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May 24th 2007

Published: August 8th 2007

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The Nomad

Holocaust Memorial Site

It's been a busy time for me here in Berlin. I've done and seen so much time has flown by. So what have I been up to?

1) The Language

The main reason for me to relocate to Berlin was to learn German. I was lucky (or unlucky) enough to be born in an English speaking country which has it's good and bad sides. The good side is that English is pretty much the worlds most widely spoken language which generally makes travel easy. Of course, I have found that if your in, say, downtown Minsk, English is about as useful as Manchu and unless you speak Russian, your screwed. Make no mistake I don't plan on rushing out and learning Russian but I feel a little knowledge of many languages goes along way, hence the reason why I endeavour to try my tongue at every local language I come across. This brings me to the bad side. Only speaking English can be limiting. Obviously knowing everyone of the world's major languages is not only nearly impossible but time consuming (if your starting from scratch) and impractical unless you have a use for it. If I was born

Geri at the Holocaust Memorial Site

in Germany, for example, with my age there is a reasonable chance I may know English as well. Being so close to France, Italy and Spain, I may be familiar or even competent with some or all of them. The point is, being Australian means that I speak English alone and I feel a little inadequate when I meet someone who speaks 3, 4 or even 5 languages. Yes these people are not as unusual as you might think and I meet them all the time. So what use will I have for German? Well to be honest, I have no idea. German is not spoken Australia for the most part and German itself is not nearly as wide spread as Spanish for example. The fact is I wanted to speak another language and German seemed to come to me a little easier than other languages I have come across. That's what I thought until I started school.

I show up bright and early for my first day and starry eyed on the possibility of expanding my total number of spoken languages to a grand total of... two. Hey, you got to start somewhere. Right from the outset I

Frank

The man whos house I live in

realised what I knew was very little. Before I started, when people asked me "Sprechen sie Deutsch?" I would respond with "Ein bisschen" (a little) But that was as far as the conversation went because in truth I couldn't even speak a little. So the days went by and the more I learned, the more I realised I couldn't speak.

The classes themselves are all in German, the staff of the whole school speak to you in German, the text books we use are in German and all info on upcoming school events are explained and written in German so there is no choice, you speak it weather you can or not. That's how it works in theory but I found for the first few weeks, I still spoke to other people mostly in English except in class. The problem is that German is not straight forward and randomly throwing German words at someone is not going to cut it. There are rules and a hell of a lot of them. Not only that but there are a whole host of rules that contradict those rules and exceptions to pretty much everything. So just when I thought I have

Schönhauser Allee

My stop

mastered a set of rules, my teachers throw more rules my way to confuse me even more. I get frustrated sometimes but my level head usually prevails and I accept it and move on. The biggest problem for me, every student and even some native German speakers is der Artikel (the article) I'll spare giving a lesson but basically it works like this. In English we use "the" for everything. In German, every noun is either Male, Female or Neuter. So The Train, the Church and the Book becomes der Zug, die Kirche und das Buch. Nearly everything you say is dictated this and it manipulates the words you use. I could write a whole section on what that means but if you want to know, come to Berlin and learn it yourself! ;-)

Currently I found myself speaking more German than English and when I get shown more rules I can work with them eaiser and understand them better. Although my German may be rough and mostly wrong, pretty much everyone, staff and students alike, understand me.

2) The School

The school itself is great. It's in the heart of Prenzlauer Berg, which is THE

Buskers

Some of the random buskers that just show up in my area, Prenzlauer Berg.

place to be for the young hip crowd. It is an amazing mix of different people with students coming from far and wide. The biggest groups that I can tell are the Swiss, Swedish and the Brazilians. There are, of course, people from all over Europe like Spain, France, UK, Italy, Netherlands, Czech Republic, Russia, Albania and Ukraine. However there is a fascinating myriad of people from places as far flung as Colombia, Japan, Korea, El Salvador, Mexico, USA, Canada, and Israel. It's almost a guarantee when you travel around the world that you will run into another Australian at some point. What amazes me is that with all these people from all over the world, there is not a single other Australian or even a New Zealander there that I know of. It's not a worry for me at all, I mean if I wanted to meet Australians, I would have stayed in Australia but I thought it was a little strange. I have two classes per day with two different teachers which are pretty good for the most part. Our new second class teacher is a little eccentric but good because he makes us talk a lot which

Dr. Pong

Ping Pong is quite big in Berlin. This is one of the places that have it, Dr. Pong.

helps a great deal. There is always some activities happening in or with the school as well so it's never a boring affair.

