin I have been drinking my wine out of small tumblers that look akin to tea light holders. Which is fine when you’re in Italy and there are old men drinking grappa and playing cards all around you and the wine comes in unmarked bottles and is sloshed more than poured. But I’m not in Italy. I’m in Berlin. And I have missed good wine glasses.

Martinis
I have not had a Martini since I left London. I love Martinis. Super dry, extra dirty, with at least two olives. Berlin is a lot of things; it's punks and dogs and anarchists and hardcore fetish techno clubs. It’s also a desolate tract as far as the shaken mixed drink is concerned. Magpie and I went to a so called cocktail bar with the express intent of finding martinis, but left after 17 or so tense seconds as it was so awfully fromagey it made us have a dual mini sick. I also usually keep martini fixings at home; however one cannot drink a martini from a small tea light tumbler.

Albert Bridge
Albert Bridge is London’s most beautiful bridge. Tower Bridge can keep it’s bascules, it’s Disney castle towers. Richmond can keep it’s smooth stone arches and storybook background. For me, it is all about the pale pink and green span of Albert bridge stretching across the Thames, connecting Battersea to Chelsea. I love the view from the bridge, the little octagonal toll booths on either end, the signs that say ‘All troops must break step when marching over this bridge.’ I love the way, at night, it glows; 4000 little round light bulbs shining as if their tiny tungsten half lives depend on it.

The Sunday Papers
Lots of coffee, spreading all the sections of all the papers out, flitting between them all before dedicating myself to any one, admiring the clothes in the style sections, hating the models, hating the writers, hating the news, HATING the columnists, pretending to be more highbrow than I actually am and finally chucking it in and devouring the smut paper I’ve secretly bought and deriving masses of guilty pleasure from it.

High Heels
My feet have been languishing in flats. Berlin is too cobbled and frankly, a bit casual, to traipse around in heels all day. I’ve worn heels here in the evenings, as under the cover of darkness the cool Berliners cannot see nor sneer at my inappropriate foot wear. I’ve missed wearing high heels in the daylight. How I love a skyscraper shoe and full light in which to appreciate the full glory of it.

Meals in Chiswick that defy classification
The ones that start as brunch and turn into afternoon tea and then cocktail hour and then dinner and next thing you know, I’m sleeping in Shelley and Paul’s spare room because the trains have stopped running and there was wine involved.

So.Back to London. London again. I can’t even count anymore how many times I have left that place. Or more fittingly, I suppose, how many times I have gone back.

Tales from a perfectly typical/typically perfect weekend

2009-11-09T15:15:00.005+01:00

Everybody has a friend like Magpie. Everyone has THAT friend, the one with the soft leather gloves, the real Coach bag, the wardrobe bursting with knitwear of which every piece is cashmere. The one with the perfectly suited boyfriend; the best dressed couple you know, the JFK and Jackie of your phone book. (albeit, hopefully without the tragic and blood stained pink Chanel end.) While it would be easy to hate this friend we all have, the fact is, we don’t. I know I don’t. I want to. She’s too clever and well put together to not want to hate, but alas, the fact is, she is brilliant. Ere go, we are friends. Berlin and I were lucky enough to play host to her this weekend. I had been very much looking forward to her trip because she understands, mirrors and sometimes surpasses my obsessions with vintage clothes stores and food.

On Friday night we went for dinner at Henne. Henne is a chicken restaurant in Kreuzberg that serves, you guessed it, chicken. Chicken, cabbage salad, potato salad and bread. That is it. For the record, along with beer and remarkable looking men, I am adding chicken to the list of things that Germans KNOW. The meal, served in half chicken portions, is milk fried. Imagine if you will, southern fried chicken, but add the delicious flavour of a roast, some german zeal and you are probably still not able to imagine even 20% of the deliciousness it possesses. We (over)ate our chicken with side orders of kraut and kartoffel salat (best potato salad ever. hands down.) and drank delicious creamy beer from white, girly sized ceramic steins. The restaurant itself looks like the inside of a log cabin, complete with red gingham table clothes, antlers and deer heads mounted on the walls and hundreds of beer bottles lined up on the picture rails.

Saturday was food markets, lunch made almost entirely of cheese, looking at beautiful shiny things in beautiful shiny shops, happening across an American Apparel rummage sale (where all the broken, returned, stained items from AA shops across Europe go and are sold for a few Euros) and joy of joys, a I found a new pair of leggings and a deliciously soft long sleeved (super, super long sleeved – hence its initial return) white vest. We bought apfel strudel, saw some buildings, sat down to eat our strudel near said buildings, coined a phrase (strudel perch: any public spot where one sits to eat something.) At home we had a dinner made almost entirely of cheese (it was a cheese day really) and incredible spelt bread we’d bought at Winterfeld Markt. Then there were bars, tequila, sand on the floor tiki huts and the long and lengthy discussions of Magpie’s upcoming dissertation proposal for her Masters Degree at the loveliest and fanciest university in England, quite possibly the world. (I told you she was clever!)

I won’t lie to you and say that anything happened on Sunday morning. Sunday morning was spent sleeping off the aforementioned tequila. I was woken early in the afternoon by a phone call from my big brother and his awesome wife. (more often referred to simply as 'my sister' but I can't talk about my married brother and sister without veering off into undeserved redneck territory.) If there is anything better than the hilarity of a drunken couple calling you from the eleventh wine farm they’ve hit that day, I haven’t heard it. It was brilliant. I also love that that they get drunk and call me. It’s like I’m their married drunk dial. It fills me with a tremendous sense of self importance. Anymore, after the phone call, we proceeded to get on with the most typical of Sundays: a lazy brunch, meandering around the neighborhood and wandering around the Boxhanger Platz Fleamarket. (Spotted: Art beast selling his wares. Be still my beating heart.)

Then it was time for Magpie to leave. Sunday night transport mayhem ensued and the painless 25 minutes journey to the airport that should have been morphed into a treacherous, heinous monster of a trip that entailed six trains (SIX!!!!), biting nails, feeling a bit sick, making several flimsy contingency plans, obsessive clock watching, sprinting through the airport, begging the staff to let her check in past the allotted check in time, rushing through security, and by all accounts, making the plane.

So. That’s it for the visitors. Berlin and I are almost about to part ways. I leave on Friday. Boo and hiss.

Confessions of a so-called "music fan"

2009-11-05T20:32:00.006+01:00

The fall of the Berlin Wall is nearing its 20^th anniversary. The city is awash with celebrations. Having said that, most of the celebrations seem to be more for the international press than the city's inhabitants. As far as I can tell most Berliners seem more concerned with drinking on the U-Bahn than partaking in public displays of post wall affection. This afternoon, I read online that one such celebration was a free concert at Branderburger Tor. Apparently, the city of Berlin in conjunction with MTV (Oh the sweet, glorious irony!) had arranged for U2 to play a short open air set before their appearance at the MTV Europe music awards. The MTV awards are this evening. While I am by no means all that keen on U2, my interest was piqued. A free show? This evening? At the lit up Brandenburg Gate by one of the biggest bands in the world 20 years after the most closely guarded border in the world was opened?! What a spectacle that would be. Apparently the band had released 10 000 tickets on their website a few days ago and were snatched up in 3 hours. Being ticketless, I knew I wouldn’t be able to get right into the thick of things, but I thought I might pop by anyway in hopes that I might be able to spy something worthwhile on a giant TV screen from a distance. For some reason I think that everywhere is Wimbledon polite and will screen events for those too cheap/lazy to get tickets. In any case, I thought that even from a few blocks away I would be able to hear something.

So off I went. No one seemed to know exactly what time it was all starting. I waited. I waited. I stood around and waited some more. I could see the Brandenburg Gate but not the stage. (Second taste of delicious irony: To celebrate the fall of the Berlin wall, U2 play free gig at Brandenburger Tor. Free gig is blocked off by 12ft high metal fencing covered in white tarp.) I was however most certainly close enough that when music was made, I would hear it. It got later and colder and still, there was no sign of them. Was this worth it? For four songs of a band I don’t even really like? It was 5 degrees when I left the house and the temperature was plummeting. After about an hour of being jostled about by throngs of manically rude Italian tourists, a misty rain began to fall. My commitment to the whole excursion, which I had been wrestling with in typical to and fro indecisive fashion, suddenly set itself. Without much ceremony, I turned and walked against the flow of people streaming onto Unter den Linden and left.

I walked along where the wall once stood and as I grew more and more resolute in my desicion to leave, it seems so did the rain in its resolve to stay. The fine mist grew thick and fat and soon droplets of water were splattering down and bouncing up from the sidewalk. As I reached Mohrenstrasse Station, where I was to catch the (quite fittingly) U2 line toward home, I heard the distant din of a screaming crowd and the thud of a stadium rock band. I don’t know if it was real or if I imagined it, it wasn’t close enough to tell, but still, I only paused a moment before descending down the stairs to the train.

There are bands that I will stand in the rain and the cold for, but U2 simply isn’t one of them.

