All stories about "Berlin"

As with all cosmopolitan cities, Berlin offers an ample selection of wild but run-of-the-mill world-capital nightlife: legendary nightclubs and trendy lounges where the young and successful (or at least hopeful) flirt and drink pricey cocktails. The style, patrons, music, and cocktails are akin to similar scenes across the globe. But then there is the other Berlin, the Berlin in which Berliners live, create, dance, and naturally, party. These are places from which the average local late-night reveler stumbles home. They have color, character, verve, and, as usual in Berlin, history.

Everyday on Gridskipper we give you a new map. Some are new, some are fetched from our archive, newly updated. Happy Gridskipping Another favorite in the Berlin pastiche of "multi-kulti" is Indian food. Though certainly not as popular as Arabic and Asian cuisine, India's curried stews and lentil soups have a tender place of their own in Berlin's heart. Once again, spicy dishes are prepared to suit fearful palates, so expect a kind of simulacrum of Indian cuisine. Follow the map for some genuine, lovingly made dishes. But if you like hot, be sure to make that clear when ordering.

A sunset that's literally out-of-this-world [Andrew Sullivan]
“Fly Derrie-Air” campaign Philly newspaper’s own practical joke [USA Today]
London sees the Second Coming of Zeppelin (airships, that is) [UK Times]
Berlin’s Schlosspolatz square will house a temporary “White Cube” exhibition space [Spiegel]
Airlines charging fatties an extra weight fee: fact or fiction? [Drudge]
Rusty bridge slows Amtrak service between NYC and Beantown [Jaunted]
Get ready for a heat wave New Yorkers [WCBS]

Spring is in the air, which means drab winter wear ought to be properly stored away. Pretty pastels in breathable fabrics are the essence of this time of year, as are sweet berries, crisp greens, and a fabulous pair of Romanesque sandals. And so, to help you shed the old and bring in the new, I've scoured east and west for the snazziest shops in Berlin. Whether you've a penchant for Tokyo's youth culture or for Sex in the City, there's something here for everyone. Happy spring shopping.

Since spring has finally arrived in Berlin (like, yesterday), the streets are teeming with life, and not just the cracked-out vampire kind that dominates the sidewalks during those sunless winter months. With the promise of multiple hours of daylight comes the heavy burden of mischief-time management for many of the city's urban art assassins -- those who had the luxury of winter's endless darkness to do their bidding in relative safety. Not anymore. The days are going to get long -- uncomfortably long, in fact. So what's a street artist to do? Hibernate until winter? Niemals (Never). Just find a corporate sponsor to fund your mural or a gallery to exhibit your work legally and call the rest of your external endeavors "exhibition promotion." Here's another look at Berlin's best graffiti ambassadors, and a sampling of galleries that have embraced urban art and its messiahs as the city's up-and-coming cultural creed. (Our previous coverage is here.)

Bids to save Berlin's historic Tempelhof airport have failed. The Cold War-era "hub of the Berlin Airlift" was built in 1923 and could accommodate 1.5 million passengers annually at complete capacity. Only 350,000 used the airport last year. [CNN]

A wise man once sang Don't do the crime if you can't do the time, a warning simple enough for even me to grasp. This threat of long-term incarceration, a staple of justice and correctional systems for centuries, is still the essential deterrent to criminal behavior. Unfortunately in Berlin, with its twelve years of Nazi dictatorship followed by four more decades of communist authoritarianism, one might end up doing the time -- or worse -- while never having actually "done the crime." Politically and racially motivated confinement, torture, and murder stain the histories of Berlin's prisons, and the process of Vergangenheitsbewaeltigung ("coming to terms with the past") has also involved examining the injustices and atrocities which have occurred within the walls of the big house. While the city now has a normal correctional system for the punishment and rehabilitation of its criminal population, several of Berlin's prisons have been converted into memorials -- remembering those innocents who suffered without cause and warning those who would forget how justice can be perverted by politics.

It's that magical time of year again! The season of all seasons -- spargelzeit (asparagus time). Bunches of chlorophyll-deprived white asparagus hit the veggie stands last week.Among the rest of the colorful fruits and vegetables, it sticks out like some sickly and awkwardly tall kid, a gangly outsider. But that doesn't deter the Germans. For the next two months, the strange white vegetable will be the envy of all edible herbaceous plants, as the star of spring-time menus in restaurants across the country. And Berlin is said to have among the best, getting it fresh from the sandy soils of surrounding Brandenburg.

When looking for a part of town to drown your sorrows because, oh, I don't know. . . your website cash cow was sold and you're probably out of a job, for example, there is but one neighborhood in Berlin where you can get as hammered, unruly, and stupid as you like and still completely blend in with the locals. Friedrichshain, Berlin's punk paradise -- where the pierced, the leather-clad, the dreadlocked, and their pit bulls can drunkenly frolic all day and night, and on the city's dime no less, without anyone so much as raising an eyebrow. It is here, in beautiful Stalinist F-hain, where your newfound unemployment won't just be accepted, it will be encouraged and even celebrated by your bleary-eyed arbeitslose brethren. So jump on the sozialhilfe bandwagon and let's take a tour of F-hain's best bars. Cheers!

