Ende januar

Berlin in January this year is all snow, all the time. Ice, snow, slush, hail, then more snow. All the same we get around:
went to LaD.I.Y.Fest last night in Friedrichshain and saw lots of great hair. Thursday we went to a place called Madame Claude in Kreuzberg, for low-fi music with friends/people we want to be our friends. Fantastic lyrics & accents, kind of an outsider artist vibe. Frida Hyvonen meets Jens Lekman meets Daniel Johnston. There was a blonde bespectacled German guy who sang "rock me like a wagon wheel" sans affect. Charmed the pants off us.
The night before that, a reading in English for the so-called ex-Berliner community, which means, counter-intuitively, people who are presently Berliners but exes of something else.
February will be the month of visits from people like you.

park near our house

Alexanderturm

And our life in Berlin

The I am Martha Rosler (Who Isn't) Series

Bismarckstrasse U-Bahn mural

I am Martha Rosler

That is not true but I DID do a Martha Rosler-inspired photo tour of a few blocks of Kreuzberg.

Bei Der Polizei: The Movie

So, we decided to make a movie about our first week in Berlin. Watch it on youtube here

Clothes Swap

Fashion Week Berlin

In honor of Fashion Week Berlin we went to a "green" fashion show/display/clothes swap/workshop sponsored by "The Key To", an International event for sustainable fashion and culture.

It made us feel really cool.

Zug

Schnee

Schnee und Farbe

Schnee und Holly Mae

Schnee und Auto

You be the judge

Y

Aber...Hallo!

On one of our first Berlin outings we found a charming little Trödelmarkt. There was a stand selling glasses frames, and each time we tried on a pair, the seller would remark "Aber...Hallo!" in a very deep, sleazy/ironic voice.

We found a pair that the seller told us looked like the ones Erich Honecker wore in the 60's and 70's when he was constructing the Berlin Wall and governing the East German DDR. That's him on the left, looking rather kindly and idealistic.