In which a hotel bar is the order of the day

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.

Disclaimer: This is a reenactment

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.

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.

The sound of Berlin is that of empties clinking

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.

Beasts of Berlin

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

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