Most of what one needs to know about Finland is easily summed up in just a few lines:
Wintersun: From August to May, the Finnish night lasts twenty-five hours.
Vodka: It's kept on ice in the freezer, and the traditional Finnish breakfast is a half liter of it accompanied by a piece of smoked fish.
Reindeer: They're quick to bite, have a greasy coat, and the whole country is rotten with them.
Linus Torvalds: This king of Linuxland keeps a harem of "virtual" wives and commands a geek army.
Saunas: The Finns sweat out their vodka-and-fish breakfasts at lunchtime saunas with the boss.
Sexy: Finnish law requires all citizens to be lanky sexpots, with shimmering hair and perfect teeth.
Suicide: Finland has Europe's highest suicide rate -- but after death Finns transmigrate into even newer, sexier bodies.

May 1 is a bubbling sea of discontent. The urban masses are a flurry with protest, parade, and party. Though in recent years a series of more benign events have taken some of the anger out of the day's mood, May Day is traditionally when a motley collection of left and radical groups -- communist, socialist, revolutionary, and anarchist -- get out for good old Berlin-style demonstrations. In addition to the primary evil, crappy work conditions and compensation, participants protest any and all things negative: racism, sexism, environmental damage, and globalization/capitalism. Other causes are uniquely Berlin: for instance there was last year's march for the release of a jailed Red Army Faction terrorist, a concern that harkens back to West Berlin as the breeding ground for terrorist groups in the late-1960s and 1970s).

Amid the ruckus, Berlin emerges yet again as a metropolis of contradictions. For starters, May 1 in Germany has seen street fights between right- and left-wing radical groups, as when the far right NPD and gangs of neo-Nazi ruffians decide that they can use the day for their own cause, which then leads to battle with Nazi opposition groups. These violent conflicts obviously contradict the messages of coexistence and peace that are the focus of several of the other groups hitting the streets on May Day.

These clashes aside, most of the violence comes from people with little political motivation -- a wave of wayward punks and anarchists out for a little destructive fun. More like football hooligans than pensive protesters, these angry champions of disorder charge through the streets come nightfall looking for a chance to throw bottles and/or rocks at cops, vandalize, and, most notoriously, set cars, garbage cans, and such on fire. Their rage against authority just causes grief for a bunch of unempowered average Berliners -- the residents of Kreuzberg, street cleaners, and other unlucky souls forced to deal with the aftermath.

I'm eager to see how things play out this year, after the peaceful and goal-oriented activists managed to win the day (but not the night) for constructive purposes last year. But as this year marks the 80th anniversary of Blutmai (Blood May), during which the police injured and killed protesters, it'll be interesting to see who'll claim that as their precedent (and how).

There are eleven demonstrations planned so far this year. On April 1 alone, exactly one month before the Tag der Arbeit, three revolutionary groups registered their May Day protests with the city's police. So, as in years prior, the Revolutionäre 1 Mai Demonstration will begin at 1 p.m. in Kreuzberg (pictured above). Then two other rallies will also hit the streets: Mayday beginning at 2 p.m. and Gegen Kapital und Krieg (literally 'Against Capital and War') at 5 p.m. Once you tire of watching these spectacles, you can wander MyFest, the neighborhood's fantastic street festival. Just be sure to batten down the hatches come nightfall.

Helen Schneider may not have immediate name recognition, but this stage siren is nothing short of a legend, especially in Berlin. She was the first American to perform behind the Iron Curtain in the now-defunct Palast der Republik. She was the original Sally Bowles in the first-ever production of Cabaret in Berlin. And she had a hit single in the early 80s off her record Rock 'n Roll Gypsy. Currently she's performing a one-woman show in the west, which will close next Tuesday. Although her resume is impressive in and of itself, the charm of her current stage production, A Voice and a Piano, has as much to do with her powerful renditions of classic songs from musicals like The Threepenny Opera and Evita as it does with her intermittent anecdotes about life on the road early in her career, including narrow escapes from the Mafia in New York, the Hell's Angels in Vermont, and showgirl pimps in Vegas, not necessarily in that order.

Home to an unconventional creative class, Prenzlauer Berg is a neighborhood with undeniable charm: colorful, renovated historic buildings, balconies laden with flowerpots, a bustling café culture, nice designer shops, and loads of youthful, successful, happy people. But there are some odd incongruities -- the way the changes here have resulted in a sameness, despite its appearance as a free, independent, multicultural urban neighborhood, and the degree to which the so-called "bohemian" avant-garde is actually quite mainstream.

