another uneventful bus trip from copenhagen to berlin, via the ferry from gedser to rostock. except, of course, our bus gets pulled over by the pigs after it gets off the ferry. and mine was the only passport they took to radio in. wilkommen nach deutschland. at kaiserdamm, so began the first of my usual cat and mouse games with the bvg ticket inspection teams that rove the metropolitan transport system, looking for fare dodgers like myself. i found a used ticket, it´s valid for 2 hours from the time stamped. i had 10 minutes left on the ticket and at least a half-hour ride to alexanderplatz. ok, let's chance it. i got to alex without incident. no-money-for-public-transport busking traveller 1, mean jobsworth ticket controllers 0.
berlin is always changing, that's why i kinda fell in love with it the first time i came here in my first hitch-hiking trip around europe in the summer of 1985. that was an amazing adventure, i could write a whole book about that one month alone. berlin in those days was still divided, one of my fellow hitchers i had hitched with from hanover in west germany through east germany to west berlin had spontaneously given me the keys to his apartment and said i could stay there while he stayed at his girlfriend's place. i stayed a week in the end, with a day-trip into east berlin through checkpoint charlie. and alexanderplatz in those days was filled with broiled chicken stands, and cheap ice-cream. it was a straight 20 west german deutschmarks to 20 east german deutschmarks exchange rate which was obligatory and a complete rip-off, but still it was so cheap on the east side that i ate pretty good that day! the best in that whole month!
and later, i passed through berlin every summer ever since the berlin crew who came to party for their summer hols at the isla de port lligat... mac, katrin, uwe, christa, lotte, ramona, luzer and the others. after the india trip, i met up with them again in their squat house in the centre of berlin, in brunnenstrasse... and then after my stay in copenhagen, i had come to live in that house in brunnenstrasse for a year and a half... some good times but a lot of stress too from some people bent on opposing all constructive community actions in the house. most of the good people had already left the house by the time i got a room there, and it was only a question of time before i left too, totally disillusioned by the whole community-house experience.
since that time, when i passed through berlin, i visited jens at his collective in voigtstrasse, a much more civilised place. now he is working in another community-house project, at kubiz, in weisensee. i went to visit him and see the place, it's a big house and a big construction project!!
i stay now at magnus' place in kottbusser damm. magnus is one of my best friends, i´ve known him since the early brunnenstrasse days when i stayed there for some time in the summer. those were the best days of the house. real collective actions, positive community feeling. but since i didn't live there at that time, i didn't realize that even then, there were lots of differences in opinions about how to live together in the house, paying rent, etc. i was a guest of mac in those days and he used to fill me in on the state of affairs.
magnus is back from a trip to the far east, he went overland through the central asian 'stan' countries to china and vietnam, laos, cambodia, thailand, malaysia and australia. so now we have been catching up on our travelling adventures this past year, and jamming with him on a stringed instrument he bought in kashgar, china. he is also studying to be a sound engineer and this keeps him busy. saturday night, we went to syndikat, an old drinking place of his from the old days. and i met up with two people from the old copenhagen days, robin and malene. total surprise. we summed up our lives in brief sound-bites and went our different ways. on the way back, magnus and i heard a saxophone playing from a first-floor flat, and decided to investigate. and so gate-crashed a party, which was in it's death throes in any case... the sax turned out to be a electronic clarinet/sax machine, i had a go on the conga drum, and magnus joined in with the mongolian throat singing. he was getting well pissed by now, and i had to drag him away as the hosts were trying to offer him whisky and beer and other alcoholic stuff... "he's drunk enough", i told them, heading for the door. he doesn't remember the trip back to the flat via the u-bahn.
talking of which, total scores so far this berlin trip: free-rider 8, ticket-pigs 0. (which included a trip on the notoriously cat-infested ring lines, so should count at least treble!)
