another brick in the (berlin) wall

"Germany is a RUDE and VIOLENT country!"
- Frances (after having her internet cafe receipt spat out in her face)

Berlin was awesome, thanx for asking. I went with two slamming young ladies, Nikki from Brighton, Melbourne and Frances from Santa Cruz, California, and I couldn't have asked for better travelling companions. In their company I feel like I'm 16 again - laughing uncontrollably, being innappropriate, being silly.

Frances and I caught the lovingly dubbed "Snafflebussen" from Malmo to Berlin on Friday afternoon. The trip took 7 and a half hours. Our European geography is so dodgy that we were very surprised to discover that there was a sea between Denmark and Germany, and that we'd be taking a ferry across it (European map, FYI).

Our first glimpse of the German people were the 50 or so truckies in the bar of the ferry who smoked out the side of their mouths, ran their hands over their shaved heads and stared at us like we were pieces of bratwurst. Ahh, the objectifying male gaze, how i miss you in Sweden! We arrived at the Berlin ZOB am Funkturm at a moment to midnight, knowing we had a bed somewhere in the city but not having the faintest idea where it was. I left this part up to Frances. We eventually found an internet cafe and worked out where Chloe lived. Aided by some bottled beer and a crumpled U-barn map, we navigated our way across the tangle of public transport and arrived, finally, at around 2am. Nikki arrived early the next morning, and so our weekend began.

Berlin is too big to do in one weekend, but we gave it a damn good shot. On the first day Chloe took us to an amazing flea market, where I bought a sexy black hat and clip on earrings. Nikki and I had the most amazing midafternoon sleep in the park. Then we went walking all around centre Berlin, past the building where Michael Jackson dangled his baby from a few years back - see our re-enactment here! Past canals, the parliament, the Jewish Museum, the memorial to the murdered jews of Europe (absolutely amazing) all the other beautiful sights that I won't be specific about because, ah, I don't know how to spell them.

I've heard a lot about the Berlin nightlife and we got the chance to experience both ends of the spectrum. On Saturday night we went to a glitzy nightclub in an office building, 12 floors above inner Berlin. It was quite crap, actually: a combination of sleep deprivation, the company of three loud Americans, boring techno and an 8 euro entry fee kind of spoiled the mood. On Sunday we ventured out again to Oranienberger and the eclectic inner suburb of Mitte. Much more my scene. We sat in a streetside cafe and shared a joint with the owner and his guests. Then Chloe took us to this amazing artist's residence, a whole block of flats plastered with graffiti, boho types sitting on couches, a grungy bar playing The Flaming Lips balanced on the top floor.

Despite all the bustle, the craziness, the vitality of Berlin, it seemed to me to be a city of ghosts. Heavy stuff went down in that city not too long ago. The fact that we were walking through these places that i've only seen in pictures in textbooks, alongside columns of fine print on the atrocities of the Nazis and the horror of the second world war - it was the weirdest sensation. It was strange seeing old people and knowing it was quite possible that they probably lived through the Nazi occupation there. I'm fascinated with how the people of Germany are dealing with such a dark past. What do they think now?

My spoils from the trip now include -

*four more words to my German vocabulary, bringing the grand total up to 6;
*six bottles of spirits and one of an Australian shiraz. To all those concerned, stocking up on alcohol in Germany is a Swedish tradition - everything costs half as much.
*A grateful appreciation of Swedish fashion - in Germany it's non-existent. People MUST dress in the dark there.