Stadtkind

Berlin greets me with a cold wet smack in the face as I head down towards the U-Bahn and Rathaus Neukölln (or Rat-house Newcolon as I like to think of it), location of Cruiser's new flat. This town oozes coolness and kultcha from every pore. Walls and doorways are splattered with street art and stickers promoting a hundred different parties, exhibitions and groovy happenings. There are ramshackle bars on every corner; scaffy, makeshift holes-in-the-wall with minimal decoration and minimal beats scratching out of some crappy sound system in the corner. Cruiser and I attempt a quiet first evening by going on a crawl of these local sprechen, erm, easies. Alas, Berlin has chosen to not only ignore the smoking ban, but carry on as if it were never implemented in the first place. By bar 3 I've got that old familiar carcinogenic reek about me and our quiet evening is rapidly spiraling down the neck of a never-ending bottle of beer.

Dawn breaks around 11 and despite some healthy muesli action and a hearty interface of apple, carrot and ginger, an air of fragility pervades our brains. We make a half-hearted attempt at shopping, but as a whole new brace of adventures stretch ahead of us tonight we opt for a strategic nap instead. Fortunately Berlin only comes alive around twelve at night, so we have time to recover, eat a crap burger and hang in a gay co-operative for a glass of cidre, before it's off to the Nightmare Party. This gig takes place in what was once a youth indoctrination centre, a venue which seems to have happily swapped one form of brainwashing for another. There's a DJ in every corner and the place gradually fills with louche kinders embracing the Halloween vibe in a variety of blood soaked costumes. I'm sure I saw a Zombie Nazi from Dead Snow and there's quite a heartening air of indifference the kids show towards this whole period of their history. They've moved on even if no one else has.

Much banging takes place and I'm pleasantly surprised by how good I feel come six o'clock, having abstained from drinking the whole night. It's crazy I know, but you can actually go out and not drink, who would have thort it?

Saturday evening we devote to the Illustrative 09, an exhibition of the finest graphics and illustration Berlin has to offer. I'll post a flickr link of this exhibition shortly. Another cool venue and the usual hit and miss of design; some pieces were brilliant, others looked like poor course work from some third year art class. We headed back home to cook a jolly dinner for Heinz 57 and Clarabow and managed to hit the sack before one, making the ghastly pain of rising at six to get to the airport a little more bearable.

Those of you in London on Sunday may have noticed it was quite windy. Now imagine being in a weenie Easyjet airplane attempting to land at Gatwick. We are thrown about violently as the pilot is forced to do an emergency abort of his first approach. He comes in slower the second time, but the entire craft is yawing and bouncing from side to side and there is much weeping and lamentation from all. We finally break cloud cover and appear to be approaching the runway sideways. The lamentation level increases dramatically. The pilot wrenches us around at the last minute and we skip and slide to an eventual juddering stop. A brief silence ensues before everyone bursts into relieved applause. Without a doubt the most disturbing air experience I've ever had.

Muchos gracias to the Cruiser, your hospitality knows no bounds. London, it's good to be back (in one piece).

B