In other news, on the way there, my ipod froze, crashed, then died. That’s another for the list of ‘shit I own that no longer works.'

Words of wisdom for the perpetually blue

2009-11-04T21:38:00.002+01:00

I am a pit of malaise and miserablism. It’s best to not delve into this as it comes from unnecessary and ill advised delving initially. It will surely pass with time. As such, I absolutely cannot write tales of my day today. Or yesterday. Or the day before that. However, I can say that this state has inspired words of wisdom from my friend Tanya:

“Keep your eyes on the ground, I once found $100 bill on the floor of the pharmacy. You don't find that stuff when you're following cheery people's advice to "chin up!"”

And that made me laugh. So money or a brief departure from my signature scowl, I guess I win.

Falling apart at the seams

2009-11-03T02:59:00.003+01:00

I feel utterly trashy. Not the good kind of trashy, a glitter on the pillow, smeared eye makeup and an inexplicable left brogue sans owner found in the kitchen kind of trashy. No, I am referring more to the plastic garden furniture in your living room kind of trashy.

Everything I own is falling apart.

My Laptop
The state of my laptop is thoroughly depressing. I remember when I got it and it seemed to weigh as little as a single stamped envelope. It was small and fast and the keys had just enough yield that typing created a pleasant tapping. My laptop seems to have aged with me. Let’s just say it’s not as svelte as it once was. I am embarrassed to show it in public. The keyboard is clogged. I have no explanation for this. I clean the keyboard regularly, and yet it seems as if a thin layer of filth has infected it and I need to type really hard for the letters to register on screen. Often, the C will refuse to work unless I hold my thumb down on it for several seconds. The F10 key is missing. Thankfully I have never had a use for the F10 key, so it doesn’t hinder me too much.

The insides of the poor thing are in even worse shape. At random intervals, my internet explorer will open umpteenth windows of whatever site I am on. Frantically, I work to shut them all down, but my computer is not as fast as it used to be and this takes time. Sometimes, if too many open up too quickly I simply have to wait for all 47 windows to open and the inevitable crash that ensues. At least once every 2-4 days, my screen flips upside down. There is an awful moment when the screen goes black and then my cursor will appear, the tiny arrow pointing down. Then the whole screen will return, only upside down. I have no idea why this happens. I’ve run virus checks, spyware checks, AVG, everything I can think of. Even my computer genius brother doesn’t know why it happens. When it does, I have to restore my system. This is not the most speedy of tasks. In fact, I believe that system restores are filed under ‘Ball Ache’ in the big book of life. To make matter worse, I have to restore my system UPSIDE DOWN and in reverse. When I drag my mouse right, the cursor goes left. It’s a bloody nightmare.

The speakers no longer work. They haven’t worked for about a year. However, you could still get sound through headphones. This morning, the headphone port spat out tiny bits of plastic and metal. In order to get sound before, you had to press the jack down, as there was, I can only assume, a bit of a dodgy connection. However, the laptop is apparently tired of that and now there is no sound to be had. At all. The prospect of not being able to watch Michael McIntyre clips on youtube panics me more than I can fully tell you.

My battery charger, after a long and drawn out ordeal, also died a painful death. Unable to acquire a new Dell charger, I resorted to the cheapest charger I could find. Please note that I searched for days to find said charger, and eventually found one at MediaArkt (8000square metres of electrical good hell) that cost a sickening 50 Euros. That was the CHEAPEST one! It is roughly the size and weight of your average clay brick and due to compatibility issues, I was incensed to discover, cannot charge my laptop, but instead acts only as a power source. Accidently knocking the flimsy cord and dislodging the charger has resulted in many unexpected shutdowns and much filthy sailor swearing.

My Clothes
My boots finally died. I have tried to fix them but alas, this time I don’t think I will be so lucky as to coax a few more days of fully zipped wear out of them. I also inspected the soles and found them alarmingly worn down and completely without grip. This would explain why the smooth tiles of my building’s entrance hall are such a treacherous seven steps for me. Today I closed them up by wrapping a thin belt around my calf. It didn’t look bad and if one was none the wiser, it could easily pass for pirate punk. But being in the know, the whole thing had the slightly musty smell of homelessness and free soup. Why not wear other shoes, you ask? The other flats I have here are all in similar states of disrepair. Holes abound. It was raining out. I thought it safer to wrap a belt around my lower leg.

All of my trousers have holes in them. My jeans are about to give. The darning on my black trousers is teetering on the brink of embroidery. The handles of my favourite oversized horse bag bought in Paris far too long ago are held on by safety pins. This is not ideal when carrying heavy loads. My Pringle socks have holes in the toes.

Everything is falling apart. At the seams. Other things on the precipice of ruin include my ridiculous mobile (what was I thinking, getting a Prada phone? The things I will do for an attractive carry case.) My headphones. My luggage. My Chloe Paddington. I won’t go into too much more detail as I don’t want this to seem as if I am complaining. I’m really not. I’m simply stating the facts as they are. I find the whole thing amusing really. It’s all a bit Poète Maudit, but no need for concern until I wake up in Nina Hamnett territory.

Have you ever met a man with a vagina tattooed onto his chest? Because I have.

2009-11-02T14:45:00.005+01:00

First off, mom, dad, various aunts and uncles, you might want to skip this post. This might not make you all that happy. I am not kidding.

Okay, let me start from the beginning. James was in town in this weekend. Aside from watching the Big Pink at Lido, jacket shopping in Friedrichshain & Turkish Food, I was excited that James would be in town this last weekend for another reason: It was the last race of the season. James might not be as ridiculously obsessed as I am, but he knows his cars and is a good F1 buddy. He understands what I am talking about when I stare at the screen and mumble things like “the one stop could work out for him, but that means a long stint on the softs, which aren’t option and unless the track cool sufficiently he’s fucked. crazy brilliant tiny jap.” So on Sunday afternoon James and I go to the only place in Berlin I’ve managed to find that shows the race. It is an awful sports bar. There are Australian flags strung up. Backpackers are everywhere. No one speaks german. There is a hostel upstairs. It is the sort of place you would find in Wimbledon, the type of bar where a double shot of liquor inexplicably costs less than a single. It’s hellish. But it shows the race. So it serves my purpose. We watch the race and all is well.

The race finishes at about 4 and we have a few drinks inside of us. It’s getting dark and we decide to head out of that hell hole and go get a drink somewhere a little less depressing. We head back into Friedrishshain to a fantastic cosy little bookish bar and have a glass of wine. At about 6ish, I realise that the small bowl of chips that I ate at the sports bar is starting to wear a little thin and I am STARVING. We go have pizza (possibly the best pizza in Berlin??). We are seated at the same table as two dudes and it all goes a bit wrong. We eat their bread sticks. (We thought they were ours. They however, knew otherwise) We drank their beer. We didn’t realise we drank their beer until our beer arrived. When their pizzas arrived they made a snarky comment about how we might enjoy their pizza too. It was awkward as hell. After we eat, we go to meet James’ friend L. L works at a mammoth club in Berlin that is often said to be the best club in the world. It’s an old power station that now is hardcore techno heaven. They have a VERY STRICT no camera policy. If someone sees you with one, your ass will be on the street in a heartbeat. So, there are no pictures. Don’t ask for any. Also, this club shall remain nameless. If you know it, then you know it. If you don’t, then I’m not going to be the person to tell you. It’s better this way. I don’t want to get into trouble for disclosing the details of what might be the most literal interpretation of hedonism I've ever encountered. Anyway, L went to work at 6am on Sunday morning. She finsished her shift at 7pm on Sunday night and we went to have a drink with her at the club. This place opens on Friday night and closes at midnight on Sunday. When we went in at 8 o’clock on Sunday night, it was HEAVING. People had been there for 36 hours plus. Seriously. Time does not exist inside. There are no mirrors anywhere. There are no clocks. No windows. People are going off. Throngs of writhing bodies move as one organic mass. We walk through the club. There are mezzanines where people are making out, nodding off, talking shit, drinking and dry humping. There are dark rooms where you can nip into for a quick fuck. It’s not strictly a gay club, but I wouldn’t recommend it for anyone who is even slightly homophobic. For two reasons. Firstly, homophobia is a dickhead mentality and you shouldn’t be let out of the house. Two, you are almost guaranteed to see two guys fucking. Or at least getting head. Broken bottles are everywhere. Trails of piss and cum lead the way, Hansel and Gretel style to and from the bathroom. There are separate toilets for men and woman, but that is only a formality. People of both sexes walk into both. The bathroom is a party in itself. You wouldn’t believe that so many people could fit into such a small space. L’s boyfriend, R, having done a line of speed and an electronic music fan, dances with jazz hands. He is in general, a bit of a delight. He introduces us to a friend of his, a true Aryan boy, rail thin and beautiful, with white blond eyelashes and a lip ring, snowy blond hair that is shaved on the one side and falls over his face on the other. He is impeccably dressed, in black harem pants that sit low on his skinny hips, a just tight enough white t-shirt with a monochromatic image on the front (possibly naked 40s film star, can’t remember exactly) and the sleeves cut off, white lace up leather ankle boots. Naturally, I assume this beautiful young thing to be a rampant homosexual. He is too pretty, too well dressed, too, well, GAY, to be straight. That is the assumption I go with for a while, until L beckons me close to him, lifts his shirt with one hand and I see, on his breast bone, the most unbelievable intricate tattoo..... of a vagina. R laughs when he sees my shocked face. And then he mimics going down on it. I look again. There is something biblical about it. Literally. The clit is the Virgin Mary’s head. I will say that again. The clit. Is the Virgin Mary’s Head. My thought process went something like this:
WhyWhaHowWHoWha???WHAT????
Tattoo artists wield great power. I think that there should be some sort of psych test that a tattoo artist has to undergo before picking up an ink gun. I also think that ther should be some sort of psych test that people undergo before getting a tattoo. (Quick side note, there is a tattoo parlour in F-hain, that might qualify as the greatest tattoo parlour in the world. On the front door there is a sign. It has two red circles on it. In one circle is a Chinese symbol. In the other is a star. Both have big red lines drawn through them. Basically, if you want ‘spirit’ in Chinese tattooed on your shoulder or stars on your wrist, you can fuck off. It is BRILLIANT.) Anyway. It generally doesn’t take all that much to get somebody to mark you PERMANENTLY. Just a bit of cash. That’s all it takes. Seriously. If you have some money, then it’s not that much of a stretch to get someone to forever change the pigment of your skin so that for the rest of your days, there will be a giant, shockingly life like, gaping vagina on your chest.

