Where the fuck am I? Seriously, where the fuck is this?
All I really know is that we're not in Paris and we're not in Berlin, we've stopped somewhere in between and there's a man walking around outside on the loud mutant offspring of a sack of gravel and a bowl of Cap'n Crunch. I'm on so little sleep and we've stopped at so many dark, nameless train stations that time is starting to go all spongy on me. It's as if I've spent an entire lifetime on this train, or maybe several lifetimes. Or maybe no time at all--I light a cigarette and then I hand it back to the man who gave it to me, then he gives it back to me but I've already smoked it? Or maybe I'm actually inside the train and I dreamed the man and the cigarette, or he dreamed me, which is the same. Fuck, where are we?
A few lifetimes later the sun comes up and the German countryside starts to take shape.
Man, I'm just happy to see something that isn't the pitch black inside of my sleepy mind. We arrive at the train station and I don't even remember putting on my backpack or making my way into Hauptbahnhof. I have a loose sense of what I'm supposed to be doing, some kind of hotel that I need to find, that I need to get in touch with Joshua or something. Mostly I'm just overwhelmed by German architecture.
Something that may confuse first-timers in Berlin, especially sleep deprived ones, is that the underground is actual ruled by two separate organizations: the U-Bahn and the S-Bahn. Just to be completely clear I'm not talking about two different lines but about two completely difference systems of lines, two different rhizomes, as it were. Actually I suppose it's not too uncommon for a city to have two rail lines, one to handle underground transportation within the city and the other to move people in and out, but in the case of Berlin the line between the U- and S-Bahn is disturbingly murky. Of course the whole issue is exacerbated by history (this, it will come as no surprise, is a running theme in Berlin), by the changing of hands between aristocratic powers, Nazis, the GDR and modern Germany.
WARNING: Travelers from Paris, do not go to this chain cafe expecting to find an acceptable croissant. You will find pastries. You will find a strong smell of butter. You will even be able to buy a brown, crusty roll in the shape of the letter C. But this is not a croissant, it is a sculpted lump of buttery dough. In fact, every single thing for sale at this demonic anti-bakery is just that: one of a billion different shapes of the same unpalatable slab of butter drenched flour.
The first thing I notice about Berlin: Streets. It's funny, after being in Paris so long I almost don't know how to handle streets this big. What am I supposed to do with all this space? If I'm walking down the street and someone starts walking towards me there's plenty of room for each of us on the sidewalk. We don't have to lock eyes and challenge each other to a game of French-flavored chicken where each one of us tries to intimidate the other into stepping down into the gutter. We just take a tiny step to the side and go about our day as equals. Where's the fun in that? Where's the daily, ritualized humiliation I've come to know and love?
Beyond that my exhausted, foggy mind doesn't notice much. It's all I can do to stagger my way to the hotel, up four flights of stairs (remember, what Europeans call the fourth floor we would call the fifth in the States) and directly into bed, where I fall asleep under the reassuring weight of my backpack.
Joshua is bemused but understanding.
All I really know is that we're not in Paris and we're not in Berlin, we've stopped somewhere in between and there's a man walking around outside on the loud mutant offspring of a sack of gravel and a bowl of Cap'n Crunch. I'm on so little sleep and we've stopped at so many dark, nameless train stations that time is starting to go all spongy on me. It's as if I've spent an entire lifetime on this train, or maybe several lifetimes. Or maybe no time at all--I light a cigarette and then I hand it back to the man who gave it to me, then he gives it back to me but I've already smoked it? Or maybe I'm actually inside the train and I dreamed the man and the cigarette, or he dreamed me, which is the same. Fuck, where are we?
A few lifetimes later the sun comes up and the German countryside starts to take shape.
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| Actually that's pretty glorious |
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| Hauptbahnhof. You have been abducted/arrived |
WARNING: Travelers from Paris, do not go to this chain cafe expecting to find an acceptable croissant. You will find pastries. You will find a strong smell of butter. You will even be able to buy a brown, crusty roll in the shape of the letter C. But this is not a croissant, it is a sculpted lump of buttery dough. In fact, every single thing for sale at this demonic anti-bakery is just that: one of a billion different shapes of the same unpalatable slab of butter drenched flour.
 |
| Challenge: Say the word Crobag. Now try to be hungry ever again |
Beyond that my exhausted, foggy mind doesn't notice much. It's all I can do to stagger my way to the hotel, up four flights of stairs (remember, what Europeans call the fourth floor we would call the fifth in the States) and directly into bed, where I fall asleep under the reassuring weight of my backpack.
Joshua is bemused but understanding.
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