Pick-A-Day

August 2008
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Friday Night: Work

US EmbassyI realize that it might sound a little bit lame to the world at large, but my Friday night in Berlin was good.

On the train ride up there I got quite a bit of work done—from 08:50, when I sat down, until 11:05 when Berlin was announced, I focused on something I needed to get done, rapidly. I even got about half way through it when my computer’s battery started to signal weakness (a bit odd; perhaps I need a new battery) just as I started shutting it down in order to pack up.

From there I had a busy afternoon: I met up my Berlin landlord to get my keys, stopped by the apartment, plugged in my laptop, unpacked a few things, and then headed across Berlin to meet Snooker for lunch.

I’ve bitched about it before, and I’ll bitch about it again, but Berlin is one enormously spread out city: from my flat to her office took me over 45 minutes: walk to tram, tram to Alexanderplatz, up to the S-Bahn, and then a number of stops later, I got off, got briefly confused, reoriented myself and then walked the last two or so blocks to her office during a brief downpour. Thankfully I had an umbrella with me.

Lunch was great—we ate at an Italian restaurant near her office that offers a special 5€ entrée with coffee. Snooker assured me that the portion sizes were smaller during the special than at dinner: I couldn’t finish my dish.

From there I had a plan: I first went to Eisenherz, the gay bookstore in Berlin where I picked up two DVDs that were on sale, two books not on sale, and two free Gay Stadt-Magazines. From there I wandered through the gayborhood briefly before heading back to the Berlin Zoo area, using public transport. From there, I walked on foot across the Tiergarten.

Somewhere in there it dawned on me that I’d made a serious mistake: books are heavy, and carrying them across an enormously long city park was an act of utter insanity. To make matters worse, one of the books I’d purchased is a dense, glossy, and thick book of gay-oriented comics. I started consulting my map of Berlin every time I passed a land mark to see how far I’d gone. The first third was fast, the second third was slow, and the last third was like trudging through a deep pool of molasses.

I was thrilled to see the Brandenburg Gate—the Tiergarten was conquered, my back was hurting, and I was reminded that CNN is still using graphics that show cars driving through the gate, even though it’s never been possible to do so since I’ve moved to Germany.

Gay MonumentJust south of the Brandenburg Gate is the new monument dedicated to homosexuals, remembering the terror inflicted upon gays by not just the Nazis, but post-WWII German Governments on both sides of the Iron Curtain that didn’t bother to immediately delete Paragraph 175. I stopped by to see it, a block set in the Tiergarten, with a window one looks through to see a video of two men kissing.

From there, I passed by the Holocaust Memorial and the new US Embassy to catch a bus back to my weekend flat.

Once relieved of the weight, I went for a walk in the neighboring park, working off the rest of my energy in a futile attempt to become tired enough to sleep before dancing. Unfortunately it didn’t work: although I was tired, I was restless and I ended up working for a couple hours, until 10, or so, finishing a segment of a project, which made me very happy. It may sound geeky, but this was absolutely fantastic.

I was wavering, ultimately showering, getting cleaned up, and heading out to G-53, a nightclub that Blu had suggested would be having a mildly sleazy night that sounded very much to my taste. It was tricky getting there, I needed two U-Bahn lines, including the infrequently running U4, a line I’d never ridden before. When I got to G-53, I looked in the door, and it was dead. There was no activity on the street in front of the bar so I decided just to head back to my flat: I’d gotten fresh air, seen freaks on the U-Bahn, and was starting to feel sleepy since I’d never actually slept.

Ultimately I slept really well, briefly waking at 6, only to turn over and sleep solidly until sometime after 8. It was good preparation for my exhausting Saturday at the Volksfest.

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