Babylon on the Spree has been all atwitter this past week with the news that Pope Benedict XVI is planning to visit Berlin sometime next year. Big Bennie's visit, ostensibly to help celebrate the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, will mark the third time he has returned to Germany since becoming Pope, but it would be his first time in Berlin. Born in Bavaria in southern Germany in 1927, Bennie visited his childhood home two years ago and even made it to Cologne back in 2005 to hang with the homeboys as part of World Youth Day. Since then, eighty-year old Pope hasn't been traveling much, spending most of his time dictating his memoirs to a cat named Chico. But just like the rest of us sinners, he has difficulty passing up an all-expenses paid junket in Berlin. Like every other newbie in the city, Bennie is sure to hit Berlin's notorious hot spots -- the after hours parties, fetish clubs, and dimly lit backroom bars which keep Berlin humming all night long -- while the daylight hours will be filled banging out emails and sipping milchkaffee or shopping for fabulous new Pope-wear in Mitte's fashion-shocked frock shops. God knows he's got the budget! But there is just so much to see and do in the city, and tourists (even those with a direct line to Mr. Big) are always running short on time, so we thought we'd help His Holiness by pointing out the places that are definite must-sees for every new Pope in town.

"Spicy" is hardly a word I would use to describe Berlin. Neither is hot -- the German capital is definitely cool in all senses of the word. So you wouldn't expect to hear that Berlin has long been one of the world's tango capitals. (Dancing Berliners will even say that it's second to Buenos Aires.) Really, if the city is to be defined by a cultural import, I wouldn't have expected it to be a form of passionate, vibrant Latin music and dance. Berlin seems, rather, to resonate with a mellow, reclusive style of jazz, or the blues. But maybe that's the point, and this a case of "opposites attract."

Photo: "sei stadt, sei wandel, sei Berlin" "be city, be change, be Berlin"....

Does Berlin's new tagline symbolize the end of an era, the death of Europe's beloved urban, semi-socialist bohemia. Street art was once the most outward symbol of Berlin's organic and independent cultural scene. Now the urban phenomenon is being used as the new advertising medium for multinational corporations. And as part of the city's ad campaign, the faces of individual Berliners are being commodified. The German capital is getting rid of the the spontaneous "Poor but Sexy" tagline, used by the mayor in an interview, for a more formal, planned approach to selling itself.

Of course, the campaign has a a mission statement of sorts -- it includes several options for what Berlin is: inimitable, tolerant, cosmopolitan, etc. It's all so multifaceted and dynamic! But in naming all these adjectives that are so predictable and appealing to investors (let's face it, they didn't sink advertising cash in the campaign for our benefit), the committee missed some major characteristics of the city. Characteristics that are more typically and uniquely Berlin than classic mantras like "we're tolerant" and "we're cosmopolitan."

This weekend the Berlin Biennial officially begins, sparking one of those rare occasions when the city's art community erupts in a fervent spasm of hyper-activity and shameless courting of visiting collectors. With so many events strategically opening to coincide with the Biennial's commencement, atheist artists across the city are actually praying to God for blue skies, reliable public transport, and bountiful prescription stimulants. As we've noted before, Berlin's cultural sector heavily depends on out-of-town collectors coming to the city to financially support the local scene, and the Berlin Biennial is one of three major art events that promises fiscal payback (the other two are Artforum and the annual gallery weekend). Openings, after-parties, bellini brunches, and exclusive private views will dominate the upcoming weekend, so here's a guide to help filter an otherwise overwhelming social agenda. It should be noted, by the way, that the easiest way to tell if you're in the right place is if Adel and Eva, the couple pictured here, are there too. (photo)

The weak dollar. It brings scary things to mind, such as economy-class travel, early-bird specials, and (this just sent a shiver down my spine) McDonald's. You imagine yourself window shopping (only), depending on the subway for cultural intake, and gazing wistfully at those lingering in cozy cafes while you drink beer at sidewalk imbiss with the unfortunate Hartz IV recipients (basically the long-time unemployed on welfare). These are the depths to which, we fear, our measly American dollars are going to take us. But Berlin is here to show you that poor can also be sexy! The following lists the city's ultra-schnäppchen (little bargains).

The DIY ambience that has come to define Berlin's basement club culture has proven too babyish for many of the city's more mature clubbers, assuming that "mature" means showering in cologne, donning a designer-brand encrusted muscle tee, and gelling your faux-hawk until it resembles a dead porcupine. In light of the dollar's steady decline, Europe's privileged classes have a real reason to celebrate, and for Berlin's nouveau riche, it's no longer enough to snort a mountain of speed and run around the labyrinth halls of the city's cavernous clubs. They've done it all, and much like the stretch pinstripe shirt that still dominates their wardrobes, they've outgrown it. Let the nu rave kids sweat it out in the cellar, the nouveau riche kids are moving up to rooftop views, champagne flutes, and VIP rooms. In honor of their graduation, here's a quick list of the most expensive, garishly overdone, and elitist clubs in Berlin -- for whenever you feel like taking out the euro trash. (Please, like you didn't see that one coming.)

Berlin's fashion scene is full of indie mavericks. These rebels against uniformity have a growing prominence throughout the world. On a given day, you might see busloads of Japanese tourists admiring Konk's playful opulence, or visiting Europeans enduring the dismal walk on Invalidenstrasse in order to shop at Penkov. I myself was rather shocked at just how many designers are not slouching towards the fashion empires in other major cities, but instead are staying put and selling their works at boutiques here in Berlin.