So it stands to reason that the beautiful Aryan was in fact straight. After all, what gay man would EVER tattoo a vagina on their chest? A vagina with the Virgin Mary as a clit, no less. That might be gay hell. If he was gay, that would be a sure fire way to NEVER get laid. What gay men wants to be faced with a dogmatic vagina? He would have to spend the rest of his days having sex with his shirt on. So the beautiful Aryan is straight. Beautiful, blond, with the weirdest taste in tattoos ever. He also has a weird triangle thing around his belly button. I didn’t look that closely. There were other things that were taking up my attention. Clearly.
Unfortunately, I am not 100% certain what the etiquette is when faced with a such a sight. I reigned in the millions questions that were racing through my mind. Not once did I say, “WHAT THE FUCK?” I did however ask to see it again. Just once. And then I kind of nodded in an unimpressed way with sort of New Jersey Mafia lip curl and smirk, as if to say, “Yeah, cool, whatever. It aint a thang.” (Imagine the accent please.) And then we were done with it. But in my head, we were so not done with it. Every few minutes the image of it flashed in my head. And I chewed on the straw from my Whiskey and soda so that my lips did not ask the question that frankly, needed to be asked. "Why?"
Anyway, we leave the club after a few hours. It might be the best club in the world. I've heard it said. And even though I am not what you'd call a techno fan, it might be true. It's everything you want in a club.

Before we go home, James and I stop off at a Tiki bar. There is real beach sand on the floor. I love Berlin.

Nico leaves Williams

2009-10-29T22:49:00.003+01:00

Nico has officially declared that 2009 is his last season with Williams.
Firstly, I win that bet. I knew he would leave.
Secondly, what are the odds? Is he replacing Kovaleinen at McLaren or Barrichello at Brawn next year? Who wants to play? Paul, dare I say you and I might be on the same team next year?!
I'd prefer him to go to Brawn honestly. I'm quite certain that the McLarens will be back on pace IN A BIG WAY next year, but I my reasons for wanting Nico to race for Brawn are 3 fold:
1) I don't want to be a McLaren supporter. Really. It will pain me.
2) Barrichello needs to get his ass out of a race car and into some random commentary box a la DC. I am so over that small Brazilian.
3) I'm just not sure Nico can pull off the orangetastic garb those McLaren boys wear. I love me some Brawn.

Realistically, as it stands, I can see the following happening:
Nico takes Heikki's place at McLaren
Heidfeld takes Nico's place at Williams
And new boy on the block Bruno Senna gets his first F1 drive for Brawn. He tested for them last year. They can't possibly let another F1 season go by without getting that kid in a car.
Having said all that, my hope is still for a Button/Rosberg Brawn team. Can you imagine? I am hyperventilating just thinking about it.

Mother of the Blueness

2009-10-29T21:39:00.004+01:00

I’ve been eating speck and barley soup and drinking wine. I am bringing wine back. My body feels like the wasteland where complex carbohydrates have come to die. It’s all I can think to do. It’s winter and I want wine and soup. You can buy beautiful soup green bundles here. At Winterfeldt Markt in West Berlin they sell them all bundled up for a single Euro; two carrots, a leek, a few baby parsnips and a chunk of celeriac wrapped in twine. (Shelley would love them) A bit of speck (when in doubt, add smoked pork product to everything) and a handful of barley and you’ve got yourself a postcard worthy winter in a cup. Something about the soup makes me think of Glamorgan Road and for a few moments I am sitting at the table next to Craig eating soup out of those blue bowls with bread slathered in thick, cold butter, Matthew and Robin mercilessly making fun of us. I love winter food. Its richness, the comfort of it. How it tastes like nourishment.

Though it is technically fall, the ankle deep autumnal mulch underfoot a testament to the fact, I am already in winter mode. It’s a season for hats and scarves and popping the collar of your jacket up to shield you from the biting wind. It’s weather that makes me long for the rabbit fur snood Magpie and I are currently co-coveting. I love the smell of winter. Every time I leave my apartment I am assailed with the warm scent of firewood flooding the courtyard. It smells like trout fishing weekends and fireplaces so big you can sit inside them and nod off against the warm stone walls and card games and copper tables and glasses big as bell jars. I love the way the winter mist makes a haze of the wide streets and fogs up the headlights of the cars and make ladders of their beams. And tucking your hands into the sleeves of your jersey and sitting outside cafes with blankets over your knees, drinking hot black coffee, your breath blowing silver from your mouth.

Still, winter girl though I am, I can’t help but succumb to the mother of the blueness some days. (This by no means is something true for only winter. But I digress....) Today I went walking to try and shake it off and clear the cobwebs in my sleepy, sullen head. But I only ended up being followed half way around Prenzlauerberg by a creepy man in some sort of industrial waste cleaning uniform, who kept trying to get me go into large, wooded areas with him. After fifteen or so tense minutes, I tucked the blond bit of my hair into my bowler hat, pulled the old Rope a Dope and faked right when I in fact went left and ducked into the courtyard of a pretty church. Satisfied I’d lost the creep and happy to see there was a small organic market set up on the other side of the church, I spent some time wandering through the carts, admiring the stalls selling 12 types of apples, 54 kinds of meat. Though starving, I didn’t buy anything. I couldn’t face it to treat myself, thinking of my poor book left unloved most of last week. Terrible writer. I smack myself on both wrists and stare sullenly at the cold, unimpressed smirk of my blank notebook. It is not buying my “But I had visitors” excuse, and like a scorned lover, turns away from me and edges to the other side of the bed.
Later, I rode the U-bahn with no real destination in mind, listening to The National until my i-pod battery ran out, the unmistakable rough tongue of miserablism licking my neck. By the time I got home it was dark and cold. And I walked into my apartment and found it warm and smelling of European indoor heating. (a ridiculous sounding, but completely true phenomena. No other central heating smells quite like ours.)

I can’t help but notice that my time here is dwindling to weeks and soon those weeks will become days and then I will gone from the wide roads and the late night Turkish beer stores and the taste of winter on my tongue and soup greens wrapped in bundles and red paved cycle paths and smell of firewood in the morning...

Disclaimer: This is a reenactment

2009-10-29T19:08:00.005+01:00

MzTanya goes hobo outside the Gay Vampire Bar. Shockingly, this is not from Friday night. No, this was on the (comparitively) sober Saturday night, when we thought it would be a scream to capture what could have been/almost was. Taking this photo without the bar staff seeing us was challenging. I am behind the lens. Hiding behind a car.

Friday was a MESS.

2009-10-27T19:46:00.004+01:00

It started innocently enough. Tanya and I got up earlyish and went Second Hand Store crazy. First, we went to the five story monster Humana near Frankfurter Tor (spiritual home of the brightly coloured 80s leather jacket) and then the smaller, somewhat cheaper and less hilarious store near Alexander Platz. After we tore through Humana at lightning speed (purchases: Tanya: amazing tiny, fitted denim jacket with stretch cuffs and a double zip, black scarf, rock rock forever t-shirt, child sized zebra costume for Halloween. Eloise: double strand of buttery cream coloured pearls, ornate jewelled clasp. ridiculously underpriced.) we needed to stop by the bank so that Tanya might exchange some cash. As we walked into the bank, we spied an odd sight. The front counter, which would usually serve as an information point, was decked out for a party. There were bowls of sweets, leaflets, goodie bags of some sort etc etc. I looked closer. There were glasses. There were ROWS AND ROWS OF GLASSES. THERE ARE BOTTLES. The smiling woman behind the counter was handing out red canvas bags with the bank’s name on them. As I took a bag, I studied the scene more closely and it dawned on me that we have stumbled into what I can only describe as the Holy Grail of the finance calendar: Free Champagne Day at the Bank. It is about 2pm. Between queuing up to exchange money (wechseln, bitte!), loitering a tiny bit and pocketing the leaflets, sweets and balloons that had yet to be blown up, we managed to polish off three glasses of champagne. Each. We were in there for 20 minutes at the most. The glasses were not tiny. We had not eaten. Do you see where I am going with this?

