Nightlife

It's taken me a little while, but I've finally ventured out into the Berlin nightlife scene. It was a bit overwhelming at first because there are SO MANY places to go and going out alone in a strange city is scary at first. I started easy, going out to get some food the other night in my neighborhood. Only a five minute walk from my house is a very happening street called oranienstrasse. Tons of restaurants, bars, shops, clubs, etc. I ended up at the place where the Doner Kebap was born, a restaurant called Hasir. It was very crowded and I was siting outside at a huge table by myself. Naturally, a man who was also by himself asked if he could share my table. We ended up talking for a few hours through dinner and a few beers afterwards! I have unfortunately forgotten his name, as per usual, but he was a really cool 38 year old from Frankfurt. He was in town on business and had decided to ditch his friends and come to Kreuzberg (my neighborhood) for dinner. We spoke in English which allowed us to have a significantly more intellectual conversation then if we had spoken in German. We talked about war and world politics, about travel and music. His parents are Iranian so we talked a bit about life there (even though he was born in Germany). He loves Berlin and told me a few places that I have to go to. It was so easy to talk to him! He was so friendly and interesting, quickly mentioning that he had a girlfriend, so I didn't feel as if he was hitting on me. We ended the night with a friendly hug and went our seperate ways. One interesting fact that I learned from him is that they call Frankfurt "Main Hattan" because their river there is the Main, and it is the only city in Germany that has skyscrapers...just like Manhattan , cool.
The next night I went also to a club nearby to get a ticket to see CocoRosie ( I know, they are American, but I have missed all of their shows in NYC, and thought they would be significantly weird enough to see in Berlin, I was right :)) The early show was sold out, but they had added a midnight show, so I got a ticket for that. I talked to a guy in line, a very tall, very cute guy. So then I had about 4 hours to kill before the show! My first stop was to a kiosk to buy a beer and drink it in the street. Well, I actually walked to the river Spree which was a block away and sat on a wall to drink it. My view from there was across the river to the Eastside Gallery, which is a long stretch of the Berlin Wall that remains intact. Artists and other locals have grafittied pictures and words all over the wall. Needless to say it is a pretty amazing sight. I was struck by how small the wall looked (it's only like 10 feet or so). I could clearly see the city behind the wall, and it was so hard to imagine that that concrete wall affected the lives of so many people!
When i had finished my beer, I went in search of another bar. I found a punk bar called Franken again on Oranienstrasse. Sweet! I was sitting alone for mere moments when i struck up a conversation with a guy who was buying shots next to me. I joined him and his friend at a table outside. They were two Swedish guys in their early 20's who had come to Berlin to hang for a few days. They so reminded me of Ginny and I when we were 21 and travelling through Europe together :) I realized then that I am such a different person and in such a different place then i was back then (thank god!) They were fun though and gave me the name of the club where they were going that night to see some local punk bands. I will have to check it out one night! After they left , the two girls sharing our table started talking to me. They were Germans, and were laughing a little at the 2 young Swedish boys (and probably at me too, having loud conversations in English!) They are both students, late 20's, recent implants to Berlin from Heidelberg. We had a lot of fun talking and they invited me out tomorrow night to an after work Rock club that is in an U-bahn station, cool.
My last stop that night was of course, the concert. I didn't talk to anyone there, I was just drinking in the scene. I've got to say that German concert goers seem to be much better behaved then Americans. At least in this case. CocoRosie were great, and the venue was small and intimate. I caught the night bus home, and even though it was 2am on a Monday night, the streets were still packed with people. Gotta love it!