in friedrichshain

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Sunday afternoon, in friedrichshain (the neighborhood i'm living in) at an internet cafe with Whitney and Danielle, a friend who's here visiting from the states. We just ate at a great big brunch buffet--fruit and sausage, whole grain bread, nutella, various forms of eggs and a wide variety of vegetable dishes. Quite tasty. then we walked around this awesome flea market and combed through stand after stand of vinyl, interspersed with stands of old books and other old crap, alongside hand-made hipster skirts and punk rock miniskirts and belts, stands selling anti-bush banners and other anti-establishment paraphernelia and artists. There was one stand that had a ton of vinyl from the Soviet Union and east europe, but i didn't even know where to begin in recognizing any of it. I bought Duran Duran _Seven and the Ragged Tiger_ for 1E. americana is popular here in that ironic kind of way--people were selling buttons and lighters with american flags and eagles and "god bless my nation" printed on them. also cowboy belt buckles that say North Dakota and Wells Fargo. The flea market as a whole was totally awesome and I plan to go back and buy souvenirs before I leave.

On a related note: A Danish guy from the goethe institute (school) also informed me that Americans eat only with our right hands, i.e. using only a fork and not a knife and fork as is proper in Europe, because 'when you were a cowboy you always needed to have one hand on your peacemaker.' he was quite serious!! too funny. it's great to find out how hilarious americans seem to people in the rest of the world.

What else? Watched the world cup game for third place between germany and portugal last night. I actually got really into it, and was so happy when Germany won. It was great to see how happy everyone was out in the streets afterwards, driving around honking and singing and waving flags out of the windows. All of the flags ARE really a little creepy, especially when you see those shots on the TV of the huge crowds of Germans waving flags. Tonight I'm going to a public viewing of the final game, and plan to root for France. Sorry Italy, but they aren't too popular here right now after beating Germany! It's at this giant old brewery that is now a sort of arena and also houses some government functions, including the police station.

On another related but random note: on friday I drank beer from the oldest brewery in the world--they claim that it began operation in 1040. (I wasn't at the brewery itself but they serve this beer at a beer garden I went to on Friday night). It tasted very good. All the beer is so good here I keep on drinking a bit too much, and the alchohol content is so high! But for whatever reason I don't seem to get hungover. The effect of the beer on me is just that I get the mad giggles and German becomes much easier to speak, although I speak it very, very sloppily. But it's fun. 😊

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