We proceed to The Ramones Museum in Mitte where we were due to meet Nat and Sarah. The museum has a cute little cafe at the front of it and since neither Tanya or I are desperate to see the actual inside of the museum we decide it best to continue what we started. We order Irish coffees (It was COLD out) and sit back and wait for the girls to arrive. We are starving. But the whiskey lashed coffee is hitting the spot. The girls are nowhere to be seen. An hour and a half passes before they arrive. By this point, Tanya and I have settled happily into our drinking boots and the warmth of the interior of the cafe coupled with the comfort of the couches has resulted in afternoon inebriation. Everything is hilarious. We are starving.

After Nat gets her Ramones fill (the only of the four of us with sufficient love and dedication to the iconic punk band to willingly part with her money to enter the little museum) we head home, stopping at a supermarket on the way home to pick up some bits and pieces for dinner and some wine. Becuase this is what we need. Wine. We hang out and talk shit and drink and finally get some food into ourselves. As the night draws on, Tanya, Sarah and I decide to go to a bar. Because that is what we need. To drink more. (Nat is a clever girl and stays home to have a little sleep. This was to be the beginning of a vicious 48hr bug that flattened her for two days, but more about that another time.) We go to Habarmeyer on Garntnerstrasse (home of the DJ BEAST who had been playing there the Friday before.) Alas. DJ Beast is not there and neither is the incredible selection of music he plays. Still, we stay. A less beastly DJ arrives and plays and the music is good and beer is cheap and the people are nice to look at and you can smoke inside, so we stay. We stay a while. Eventually Sarah, having just landed that morning, calls it a day and heads home to bed. Tanya and I do no such thing. We continue. We tell hilarious stories until we cry. We tell sad stories until we almost cry. We drink some more. We realise that I do a pitch perfect Bronx accent and I spend the rest of the evening talking as though as I care/know anything about the Yankees and live somewhere above East 132nd Street. Eventually, we leave. On the way home, we stop for drunken falafel. This naturally comes with a side order of beer. As we are finishing said falafel, Tanya says, “I could really do with a whiskey.”
When you are drunk and really don’t need anything more to drink, a night cap before going back to your apartment seems like the best idea on god's green earth. So we stumble up the road. We are plastered. We are doing that thing that girls do when they are hammered, holding hands and walking in something of a zigzag, all the way keeping our forward motion. Something is hilarious. I have no idea what. But something certainly is. I am still talking like I come from the Bronx. “I don’ wyatch it, but if yoo wanna wyatch the gyame, I’ll fuckeng wyatch it!” My stomach hurts from laughing.

There is a bar literally opposite my apartment block that I have been wondering about for a while. It looks like an unassuming old man’s pub and some boys I met from Sweden a few weeks ago told me that they had ended up in there almost every night before returning to where they were staying, a block away. It stays open until 5 or 6 or some ungodly hour and those boys were Mark Twain Cool, so I assumed it would be safe enough. It was quite easily decided that this bar would be the spot for our last drink of the evening.

We open the door. We walk in. Somewhere in the distance, a fruit machine plays a tinny tune. The air is musty, the faint smell of stale beer. A tumble weed blows past. We’ve opened the door. The bartender has seen us. There is no turning back. Our steps are impossibly loud on the floor. This is no cool after hours drinking dive. No. This is Not. Where. We. Are. Supposed. To. Be. There is no music. The room is tiny, a small wooden bar along the one side its main feature. Propping themselves up on the bar are an old homeless man with a plastic bag full of possibly shoplifted items he tries to sell us and the bartender at random intervals (contents include 54% Rum and a tray of Belgian chocolates) and on the other end of the bar is a very boring and simultaneously massively creepy looking 50ish man. The bartender looks at us with indignation. We should not be here. We know it. He knows it. We just don’t know how to leave without making the situation even worse. Let me state that I was at first convinced the bartender was a masculine woman. Tanya was convinced it was a feminine man. I eventually conceded that he was in fact male. He was rocking some fierce guyliner. Not drag queen make up, rather, getting up and fixing your face for the day makeup. You know, basic foundation, liquid eyeliner lids and a lick of mascara. His shirt was red satin with a black fringe, pearl snap buttons and patterned, silver collar tips. We were very possibly in the scariest gay bar in the world. The bartender was hating us. The other guy was hating us. We were by then hating ourselves. Only the homeless man found our presence entertaining and would every so often, point at us and say something in German and laugh hysterically. We were all thinking it. He was only one crazed enough to vocalise it. It was the single most awkward drink I’ve ever had in my life.

When we were done with our drinks we paid and walked as casually as possible toward the door. As soon as we were out of it, we sprinted across the street and into the safety of my apartment building. In hysterics, we climbed the stairs, trundled into the apartment and collapsed. As it stands, ‘Funfundreissig’ or ‘The Gay Vampire Bar’ (as it is now known) is not on my list of bars to frequent.

Needless to say, we slept in on Saturday.

Art Beast.... and miles to go before I sleep

2009-10-26T00:28:00.007+01:00

On Thursday afternoon the girls and I were walking down MainzerStrasse on our way to an alcohol induced something or other. Passing by the Milkabilly Rock n Roll Milk/Soda/Waffle Bar and a tattoo parlour, we spy a small art gallery. Zozoville Gallery. A Mecca of galleries. No snotty assistants, no severe haircuts, no stark white walls, no abstract anything. Instead, it’s a small room that looks warm and inviting, a bench outside to cater to passing smokers in need of a sit down. The gallery appears to be run by/feature the work of two artists: Johan Potma and Mateo Dineen. We go and have a look around and we are all enthralled. The work is beautiful and a little comical and sometimes sad and whimsical and often, the tiniest bit heartbreaking. The girls love Johan Potma's stuff, who seems to specialise in fanciful furry creatures and somewhat endearing monsters while I fall utterly in love with Mateo’s work. It’s acrylic (I am almost certain, thought not enough of a connoisseur to be of a definite stand point) on various surfaces. Some are on standard canvases, but they also have paintings done on the back of geometry set tins (remember your first day of high school and your shiny new maths set?) the tops of old wooden chests, armoire doors and the rogue covers of DDR era fridges.
On the wall, on the back of a box top, is a small painting of a small man under a night sky in a forest, his chin in his hands, looking into a campfire and birds nesting in his white bear hunting style hat. (I pause to notice how I own a similar hat., sans birds.... sometimes....) I love the picture. I LOVE IT. and then, as I am swimming in its delight, I notice how at the bottom, a phrase is inscribed:
“...and miles to go before I sleep...”
This piece of work that I am so instantly and utterly drawn to is not only one of the most beautiful pieces of art I have seen, it is also INSPIRED BY A FUCKING FROST POEM?!I am undone.
I must have it.
I need it.
it makes me want to have a permanent address so that I might have somewhere to hang it. This Mateo, he of the beautiful beautiful art, knows Frost?
Tanya sees a piece that she loves and inquires of the price. It is 2500EUR. Holy God. That’s half a years rent in Berlin. I am afraid to even ask the price of my painting. I know I will not be able to afford it and I know that the disappointment of the concrete fact will crush me. So instead I go over the boxes of prints and sift carefully through. Woe is me, the print is not there. The girls find other prints they love and purchase them. They pay their money to a tall blond man who is, typically for the city, far too good looking for his own good.. Sullenly, art printless, I start to leave the shop and then ask, in a fit of optimism to the blond, “You don’t happen to have a print of the Frost painting some where?”
He says, “Actually, I made some of those today. I haven’t put them out yet. Do you want one?”
Firstly: Holy hell, YES.
Secondly: Is this hot blond Mateo? He of the penchant for whimsical heartbreak and Frost?
As he goes into the studio or back room or whatever magical Alladins cave it is that holds these treasures, I lean over the girls and whisper, “Art. Beast.”
He returns with my print. I attempt to pay him and find myself quite suddenly with too many thumbs and an alarming lack of dexterity. Put me in fumbling distance of a talented beast and chances are I will indeed fumble. I berate my hands. I momentarily loathe myself. As we leave, he says, “We are having a gallery party here on Saturday night. There will be music and food and a silent auction. You girls should come.” I make some noises that seem to be a garbled vocal agreement to the flippant invitation and stumble out into the freezing Berlin night, my Frost print close to my chest. Mateo, the boy genius with the love for frost is a 6ft tall Californian Art Beast? If I didn’t love Berlin before, I am pledging allegiance now.
Anyway, Saturday night rolls around and we head over the gallery to find it RAMMED. there was literally not even space to step inside. So Tanya, Sarah and I decide to go get a drink and a bite to eat and head back later and see if anything is still going on. I can’t even see my Frost Painting on the wall and I feel myself jonesing. I want to see it again. Just like the way Shell can’t go near the Tate Modern without spending some time with “her” Monet. We agree to return post sustenance. Dinner is fantastic and delicious and in a restaurant with a black and white checked floor so beautiful I want to press my face to it, but for the sake public decency, don’t. More about that another time. After we eat ourselves into an Italian coma, we trudge back up Mainzer Strasse (this time slightly heavier with wine and pasta) and find, joy of joys, the gallery still open and with somewhat more room to manoeuvre. We go in. The painting is there. I spend a ridiculous amount of time looking at it. A man who works there asks Tanya (who is armed with her camera) not to take close ups. I spy Art Beast. Inexplicably, I am smitten. Or, completely understandably. Depending on how you look at it. The Frost quote on the painting has been up on my (kill me now) book mood wall since I got here. I feel a cosmic alignment I want to hold onto with both hand followed swiftly by a brief wave of sobriety and I know that the cosmos has fuck all hand in this. Lots of people like Frost. Not as many as should, but a lot, none the less. He is wearing a polka dot shirt and being the artist of the hour. I want to go up to him and get aggressively in his face about the painting and ask if he has a Birches inspired painting in the works and if so, how much will it be, so I can start saving now. [side note: an old friend of mine from NYC, SS, is an INCREDIBLE artist. Unbelievable. I went through a good few months of being, quite plainly, obsessed with Birches and as a result of my obsession, she painted the most beautiful piece, over the prints of emails I had sent her quoting the poem. Even my typos were included. It was extraordinary. It’s been two years since I’ve spoken to SS (heartbreaking in itself, I am sure with good reason but sadly ones I know not of) and I cannot even hear Frost without thinking of her and what was to me, a simply awe inspiring work of hers. Anyway]
I don’t go up to Art beast. I salivate over the Frost Painting. I tentatively ask the dude who works there of the price. He tells me it is 2450EUR. FUCK ME. Worth every penny, I am certain, and if I had it, I would buy it. But I am dealing with discount supermarkets here. I really should not even be allowed in galleries at this point.

