A few weeks ago Katrin, Lotte and I went for a stroll through the district of Hohenschönhausen. Out of this Sunday walk I wrote an article for Slow Travel Berlin and Katrin took a series of photographs of a street that she knows very well…
Berlin has so many wonderful green spaces, from the Tiergarten in the heart of the city to the forests that occupy the edges though very much within the city limits, so perhaps it is not so surprising that it took me the best part of ten years to find my way south of the Ringbahn to the district of Neukölln and the Britzer Garten. The garden was created for the Federal Flower Show in 1985, and although it still charges a small admission, it is clearly used by Berliners from this corner of the city as their local park. Indeed, as we were trying to find our way from the bus stop to the entrance, an old lady guided us expertly whilst telling us that this was already the 32nd time she had visited this year. I guess at that rate, the season ticket pays for itself.
Apologies for the silence. I have been sick for a few days, missing the sunshine and other fun and games, and I did not even have the energy to update the site and add the new posts that I have in the pipeline, waiting. Normal service should be resumed in the next couple of days, but in the meantime I have a gallery of photographs from the Bergmannstraße street festival that took place down in Kreuzberg last weekend. One of the things about Berlin is that a lot of neighbourhoods take their identities from specific streets, and some of those streets celebrate their unique identities and communities through festivals such as this one.
The market at Kollwitzplatz takes place every Thursday and Saturday, on this square in the neighbourhood of Prenzlauer Berg – a neighbourhood that was once the centre of bohemian life in East Berlin and has become, since the fall of the wall, one of the trendiest districts of the city and a central flashpoint in the gentrification debate. Here’s what our friends at Slow Travel Berlin have to say about the market itself:
I have never lived in Liverpool, although for family reasons and one of the football teams, it is probably the city that I identify most with back home. Living in Berlin, and working in the hostel, it was the answer I gave when asked where I was from – unless the asker was from the UK, in which case I would add a “near” to the “Liverpool.” It was only if I heard a trace of a Scouse accent would I admit to Burscough which, despite its L40 postcode, never had the purple wheely bins.
Last summer we spent a couple of weeks back across the water, and I returned to Liverpool for the first time in a decade. Most cities will be different after a ten year absence, but I was struck by the dramatic nature of some of the changes in the centre of town, a re-development spurred (I presume) by the year as Capital of Culture in 2008. I couldn’t tell whether it was an improvement or not, and I guess I will leave that up to the locals to decide, but it was slightly unnerving to be standing in a place that I thought I knew and having absolutely no sense of direction or idea where I was in relation to anything else.
Back home from a walk along the Kurfürstendamm, West Berlin’s most famous street, I search the bookshelves for Joseph Roth. I have been to the Ku’damm many times, but never explored its entire length, and I want to know what the master of observation thought. With my feet aching a little from the adventure, the following passage jumped off the page:
“And so the Kurfürstendamm stretches out endlessly day and night. Also, it’s being renovated. These two facts need to be emphasized, because of the way it’s continually ceding particles of its true self to its designated cultural-historical role. Even though it never stops being “a major traffic artery”, it still feels as though it weren’t a means to an end but, in all its length, an end in itself” – Joseph Roth, What I Saw.
It still does. Predictions of the “death of the West” have come and gone over the past two decades since the fall of the Wall, as attention on the city moved across the Tiergarten to the historic centre of the city, but whenever I return to the Kurfürstendamm – infrequently – I am always struck by the fact that the street and the neighbourhood around it are doing fine thank you very much, regardless of the hype and the development going on over in Mitte.
“Aus dem Hintergrund müsste Rahn schießen, Rahn schießt – TOR, TOR, TOR!”
When did it start? The first tournament I watched in Germany was the Japan/Korea World Cup in 2002, and certainly bars and cafes broadcast the games, often pretty early in the morning, and those highly-paid superstars strutted their stuff on the perfectly manicured lawns of Tokyo and Seoul whilst the late-rising Berliner gazed bleary-eyed at the screen across the top of a foaming Milchkaffee. It was the same two years later in Portugal, although for the European Championships the games were at a more sensible hour, when drinking a beer during the first half was more socially acceptable…
Regular readers of Under a Grey Sky will know that we are fans of St Jude’s Fabric and Prints. Angie Lewin is the co-founder of St Jude’s, and this week as part of St Jude’s In The City is holding on exhibition of her work alongside that of Mark Hearld and Emily Sutton.
Angie will be exhibiting a range of limited edition prints including “Island Celebration”, which you can see at the top of this post, and there will be framed and unframed works from all three artists, as well as examples of the fabrics and wallpapers that have been made for St Jude’s. No tickets or invitations are required for the opening event, which will take place this Wednesday 23rd May 2012 from 6pm until 8pm at 30 Tottenham Street, London W1 (Tube: Goodge Street).
The exhibition then runs from 11am Thursday 24th may until 3pm Saturday 2nd June 2012, and if you want a chance to meet Angie, Mark and Emily beyond the opening event, then they will be hosting a book signing from 11am on Saturday 26th May. It all looks great, and we can only urge Londoners and those close by to go and check it out. Maybe there is a way we can persuade them to hold a St Jude’s in The City over here in Berlin…
A photo diary by Katrin Schönig:
Between the 16th and the 19th October 1813 the allied armies of Prussia, Russia and Austria convened on the battlefields just outside Leipzig to defeat Napoleon’s army in what was the biggest mass battle of the century. There were over half a million soldiers fighting on those days, and one in five never made it home. The villages and the landscape were left in ruin, but the Battle of the Nations would prove to be decisive. A year later and the coalition forces invaded France. Napoleon was forced to abdicate, and though he would return to power, it proved to be only in order to suffer a final defeat at Waterloo and exile for the remainder of his life on St Helena. Continue reading
Last week I sent an email to the guys at Caught by the River about the Panke river here in Berlin, and today they published it on the site. You should take some time to read through the archives, as it is a website I really enjoy that was quite an inspiration for Under a Grey Sky. I also thought, having picked out a few pictures to send them, I would take the opportunity to show a few more. Continue reading
Under a Grey Sky 