3) The Lifestyle

I live in Prezlauer Berg and this is important for several reasons. The first is that I'm not too far from school so I walk the 20 minutes each way every day. The second is that the area is THE place to be as I stated before. You can't walk two minutes without walking past several cafes, restaurants, bars, nightclubs and the like. The third reason is that since there are so many young people in the area, there is a real vibe. It's not unusual to see some random activities taking place in the street. A casual walk down Schönhauser Allee can reveal skateboarders, buskers (but good buskers, I even saw an eight piece brass band playing one day) and people just hanging out at the local Mauer Park. There is no shortage of parks in Berlin but In my area, there is more parks than anywhere else in the city. Why? Well on that same walk down Schönhauser Allee you will see an seemingly endless stream of women

Mariana and some kid

All the Brazilian girls seem to have a fascination with kids.

pushing prams. I don't know why but it's a funny sight to see. It's covered in graffiti, has beggars and drunk punks lining the streets so it's not the most beautiful areas but I love Prenzlauer Berg for the atmosphere and centrality. I live in a quiet little corner just off Schönhauser Allee with a man called Frank. He is a middle aged local who can be a bit of a larrikin sometimes which works out well because he doesn't take my Australian sarcasm the wrong way.

Living in Berlin is similar to most other major European city I guess but there are a few differences. German's are relentless recyclers. It's a bit of a joke in Berlin but recycling a simple tea bag properly can be a confusing, drawn out affair. We have 5 bins, that's right, five! Some places even have seven but it seems 5 works well in our apartment. Recycling a tea bag properly actually uses 4 out of the 5 bins.

There is a bit of a saying in Berlin that the weekend starts on Wednesday and it's so true. It's well known that Berlin is party central but where to go is

Volkspark in Friedrichshain

a hard decision because you are spoiled for choice. There are so many bars, clubs and night spots in Berlin that I could go to three different places every night of the week and still not see a quarter of them in the 2 months I'm here. But beyond the number, when the party starts, its crazy. Since my main reason for being here was to learn German I took it pretty easy during the week but when the weekend rolled around it was party on!

4) The Activities

Lifestyle is going to vary between visiting students and normal residence but for us students, there is something happening everyday. If there is no activity arranged by the school, we usually find something to do. The school has organised some good things like Beach Volleyball. There is obviously no beach in Berlin but in Wedding there is a large block filled with sand and completely set up for "Beach" Volleyball. They also organise a day trip out to some other place in the country every week. Although I didn't go every week, I did tag along to Leipzig and Dresden. Dresden was my favourite because it was just

Hiroko, Sayaka and I

At a Columbian restaurant

so beautiful. Since they were only day trips, we obviously didn't get to spend long there but it was good all the same. I did also take a trip with a friend of mine to the beautiful city of Schwerin in North Germany which was a great time.

My Geburtstag (Birthday) was on the 7th of May and the weekend leading up to it was huge for me. On Friday I was treated to small party with a total Japanese theme. Some of the Japanese girls decided to make sushi and serve sake all to the ambiance of traditional Japanese music. Francesca (an Italian girl who also is a excellent cook) made a cake complete with 24 candles. It was all very special. On the Saturday we went to Dresden and on Sunday we went to The Berlin Olympic Stadium to see the football. Berlin v Bremen. Since I am an honorary Berliner, I felt obligated to go for Berlin but unfortunately we got absolutely thrashed 4:1. The atmosphere was electric though. My actual birthday was on the Monday and it was just like any other Monday except that night, all my friends threw me a surprise party, complete

Marcela and I

At a Columbian restaurant

with cake (again) beer (a great mix with the cake) and happy birthday banners (in German of course) hung all over the walls. All the Brazilians sung happy birthday in Portuguese as well which was new for me.

I've still got about 1 week to go and it will be unfortunate to leave as I have had an absolute blast. I was planning to get a job and stay here but the only jobs I can get with my limited German is low paying ones. Besides, unemployment in Berlin is 12% by official statistics but in reality it's about 20%. Trying to live, learn, pay rent and bills plus saving to travel wouldn't work on a low income so I'm afraid it's back to England for me after this.

As I have a bit of time left in Berlin I will put a few more pictures up on this blog later so check back.

Hope all is well with everyone at home and where ever you are around the world. Take it easy and until next blog, Auf Wiedersehen.

FRIEDEN CAMO!

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