Tanya and I get a drink and check out more of the work and she buys a bunch more prints (from the other dude Johan Potma) and a t-shirt (been there, done that, yadda yadda) and we go and smoke a cigarette on the thoughtfully laid out afore mentioned benches. It takes us a good fifteen minutes to eventually drag our asses out of the vicinity of the gallery and head (the whole three and a half minutes) home. Every time we go to leave I need to see my painting (“my painting?!”) one more time. We look at the painting, we take six steps out the door, we turn, we look at the painting again, almost leave, go back to look at the painting, repeat ad nauseam.

We went home. Print safely in my possession. Art Beast and original art work still at large.

Things I LOVE/HATE about Berlin. Part 2

2009-10-21T00:03:00.005+02:00

Things I Love
The Beasts of Berlin.
I know I have spoken of the aforementioned beasts previously, but since then I have had more time to further process and hone my, frankly bordering on vulgar, perversion. I have invented a new game whereby once a beast is spotted he is nicknamed and given a place in the pecking order, of most beastly to least beastly beasts seen that day. At the end of the day I award a small prize award to The Beast of The Day. The Beast of the Day award is for the large part a redundant exercise. There is no physical proof of it, no certificate. It proves absolutely no purpose except to entertain myself and whoever I am with.
Last Friday, for instance, Tamaryn and I partook in beast spotting all over this fine adoptive city of mine.

Potentials for Beast of the Day were:

Preemie Beast
Young enough to do without shaving. Not so young it was illegal.

Lord Beast
English Aristocratic god with Rod Stewart hair in navy McQueen coat who asked us for drinking establishment recommendations. Wore brogues.

Blond Beast
Possibly wearing foundation. Didn’t detract from his beastliness. That is saying something.

Waving Beast
Driving past us on Unter der Linden. Checking us out checking him out checking us out. He looked first. Awkward ‘deer in headlights’ moment as both parties realised we were busted mid scope. Beast smiled, waved. Charmed.

Beast on a bike
Possible cycle courier. possibly rocking a half shaved dread locked disaster on his head. Didn’t even care.

DJ Beast
Playing 60s Motown and swing beats in fantastic bar in Friedrichshain (aka my hood), black shirt buttoned all the way up, severe moustache. Most certainly in the Top Ten Most Beautiful People I Have Ever Seen In Real Life.

DJ BEAST WON! Hands down. It was not ever FAIR to the other beasts.

(side note. My dad reads this blog. Sorry dad. I swear I am also writing a book and being productive. Also, any distractions this city has made me succumb to I blame wholeheartedly on my genetic coding. I am a de Fine.)

Nat is here now and we spent the evening eating Thai food, walking around Friedrichshain, drinking rice beer (me) and lemon grass tea (her) and explaining the rules of Beast of the Day. She has proved to be an apt pupil. One day initiation done and dusted, tomorrow we hit Prenzlauerberg. Five bucks says she spots the winner. I am a wonderful teacher.

Things I Hate
The goddamn early flights that arrive in this city. This morning I went to the airport to pick up Nat. I only got three hours sleep before having to get up and go through to the flughafen. That’s right. That’s some elementary German right there. Now Nat is one of my best friends. We have been through some things together. More trips to New York than is healthy, delicious eggs, more hotel bars in more cities I can begin to count, road trips, whipsnade, bars, chemo (hers), shaving heads (hers again), recovery, bars, more bars, more treatments, less bars. She was the girl who helped me with my broken heart. I was the girl who made her wear skinny jeans. We are a team. And I am honestly so so happy to see her, but this morning, on the S-Bahn back from the airport all I could do was yawn and shiver and feel that awful prickly feeling I get when I am desperately in need of sleep. And for a few awful, awful hours, I was a terrible friend. I was not a hostess with the mostess. I could see Nat look at me in that way, arching her eyebrow as if to say, ‘Are you fucking kidding me? I come all the way to Berlin to see you and you can’t even get it together to PRETEND to be excited to see me?’ Shame washed over me. Hot prickling shame. Embarrassed and apologetic, I locked myself in my room for a one hour disco nap. When I awoke, it was as if it was a new day. I bounced out of bed, my hair awry, jumped on her bed, accidently sort of bit her arm in my excitement and hugged her. I am sometimes a bit shitty, but I make nice when I can. Needless to say, I’m ecstatic she’s here and cant wait for our friend Tanya to come and join us from NYC on Thursday. Bastard flies in at 7am and I have to go get her from the airport. Expect repeat scene. Balls.

My final word on 'The Skirt'

2009-10-20T00:42:00.002+02:00

Completely inappropriately, this bizarre little dance was captured at the very sombre and fascinating 'Holocaust Memorial.' I promise that the image captured is not at all reflective of my feelings about the memorial, the travesty it spoke of nor the shitty weather we were experiencing at that moment. Frankly, i don't know what is going on with it. However, it does show my skirt. Corlia, I have no more to say on the matter.

Poor but sexy

2009-10-19T20:56:00.003+02:00

How to eat your way through three days

2009-10-19T15:55:00.007+02:00

I am cutting teeth. One would hope at my age that such glories as pushing new bits of dentyne and nerves and enamel through sensitive gums would be a thing of the years past, but no. My wisdom teeth are making their presence known. It hurts. it feels like I am chewing on a mouthful of gravel sized glass. In what I can only assume is some sort of reaction to it, I have also taken to grinding my teeth/clenching my jaw in my sleep. When I wake in the morning, I have to literally pry apart my upper and lower jaw with the use of my hands. Needless to say, I am somewhat unhappy with the whole situation.

Anyway. Enough about that. This past weekend was graced with a visitor so therefore I spent more time concentrating on eating and drinking than I did on my teeth. Tamaryn was in town. She arrived on Friday morning and we spent the morning taking in a whirlwind tour of the city. It went something like this:
Checkpoint Charlie
Course of wall
Holocaust memorial
Brandenburg tor
check, check, check, check.
Can we start eating yet?

Our first food stop was to eat some currywurst. Berlin is famous for inventing the snack, credited to a Charlottenburg woman called Herta Heuwer sometime after WW2, using the ketchup and curry powder she acquired from British soldiers to dress the plain old pork sausage up in new, post war garb. I tried currywurst a few weeks ago from a place called ‘Konnopke’, arguably Berlins most famous currywurst stand and was UNDERWHELMED. nothing about it was good for me. it wasn’t inedible... but it wasn’t good either. The sausage was rubbery, the curry was nonexistent, the ketchup was an unnatural coloured, watered down mess usually found at Wimpy restaurants. Currywurst, I decided, was a tradition the germans could keep for themselves. However, I read about this place called Wittys. Wittys is an imbiss stand (a sort of snack hut) on the northwest corner of Wittenbergplatz. Its specialty is, of course, currywurst. I heard that the chips were the best in the city, the wurst delicious. But it was something else that piqued my interest. Everything was organic. So I thought, if I was going to foray back into the wurst thicket, I would do so with organic intent.
After our whirlwind sightseeing tour, we hit the imbiss stand. And on my days. OH MY DAYS. It was so delicious I almost wept. The chips were thick cut and golden, crispy on the outside and light and fluffy on the inside, the sausage was soft, flavorful and spicy, the tomato sauce was deep red – clearly made of real tomatoes. Having eaten Wittys currywurst, I do believe I understand why Germany sells 800 million servings of it a year.

