Animals on the Grass

Last weekend I found myself lying in the barely-dried spring grass along the riverfront stretch of Treptower Park. Lots of other critters broke out of their winter caves and sprawled out in the sun in the grass in the park on the waterfront in Berlin. Dogs, ducks, swans, punks, breeders, children, joggers, drunks and sausage vendors all broke out of their zoos and hit the open air last weekend. God DAMN, Berlin winters are long. But so are the Prague ones, so after 10 years spent there I should be used to 6 months of cold, gray, frozen hovno/sheise weather. It makes me appreciate the sun even more when I don’t see it for several months.

The shack shutters were flung open and wares were peddled. Bier und bratwurst, ja, but more mysterious foodstuffs could be had by the brave—or locals from a very specific mountain range in Germany specializing in snacks with names like ‘Niedersachsenisch Kugelfliegeln’ or ‘Thuringer schweinenkrustenbraten.’ Of course I made these names up because I can’t remember the original names of the mystery meats. But trust me, unless you wear lederhosen you would have no fucking idea what this food was. We looked at it. We smelled it. We STILL had no clue.

We had our bottles of cheap beer by the river’s edge; me, my girl, the dog and her brother. The brother was sprawled out on the grass wearing the previous night’s hangover like a cement trench coat. The dog watched the swans with curiosity. Or hunger. That little bastard will eat ANYTHING. Couples giggled and smooched on blankets several meters from us even though we had tried to escape such obvious teenage tomfoolery to get down to the serious business of sun-soaking and suds-sipping.

With the river and the sun and the cloudless sky overhead, I welcomed Spring along with all the other animals on the grass.

photos by Dunkin' Berliner

Accidental Urbex

As long as I can remember I’ve been fascinated with ruins. Medieval castle ruins, crumbling chateaux, or ivy-buried cemeteries seem to call out to me to enter and explore. My main purpose for the exploration was always photographic—to capture the phases of decay. Why? Because decay and decomposition are beautiful. No, I do not wear all black clothing and guyliner. I just happen to think that the aesthetics of ruin is visually and viscerally appealing. Perhaps it’s a statement on our impermanence—and of that which we design and build. Eventually, the Earth takes it all back.

A group of us in Berlin get together in a photography ‘club’ of sorts and explore. We have hit various small German towns and villages as well as miscellaneous Berlin sites and have taken thousands of pics. I’ve noticed that there are those of us who tend to favor the more dilapidated industrial, military and medical sites that have come across our field of view: an abandoned sanatorium in the countryside, a former Cold War listening post or a disused airfield. While we were planning our next outing into a former-Soviet-something-or-other, a new voice chimed in on the bulletin board, one who claimed to be into photography and Urbex. I had to look that one up. An urban explorer is one who enters, creeps, crawls and explores all that is unseen to the average human eye. Many of them take pictures and many of them just like to crawl around in the muck. I am of the former group, as crawling in muck is impractical for a man of my bulk. Some carry bags of spelunking gear and galoshes; I’m often seen in sandals and a Hawaiian shirt with a camera around my neck. Call me the Urban Tourist.

On all of our trips I am the last guy out. I probably slow the group down with my need to explore every corner of the places we conquer. Most often I am found taking pics of peeling paint or rusty metal objects. I am simply fascinated by decay in extreme close up. I fear I may have to purchase a macro lens if this keeps up. On each trip, either shouts from the group urging me to keep up--or my fear of being left behind in a village with no bus service--will eventually pry me from the crumbling decay of the past and back to the quiet bustle of the streets of Berlin.


photos by Dunkin' Berliner

Napalm Wings of Death

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

The Return of Lo Fi

In the dusty cobwebs of childhood memory I recall first hearing the term ‘hi fi.’ The audio buzz was circulating around the schoolyard, kids talking about their parents’ new ‘hi fi stereo systems.’ Some rich kids, no doubt. High fidelity stereos were not cheap. Most kids’ parents had shitty mono systems with shitty mono records playing at home. But the buzz was in the air and everyone wanted to hear the hi fi. One day a kid captured a bee in a school lunch milk carton and ran up to me and shook it up, pressing it to my ear. The bee buzzed and thumped against the inside of the milk carton angrily as the kid yelled ‘TRAN ZIS TOE RADIO!’ He was no doubt a poor white trash kid like me who was inventive out of necessity; mother didn’t own a hi fi.

In the dusty columns of the Berlin U bahn the kids run around with their mobile phones blasting lo fi mono noise in what appears to be technology gone full circle. Mobile phones are the ‘in’ device for today’s crack smoking yoots. The damn things have radios and tiny speakers in addition to cameras and internet. But rather than spend 300 EURO on a decent ghetto blaster to hoist proudly on their shoulders to share their noise pollution, they buy a mobile phone and blast their hideous music at full volume through the tiniest speaker known to man. I remember the good old days when the yoots would pollute our fair air with bumping, thumping hip hop cooked up in low riding trucks and slung through 1000 watt speakers into the night air. Actually, that is a bit of an understatement. It KICKED through the metal side panels and rattled rivets and screws of the body of whatever poor Nissan or Toyota mule bore the huge musical burden. And they shook the cars next to them. The police issued tickets for noise pollution. Those were the days.

Now BVG (Berlin public transport) has signs on the U bahn trains. The signs feature a cartoon woman who looks like she ran off the set of ‘Run Lola Run’ directly into the unemployment office. With her official uniform, shock red hair and exasperated look, she touts a different message in each sign; such pearls of wisdom as ‘the seats are not garbage dumps,’ ‘don’t eat on the train,’ or ‘travel only with a valid ticket.’ Common sense shit for the white trash of Berlin (and there is a LOT of white trash in Berlin; hmm, subject for future blogs and/or government study money/cash cow). My favorite of all of Lola’s Ten Commandments has to be ‘Ein handy ist kein lautsprecher,’ or ‘a mobile phone is not a loudspeaker.’ Clearly this was meant for those unfortunate yoots whose parents saddled them with a mobile phone rather than a mini hi fi system with headphones. And they are everywhere, sitting and giggling and spazzing out with some dumbass drivel like Whitney Spears blasting through the tiny speakers of the mobile phones clutched in their sweaty, pimply hands. Usually it’s one phone per group of 6 yoots. Poor bastards.

One of the joys of getting older is complaining about the miserable, uncouth youth of today. I don’t do that. Instead I pity them. They gather in small circles with their single shitty speaker and socialize in U bahn trains. “Why in my day….” I pumped up the volume in my $500 car with the $2000 hi fi stereo. Sometimes I even curled up in the back seat with a babe and a beer. Those were the days. The yoots of today? Poor bastards.

I KNEW Angie Was a Donut Muncher...

A picture of Chancellor Angela Merkel munching carpet a donut.
I always thought the lady was a bit 'special.'
Her first American donut.  I'm sure she's old enough to remember Kennedy's donut speech and I'm glad it made an impression on her.  It was especially diplomatic of her to realize that Amerikaner donuts beat the SCHEISE out of Berliners. I'm coming to grips with that, slowly.

I will wax poetic (non faggy) when I've gone out and munched a Berliner on Monday morning.

"Always start yer fucking week with a donut."
--Dunkin' Berliner