If you asked me to take you to a place in Germany that is the opposite of Berlin in every single way (except for temperature), I would immediately take you to the Ostsee. If you asked me to take you somewhere that was the definition of Freud’s ‘uncanny’ (thank you, useless literary theory paper) I would take you to the Ostsee without hesitating. If you asked me to show you what Henley town centre would look like with a huge terrifying voodoo swamp replacing the river – well, you’d probably stop asking me to take you places because the lack of variety I offer is so disappointing.
The Ostsee (and Riebnitz, the town I was staying in) is a very strange and lovely place. While I was there it seemed to be stuck in the ‘slowing down time’ mode of Prince of Persia, because everything was half-soaked in a translucent grey mist and the few living things in the area just drifted, like flecks of soot suspended in lamp-oil.
Things persist in being stubbornly picturesque no matter where you go, which is probably why my internet has suddenly decided to once again forbid me from uploading any images. Thanks again, O2.
Well, it’s not exciting, but it’s totally unlike anything I have ever seen before; it was so quiet there were bubbles on the surface of the water that you could tell had been there for days, and at one point there was a grebe casually diving in and out of the water, creating a strange optical illusion as the sky and the sea were indistinguishable, both being an identical shade of grey. I’m also terribly upset thatI can’t put any more images into this post because one thing I absolutely loved in Ribnitz was the amber museum; I promise, fossilised resin really is worth a museum. They gave me a little sachet of amber chunks when I bought my ticket (I think partly out of gratitude for being the only visitor of the whole day) and I spent forever wandering around all the brilliant displays, my favourite being the array of insects stuck in amber and featuring as the main attraction the world’s only example of a REAL GECKO encased in amber that is millions of years old. Imagine seeing a laminated mammoth. That’s basically the same thing. It’s astonishing.
I returned on Sunday night – shockingly, things are in no way different whatsoever back in the big city. My flatmates seem to be having the most incredible time, energised by ‘Herbstputz’ (like spring-cleaning, but in autumn), as every time I return to my apartment they are having an awesome cooking-fest or dancing around wearing sunglasses pretending that it’s sunny. The children are still wild, and made wilder by the fact that they are being allowed less and less time to go outside and joyfully hurt themselves and each other before they come to my lessons. Terror alerts in the city are causing the trains to be erratic, tourist attractions to be put into lockdown mode (sorry mum, but the Reichstag will have to wait till next time) and everyone from England to wryly comment that if this were Britain we’d already be on our fourth terror alert of the week. The Christmas lights are on, the Weihnachtsmaerkte are warming up the Gluehwein, the new bakery across the road opened with a razzmatazz brass band and I can’t, can’t, can’t wait to come home.