After our delicious lunch (that I won’t lie to you, we flat hand shoveled into our mouths) we headed across the street to KaDeWe, up to its heavenly 6th floor food hall. KaDeWe (Europe’s biggest department store) is, if I am well behaved, where I am going to go when I die. Picture miles and miles of marble counters, champagne bars, sushi, pretzels, fresh pasta, oysters, bird of paradise coloured exotic fruit, whole counters dedicated solely to eggs, wraparound counters of cheese, cheese islands even, the smell of baking bread, chocolates, truffles and cured meat. One of my favourite things to do is to drink champagne in lavish food halls. I love everything about it. The man sitting next to you polishing off a 120eur bottle of rose champagne alone, the ladies what lunch with their white china tureens of steaming soup, their diamonds glinting in the store lights, the smell of Chanel as you walk past. I love the sound of cracking lobster claws a few counters along, the tempting call of the cheese counter from the next room, and knowledge that if you take two lefts and then a right you will end up at the canapé counter where the swan shaped profiteroles swim idly by on silver trays. Food halls are my heaven. KaDeWe might have surpassed Paris’ Galeries Lafayette as my favourite.

Other food highlights from the weekend include but are not limited to:
Afternoon tea and cake (or champagne and apple tart) at Opernpalais on Unter den Linden
Peanut butter and chocolate cupcakes from Cupcake
Long and lazy Sunday brunch that included hearty portions of stuffed deep fried artichoke hearts
Raclette from Winterfeldt Markt (the most delicious and extraordinary food market)
Sweet, crunchy pears the size of rugby balls
Cheese, figs and pretzels before going out
A drunken 3am hunt for falafel that ended in a drunken 3am molestation of burgers, chips and sugary soft drinks. Seriously. How can something so bad be SO GOOD?

So Tam has gone back to London and I am tired, kind of bloated and, to be honest, strangely hungry. I am doing my utmost to hold off for few more days until I venture back to Wittys. But I’m not sure just how long I can hold out.

If you don't care about cars, look away now.

2009-10-18T21:55:00.005+02:00

Interlagos BLEW MY MIND!

Some highlights for me included:

Reuben’s rather suspect pit stop with 8 laps to go. I love it when Ross Brawn plays favourites. (Actually, I now know that Reubens had a puncture and therefore had to get new tyres.... but I like my original evil thoughts better, so I’m sticking with them.)

Kimi’s incredible start. Kimi was on fire! Fantastically, after a fuel hose malfunction courtesy of the I believe soon to be unemployed Kovalainen, Kimi was literally ON FIRE. Imagining that moment in Kimi’s helmet is hilarious. Do you think he even noticed?

The fact that it was the Brawn mechanics who managed to detach the fuel hose from the McLaren.

That hilarious little tussle between trulli and sutil after they both konked out of the race. Jarno, the 'wraparound polarised lense sunglasses most often seen on cyclists' wearing Italian has NEVER been a favourite of mine and to see him stand up on his tippy toes and reach up as far as his little arms could go to push the calm and well behaved Sutil around was GOLD.

Jenson’s aggressive overtaking. The man was inspired.

Kobayashi’s showing on his first race. We’ve had so many driver changes this season and the Japanese replacement for Toyota’s Timo Glock is the only one who hasn’t left me feeling distinctly underwhelmed. Jaime Alguersuari might be a treat to look at, but that preemie beast sure knows how to finish a race dead last.

Heidfeld running out of fuel. Let me say that again. Heidfeld. Ran. Out. Of. Fuel.
Idiot.

The smile and shrug thing Nico did after his gearbox went and he was forced to retire. One day, he will be in charge of our children’s manners. He has class.

Brawn’s inaugural Constructers Championship.

Jenson Button, the new world champion. I knew it was going to be a good day when I saw his pops sitting in the garage, wearing that pink shirt. I am SO SO happy. Seriously. You'd think I know the dude.

So tonight, in celebration of two championship titles and a ridiculously good race, why not make like Kimi Raikkonen and get fucked up with a Flaming Ferrari?

Flaming Ferrari
Ingredients
3 oz. Dark Rum
3 oz. White Rum 2 oz. Blue Curacao
Instructions
Pour the white rum into a glass. Add the dark rum. Pour the Blue Curacao into a separate shot glass. Light the rum mixture and suck with a straw. Whilst doing this, pour in the Blue Curacao into the glass and finish. ALWAYS USE CAUTION WITH FIRE.
(Recipe from http://www.barnonedrinks.com/)

Bands in bookshops

2009-10-14T16:48:00.003+02:00

Last night I went to East of Eden bookshop on Schreinerstrasse. There, I saw a band called 'before you die...' (Yes, if you're wondering, bands playing in bookshops is a common enough occurence in Berlin)

before you die... might be my new favourite band. They're everything I want in a band. Their music is some some of swamp blues gypsy megaphone fuelled folk. They look like they've just walked out of a Mark Twain novel. A banjo is involved. It's fucking fantastic. They're a sort of a Swedish 'Dead Brothers' but quite possibly better.

You can hear them here.

Do it. You won't be sorry.

The Skirt

2009-10-14T16:45:00.003+02:00

For Corlia. Just me and my skirt, hanging out.

The Debacle of the Black Leather Mini Skirt

2009-10-13T13:31:00.003+02:00

(A story in 2 parts. Part 2)

Okay, so, I decided that I needed to buy a black leather mini skirt. It couldn’t just be a regular old black skirt, as I already have one of those and I can’t afford to be doubling up on wardrobe pieces at this stage of my life. So, I decided that black leather it was to be. And not slutty biker black leather, nothing you’d see in Coyote Ugly or could imagine Paris Hilton wearing. Rather, something vintage, high waisted, the skirt equivalent of Michael Crowe’s literary sock, ‘a sock you can really read something in.’ It would go with EVERYTHING! I could just imagine it. Tucking my grey wife beater into it. Pairing it with my black riding boots and Chloe Paddington. The coupling of my future skirt and grey woolly tights would be the Bill and Hillary of my wardrobe, the power couple. My skirt and I were going to do great things, write great books, travel to great places, see great sights. I may have put unnecessary pressure on the poor skirt.

So, like any girl on a budget, I hit the second hand stores. I have seen the insides of some second hand stores in Berlin. From the top of Prenzlauer Berg to the bottom of Kreuzberg, I’ve looked. I looked for days. And days. Sure, there were skirts, but none of them were quite right. Too long, too small, too shiny, too expensive. Eventually, at a store a little closer to home, the Humana near Alexander Platz (not the mammoth five storey store I previously mentioned) I found two contenders. I traipsed into the dressing room and found that the first, while fantastic on the hanger, was not ideal when it was on. It was intended for someone with both a smaller waist and bigger ass than I. To say that the cut was odd is an understatement. It also had two very strange pockets that caused the front of the skirt to balloon somewhat when you moved. It was not hot. I put the skirt back on the hanger and tried the second one on. The second one... the second one was PERFECT! It was everything I wanted in a skirt. It veered just on the right side of rock n roll without collapsing over the line into joan jett and her power mullet territory. It begged to be paired with an oversized bun and a cardigan. It was my Michael Crowe literary sock. And it was only 9 euros! Result.

Happy that I had found my skirt, I put my jeans back on and stepped into my riding boots. I zipped up my left boot, smiling to myself. I zipped up my right boot and found that smile quickly dissipate into abject horror as the slider from the zipper of my right boot detached itself from the teeth. My knee length boot flopped open, a leather puddle at my ankle. I sat in near tears, trying desperately to fix the zip. But it would not fix. It was, quite truly, pretty fucked. These are my favourite boots. Right now, they are my only boots. I NEED THESE BOOTS. Winter in Berlin begs for boots like these. Eventually, I made peace with the fact that these boots could not be fixed without some pliers, some scissors and a needle and thread. I would have to go home and fix them there. However, I couldn’t walk with the boot flapping open as my foot kept slipping out. So I tried to tuck the boots into my jeans, a reverse from the usual jeans into boots look I usually go for. The thing is, I wear pretty tight jeans. Skinny jeans. As it is, there is little room to manoeuvre, never mind make space for a knee high leather boot. So it ended up that I could fit the top 5 inches or so into the jeans and the rest of the boot sort of scrunched up around my ankle. Think of a leather leg warmer, if you will. I unzipped my other boot and did the same thing with it. If I was going to look ridiculous, I at least wanted to look even whilst I did it. Unhappy, I grabbed my skirt, went to pay, and then walked the 25 minutes home in my stupid, broken boots.

