Guten Morgen Berlin!

“Hallo? Ja, ich bin noch im Zug!” (You see this is actually a very good joke indeed, because ‘im Zug’ means ‘on the train’ and yet ‘Zug’ can mean both ‘train’ and ‘parade’. Thank you for listening.)  At a loose end for what to do on Pfingsten, the Pentecostal holiday that for some reason British people choose to ignore entirely (and yet we devote ourselves to Pancake Day. Why? Not that I’m complaining) I was delighted to hear that this weekend was the Karneval der Kulturen. I was slightly less delighted when the weather on the Saturday made the whole...

In Germany, you have to complete physical endurance tests before even entering the shop. True story. I think one of the signs that you have really settled into the everyday life of a new country is when you are able to go shopping, get the things you want and need, and go home. Before this stage is reached, there is a long acclimatisation period which involves long hours spent in malls or supermarkets staring with blank confusion at a row of shelves, none of which seem to contain anything you might have been looking for. When you first begin having...

Note the absence of canine faeces or thieves. Sometimes I spend days with the nagging intention to write a blog post lurking in my stomach without a single good idea of what to write about. It’s easy to squeeze out a fairly banal few paragraphs making exaggerated statements about “Berlin is so X” or “Life is so Y” but you just end up sounding like an amateur stand-up comedian swinging the mic and drawling, “know what I mean?!”. So in these moments I prefer to simply stay quiet and put some time into working out why I haven’t recently fallen...

These aren’t shoes; they’re actually tiny footwear-themed piñatas. Berlin is certainly a free city. Nowhere else will you find a place where doing what you damn well want is so widely accepted. You can dress exactly as you like, drink whatever you want at whatever time of day you want (nothing says ‘morning commuter’ like a crisp suit and a cold beer), take your dog through the shopping mall and protest for or against anything that takes your fancy. There is a strong and slightly unnerving hum of self-confidence buzzing under everyone’s skin; they know what they’re doing and they’re...

“I only wanted to anmeldeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh…..!” We all know that the Germans love their red tape. So, after a wonderful Maitag – which is a holiday in Germany – spent drinking alcoholic syrup at the Baumblütenfest, I began the rest of my week diving head-first into the various bits of delirious admin that are involved in moving to Berlin. What follows is a series of stories, all of which have the same moral: always never accept what you’re told. To begin my adventure, I needed to Anmelden – register as a Berlin resident – at my local Bürgeramt. Of course, my...

Besides, as long as I have access to this, I’ll be ok. While I was prepared to experience a degree of culture shock on my move to Berlin for my year abroad, nothing could have prepared me for the culture shock of moving back to the UK at the end of it. Granted, the first few months of my time there were as disorienting and painful as being smacked square in the face with a frying pan. I had a terrible time. But somehow I got the hang of the place and the language and the people and by the...