there isn't really a good place to hitch out of berlin in the direction of dresden and prague, so i chose to look up a mitfahrgelegenheit ride. plenty to choose from, and the best offer won. i walked to the meeting point outside jannowitzbrüke s-bahn station, there was also another passenger waiting, and michal finally came and drove us to prague, dropping us off at stichov station. it was the c-line so i didn't have to change, a ride to kacerov and then the 106 bus to branik. and back to helena's place, another of my bases in europe.
berlin is always changing, that's why i kinda fell in love with it the first time i came here in my first hitch-hiking trip around europe in the summer of 1985. that was an amazing adventure, i could write a whole book about that one month alone. berlin in those days was still divided, one of my fellow hitchers i had hitched with from hanover in west germany through east germany to west berlin had spontaneously given me the keys to his apartment and said i could stay there while he stayed at his girlfriend's place. i stayed a week in the end, with a day-trip into east berlin through checkpoint charlie. and alexanderplatz in those days was filled with broiled chicken stands, and cheap ice-cream. it was a straight 20 west german deutschmarks to 20 east german deutschmarks exchange rate which was obligatory and a complete rip-off, but still it was so cheap on the east side that i ate pretty good that day! the best in that whole month!
and later, i passed through berlin every summer ever since the berlin crew who came to party for their summer hols at the isla de port lligat... mac, katrin, uwe, christa, lotte, ramona, luzer and the others. after the india trip, i met up with them again in their squat house in the centre of berlin, in brunnenstrasse... and then after my stay in copenhagen, i had come to live in that house in brunnenstrasse for a year and a half... some good times but a lot of stress too from some people bent on opposing all constructive community actions in the house. most of the good people had already left the house by the time i got a room there, and it was only a question of time before i left too, totally disillusioned by the whole community-house experience.
since that time, when i passed through berlin, i visited jens at his collective in voigtstrasse, a much more civilised place. now he is working in another community-house project, at kubiz, in weisensee. i went to visit him and see the place, it's a big house and a big construction project!!
i stay now at magnus' place in kottbusser damm. magnus is one of my best friends, i´ve known him since the early brunnenstrasse days when i stayed there for some time in the summer. those were the best days of the house. real collective actions, positive community feeling. but since i didn't live there at that time, i didn't realize that even then, there were lots of differences in opinions about how to live together in the house, paying rent, etc. i was a guest of mac in those days and he used to fill me in on the state of affairs.
magnus is back from a trip to the far east, he went overland through the central asian 'stan' countries to china and vietnam, laos, cambodia, thailand, malaysia and australia. so now we have been catching up on our travelling adventures this past year, and jamming with him on a stringed instrument he bought in kashgar, china. he is also studying to be a sound engineer and this keeps him busy. saturday night, we went to syndikat, an old drinking place of his from the old days. and i met up with two people from the old copenhagen days, robin and malene. total surprise. we summed up our lives in brief sound-bites and went our different ways. on the way back, magnus and i heard a saxophone playing from a first-floor flat, and decided to investigate. and so gate-crashed a party, which was in it's death throes in any case... the sax turned out to be a electronic clarinet/sax machine, i had a go on the conga drum, and magnus joined in with the mongolian throat singing. he was getting well pissed by now, and i had to drag him away as the hosts were trying to offer him whisky and beer and other alcoholic stuff... "he's drunk enough", i told them, heading for the door. he doesn't remember the trip back to the flat via the u-bahn.
talking of which, total scores so far this berlin trip: free-rider 8, ticket-pigs 0. (which included a trip on the notoriously cat-infested ring lines, so should count at least treble!)
there isn't really a good place to hitch out of berlin in the direction of dresden and prague, so i chose to look up a mitfahrgelegenheit ride. plenty to choose from, and the best offer won. i walked to the meeting point outside jannowitzbrüke s-bahn station, there was also another passenger waiting, and michal finally came and drove us to prague, dropping us off at stichov station. it was the c-line so i didn't have to change, a ride to kacerov and then the 106 bus to branik. and back to helena's place, another of my bases in europe.
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