At home I performed an hour long boot surgery to seeming success. The boots zip up again, but they are fragile and frankly, I don’t know how much longer they have left in them. Trying to focus on the positive, I think ‘Well, at least I have my skirt.’ With great ceremony, I take it from my bag to admire it. And horror of horrors, I took the wrong fucking skirt. Oh god. In my hands in the tiny waist, huge ass, bubble stomach pocket skirt. Oh no no no. This skirt is not a skirt I can really read something in! I have to exchange it. Another terrible realisation dawns. I have to exchange it and I’m going to have to do that IN GERMAN. I’m not happy. So the next day I go back to Humana and spend a good hour looking for the other skirt. That Humama boasts that it has over 20 000 articles of clothing and I’m pretty certain I looked through at least 7000 of those to locate the skirt I accidentally left behind the day before. Skirt in hand, I go up the counted and in my best German (which, honestly, still isn’t very good) ask if I can exchange. The skirts cost the same amount, however I see that the skirt I purchased was previously more and marked down. You can’t exchange sale items. Eventually, through verbal grovelling in broken German and an inadvertently comedic skit that involved me demonstrating just how bad that skirt looked on me, the kind woman behind the counter broke down and let me exchange. And then she gave me this look, as if to say, “You, get out. Before I change my mind.” I grabbed the skirt (the right one!) off the counter and skipped out of the store, running gleefully home.

I'm happy to report that I was right about my skirt. It goes with everything. It even makes a pair of broken boots look good.

Leg(ging)less in Berlin

2009-10-13T00:24:00.004+02:00

(A story in 2 parts. Part 1)

Londoners know two things: Abstract anger and leggings. The former needs little further said. If you’ve ever ridden the tube at rush hour, you know what I mean. I don’t hate it. I kind of love it. It’s intrinsic to the workings of The Big Smoke and somewhat endearing; a blood vessel in the thigh of the city I love and call home. However... The leggings. We can talk about the leggings. You cannot brush past a hipster in topshop without being in a two foot radius of a legging clad beast. It’s been this way for some time now. I’m not judging it. I am part of it. I wear leggings. I understand the love of leggings, the damn near need. If only all leg wear gave one such comfort, such freedom, looked so good tucked into riding boots. However, love, freedom and comfort can lead one into a false sense of security and for a while there I believed that leggings were a universal (read: first world, vogue reading) fact. However, after arriving in Berlin and travelling no more than the distance than the airport to my apartment a horrific internal line of questioning made itself known:
“Holy God, have leggings not arrived in Berlin? or, have they arrived and left? Am I wearing work out gear in public right now? Is this more or less ridiculous than when Edie Sedgewick wore her ballet get ups to bars in NYC in the 60s?” after a mild panic attack on the S-bahn, I look down at my outfit and think, Fuck Edie. This is a good look.

In any case, the question has continued to plague me: Where are the leggings? What are girls wearing instead? There are a lot of leg covering variations but no consistent through and through replacement. I have been on the lookout as I need a new pair. My black leggings, trusted companions I bought in SA for R30 has a homeless sized hole in the left leg of them (amongst other smaller holey friends) and frankly, no amount of darning can repair them to the state of public showing. They are beyond help. So I’ve been looking for some new ones, to no avail. After a while (as in, from my arrival to now) I have given up the leggings charade, thinking I should move on. My plan to move on went like this.
1) I need some good thick tights for winter. Something more aggressive than the old opaque black staples. Something REALLY wintery. Something..... Woolly. Maybe a grey pair. I don’t know. Why not?
2) To go with my hot new/grannyesque tights, I need a black skirt.
After I arrived here I realised that my somewhat new but wholly beloved high waisted brass buttoned black mini skirt was accidently packed away in some godforsaken black hole of a cupboard somewhere in south London. Thus, to survive winter in Berlin I needed a new one. And the more I thought about it the more I thought that a regular black skirt simply wouldn’t cut the mustard. What I needed to go with my wardrobe was.... was... was... a Black. Leather. Mini. Skirt.
Okay, before I get into the debacle of buying said skirt, let me give you a quick rundown of how I stand, clothing wise. Three years ago I was one of the glorious 8% of females who owned and wore more than 108 pairs of shoes. I had more clothes than I can even pretend to be embarrassed about. I loved my wardrobe. I fucking loved it. I had pink silk shirts, gold lurex dresses, polka dot poodle skirts I bought in Italy and kept ‘just in case’ I ever found the occasion to wear them. Platforms from the nineties, vintage 50s pumps, grey mohair gloves that reached my elbows and filled me with pure, unadulterated joy.... I OWNED ALL OF THESE THINGS.
However, time and life has moved on. I no longer have the space or money to store such frivolous wonders. So, as time has gone on, I’ve shed more and more of my so called crap and am now the not quite so proud owner of less than 40 pairs of shoes. It pains me. I know that I am a shallow bitch and that people in Africa are starving, but still it pains me. The machete I’ve had to take to my shoe collection pains me more than I can ever fully tell you. I digress. When it comes time for me to move place to place (as I do) my wardrobe decisions are made somewhat easier by my condensed wardrobe. I have two good pairs of jeans. One, a dark blue pair tapered to the ankle, the other, a light blue stone wash ripped to shreds. I wear wife beaters. They are my go to top of choice. I own one black cardigan (a hand me down from Shelley that neither I nor her are ever sure that she in fact handed down, but still, two years and several notches down the colour black scale later, I continue to wear) and it goes with very wife beater I own. I have a few shirts I’m partial to.
My outfits, generally, go something like this:
jeans/leggings + wifebeater/ shirt + good shoes + beret/russian bear hunting hat/sack of eggs knitted hat + scarf.

Scarves are one of the reasons I love winter. It is my firm belief that any outfit can be made massively more appealing with the addition of a hat and scarf. A regular old combination of blue jeans and a white wife beater can be transformed with the addition of a scarf. Hermes was the god of travellers. Later, the fashion failsafe of the basically clothed everywhere. I rest my case.

In any case, I sometimes get a little bored of my repertoire. Especially considering that I count myself, if not groundbreaking (although I still hold that I was the girl who brought deck shoes back to Battersea) somewhat stylish. I arrived in Berlin with almost NO CLOTHES: some wife beaters, two pairs of jeans, a pair of leggings, white brogues, white plimsolls, black platform high heels, pink heels, black riding boots, my trusty leather jacket that belonged to a succession of Sharp aunts until arriving on my willing back in 1999. My meagre selection of clothes is supplemented with lots of fantastic hats and scarves. And that’s always been okay for me. Until I arrived in Berlin and my leggings are no longer acceptable to wear in public and it gold cold and wintery and I thought, “Goddamn, I need some woolly tights and a LEATHER MINI SKIRT”

As it turns out, woolly tights are easy enough to come across in Berlin. Unlike leggings. And the skirt.... Well, the debacle of the leather mini skirt will follow. For now, just know, if you’re coming to visit, buy your leggings in London. They are, as we say in the classics, “not so much in this town.”

He must have the constitution of an ox

2009-10-09T19:40:00.004+02:00

I think we’ve clearly established my status as a bona fide food snob. Being a food snob is hard work, but someone has to do it. I’ve come up against some pretty tough haters in my time as a food snob. There are those that believe that chickens really do have small bits of flesh in the guise of ready breaded nuggets, those who think that ‘a really huge portion for £3.99’ constitutes quality, those who think that truffles are a scam, because, and I quote, ‘mushrooms is mushrooms, innit.’ KILL ME NOW.
However, the herculean task of the food snob is to cohabit with the antifoodsnob. And by that, I do not mean those people who love their frozen pizzas, their ready meals, their doner kebabs. Because, and while I do not take pride in saying this, those people who love their junk, at least LOVE their junk. They get some sort of happy kick from the trans-fats and excess salts and E numbers. at least, in some perverse way, it’s about flavour. Sure, they’ll never understand the pure joy of a soft shell crab spider roll from Zuma, but then again, that is true for many people, and I don’t have the time or energy to hate all of them. No, the antifoodsnob I speak of is one who lives by this motto: EAT TO LIVE, DON’T LIVE TO EAT. blow me down. I cannot fucking cope.
Okay, I am the first to admit that I am living on the cheap. Almost every night I eat some variation of an oriental rice dish (enough carbs so that I don’t get hungry: check. Fresh vegetables: check. Chilli: check. that’s the big three right there.) but my rice dish is still delicious, nutritious and most importantly, it takes me one step closer to having a wad of cash to splurge on delicious food when one of my many visitors who will be landing soon enough arrive. I love good food, but I also love sharing that experience with people, so I am more than happy to eat my delicious bowl of thai curry and rice and save up the money I didn’t spend so that when my friends arrive, we can go to CUPCAKE and eat them out of house and home. But I digress... So, cohabiting with an ‘Eattolive.....r.' It’s hell. The man I am living with has such a shocking ambivalence toward what he puts into his mouth it makes me cower in radiated shame. He doesn’t feel it, but jesus man, have a heart. Some of us do. He makes these.... well, I can only describe them as soups, that I swear would have a homeless person pocketing a bread roll and professing, ‘I’m good mate, thanks anyway.’ THe other day he made one of chunks of cucumber, chunks of courgette and more dill than is healthy. Oh, and brussel sprouts. And trust me, before you even BEGIN to think that the combination of cucumber and dill could work, just stop. The chunks were so big they could’ve been used as beacons to direct planes into parking bays. Another ‘soup’ that made me almost die was a combination of tomatoes, broccoli, carrots, potatoes and CUT UP VIENNAS. The remainders of both of those gourmet abominations are still sitting in my fridge. Every time I open the door to retrieve something from it, I have a small, but distinct mini sick. Last night I had a dream that I was at Shelley and Pauls for the Singapore GP and Shelley made one of her incredible oriental soups. In the dream, we ate all the soup (which was, even in REM, amazing) and at the end of meal, kyle wanted more. For some reason, Shelley and Paul's was somehow in Berlin. So, I said to Kyle, “there’s more in the kitchen.” Kyle trotted off to refill his bowl. He returned with a bowl of green coloured SLUDGE. It was the cucumber/courgette/dill/brussel spout disaster.
The ensuing conversation went like this:
Me: Kyle, that’s not the soup we were eating. Check on the stove.
Kyle: There was no more on the stove. I found this is the fridge.
Me: Does it look like Shelley made that?
Kyle: No... but it was in the fridge... so I figured....
Me: Get that out of here. Seriously.
Kyle then retreats to kitchen to pour away green sludge. He returns with a bowl of the vegetables and vienna fiasco that makes me have the mini sick.
Me: Kyle.... What is in your hand?
Kyle: Soup! Can I also not eat this one?
By this stage Shelley and I are almost frothing at the mouth.
Me: NO! NO YOU CAN’T! YOU CANNOT EAT THAT SHIT. IT’S SHIT! THERE ARE CUT UP HOTDOGS IN IT! ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!
and then, in my dream, I cried. I actually cried. as in, I wept. Because I know that the people who understand this shit about me are very far away and it’s not easy caring about gremolata when it feels like most people don’t even know how to spell the word. Don’t think that I haven’t been judged for bringing my Microplane to Berlin. That’s right. I travel with my own grater. Because I can almost guarantee you that if I come to stay at your house, 98% of the time your grater will just not be good enough. I am a freak like that. I really am.

A quick but important disclaimer: I know that, that dream sequence would never happen in reality. I know that if Kyle went to the kitchen, saw the pot on the stove was empty, went to the fridge and saw those two abominations of so called ‘meals’ he would probably just throw them out. Without anyone’s consent or knowledge, he would just rid the house of them. Because he understands me like that. While I am food freak, I am not alone. It’s a family trait. So I can be a food snob. I’m in good company as a food snob. In fact, there’s no company in which I would rather be.

The sound of Berlin is that of empties clinking

2009-10-07T20:09:00.002+02:00

Germany has a very old school bottle deposit policy. Beer, bottled water and soft drinks are subject to a small deposit (or pfand,) usually at 8c a beer bottle, but up to 25c depending on the bottle type and store it’s bought from. Lidl, for instance, runs at a strict 25c a bottle. Sure, you can get that money back, but they want you to put a down payment on your shame. [see The Pork Shank Redemption] Most supermarkets have these machines that you feed your empties into via a gaping mouth with two tiny conveyor belts inside. A mechanical ‘open wide for the aeroplane’ in my mind. When you’re done, you press a little green button and out pops a receipt, a store credit voucher, if you will. With this you can go and buy more beer. Or, if you were so inclined, fresh fruit and vegetables. The choice is yours. It is also possible to take your empties to one of the many, many Turkish convenience (read: bottle) stores that around, where such mechanical wonders do not exist. In this case, you rather put the bottles in crates and the dude behind the counter deducts however many bottles you’ve returned x8c off your next purchase. Incidentally, returning 6 bottles to my local late night store will leave you with a 32c bill to pay for one bottle of beer. The plus side to the system is that one becomes fanatical about recycling. And I think we can all agree, recycling: good. Waste: bad. The not quite so good part is that to get to the point where the return of your bottles gives you the illusion of free beer, your stock of empties makes you look like you live in a frat house.... Or at Shellrick on a Thembi-less week. It also means that when you walk down the street on your way to damage your liver/save the planet, you clink.

Clinking is the sound of the city. The other day I sat outside a cafe and counted clinkers walk past me. There were eleven. In a row. Eleven people walked past. Eleven people clinked. It wasn’t even a busy street. There was an old woman, and I mean OLD, walking with a walking stick in each hand. She had a backpack on. And the backpack that clinked. She was one of the illustrious eleven.

My landlord/housemate told me that he once saw an industrious drunk in Amsterdam feed full bottles he took off the shelves of a supermarket into the machine at the back. He used the ‘deposit’ money to buy a six pack.

All this begs the question that I know that some of you are asking, “You are drinking beer?”
Incredibly, yes. While I haven’t been completely adverse to the poison of choice for frat boys and their funnels everywhere, it’s by no means my first choice of intoxicant. However, I can no longer go to wine as my drink of choice (damn you grape intolerance!) and there’s something so sordid about a bottle of whiskey for one. So beer is something I have been partaking in the pleasures of. It’s also an easy option when ordering out. By all accounts, wine lists here can be a veritable minefield. “Ein bier bitte” is a phrase that even the most linguistically challenged (a category in which, sadly, I find myself) can manage.

What Berlin looked like last month

2009-10-05T17:48:00.002+02:00

.... to me anyway.

Click here for some photos of some things I saw and some places I went.

Germany, are you trying to kill me?!

2009-10-05T17:38:00.002+02:00

I’ve been trying my best to ignore it but I can no longer pretend that this isn’t happening. I am trying to be good. I really am. But I can’t pretend anymore that Germany isn’t out to get me. For Superman, it was Kryptonite. For Achilles, his heel that was untouched by the River Styx. For me, it is the aisles and aisles of German Christmas Chocolate. I know what you’re thinking: October’s pretty early for Christmas Chocolate to hit the shops. It is. And the scary thing is that it’s been in the stores for nearly three weeks. Seriously. Advent calendar in September anyone? Do you know how hard it is to navigate the aisles of a crowded supermarket whilst trying desperately to avert your gaze from the skyscraper towers of festively wrapped sugary goodness?

I’ve tried. I’ve tried to get away from it. To not look. But I can’t do it anymore. I love Christmas. I love chocolate. Together, they are a formidable combination. How long is a girl expected to hold out and not give in to the Schoko-Lubkuchen, the Zimtsterern, the Vanillekipferl, the Stollen, the Barbie sized chocolate santas, the 1lb bags of milk chocolate balls, the marzipan squares wrapped like tiny presents? HOW LONG?!

The Germans know what they’re doing when it comes to Christmas. The wrappings of these festive treats, for instance, are strictly traditional. There’s none of that millennium themed silver and blue colour scheme, no Purple Ronnie stick figures wearing Santa hats and blowing noise makers. They stick to the tried and tested red, green, gold and snow. Sometimes there’s a log cabin on a snowy mountain side. Sometimes, they’ll include some reindeer, possibly a fat Santa. There are bells, holly, sleighs, baubles (in gold, red and green only), candy canes, fat wax pillar candles with their little wicks aglow. Now, add that Christmassy goodness to a box of candy and I am up against powers far greater than me. I’m just a girl who’s not supposed to eat sugar. With that in mind, maybe Germany wasn’t the best idea I've ever had.

I was pretty sad that I’m going to be leaving Germany before the Christmas Markets... But I see now that it’s a bit of a blessing in disguise. There is no way I would be able to behave myself at one of those.

Things I LOVE/HATE about Berlin. Part 1

2009-10-01T19:54:00.002+02:00

Things I LOVE:
The Anarchists. Everything about them tickles me pink. Their extensive knowledge of out of print books with passages they can recite verbatim, their anti-establishment hair, their ripped jeans that really ‘say something,’ their dogs, their use of flags as wall hangings/curtains/head scarves. The way they look as you as if to say, “I believe in a lot of important stuff. What do you believe in? What? What? What?”
What can I say? I’m just another girl who thinks that democracy is a good idea. Silly me.

Things I HATE :
The kid in my building who is learning the recorder. It’s all afternoon and evening, EVERY afternoon and evening. Give it up kid. It’s the recorder!!! The recorder is not going to help you in later life. If you need to go through the awful process of being musically disinclined and learning an instrument may I suggest the guitar; bass or electric. Sid Vicious had NO TALENT and still managed to be a punk pin up and get laid. Take a leaf kid.

Beasts of Berlin

2009-09-30T23:04:00.003+02:00

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?

2009-09-26T16:57:00.003+02:00

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

2009-09-23T22:01:00.004+02:00

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....

2009-09-22T18:55:00.002+02:00

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

2009-09-20T20:29:00.001+02:00

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...

2009-09-17T19:33:00.001+02:00

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

2009-09-16T20:16:00.001+02:00

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.