My my my, it has been a long time since my last post!
What's been happening? Well, apart from work, having a band split up and quite a few nights out on the town, not a great deal.
I don't really have a lot to talk about, but I did want to share this dream I had last night. I thought it was pretty funny.
For some reason, my ex and I were back together and we were traveling the world. It was her turn to show me something - we were walking through this dark cave tunnel, with people passing us on either direction. Eventually we emerged into the light and in front of us was a large shelf full of huge bottles of water. I asked her why she was showing me this, and in response she told me to turn around.
We were standing on a tiny little island at the edge of a MASSIVE swimming pool - and when I say massive, I mean it went as far as the eye could see. The water was crystal clear, so we both jumped in and started having fun in the water.
At this point I woke up - and absolutely busting to go to the loo!
So, is there a deep and meaningful reason behind these images or, instead, was it my subconscious trying to let me know I need to dump a load of water from my system?
Well, at least I thought it was funny.
Monday, 18 February 2008
Tuesday, 25 December 2007
Happy Christmas everyone
Just a short one to say Happy Christmas to everyone.
Just in case you're worried I'll be on my own today, I'm actually waiting to be picked up to go over to Warwick and Sacha's place for lunch. This very nice offer came about at our last gig, when Sacha asked me what I was doing today - my original plan was to sleep in and watch telly all day. To be honest, there's only one thing on the teevee I want to see today so I prefer this option!
Best wishes and all my love to mum and dad, Russell and Sarah, Blake and Lachlan, Bron and Alex, Margaret and Lee, Charne, Rod and Grace, and Kylie and Tony - and anyone else I've forgotten. I miss the hell out of you all and I can't wait to see you when I come back in March.
Have a brilliant day!
Just in case you're worried I'll be on my own today, I'm actually waiting to be picked up to go over to Warwick and Sacha's place for lunch. This very nice offer came about at our last gig, when Sacha asked me what I was doing today - my original plan was to sleep in and watch telly all day. To be honest, there's only one thing on the teevee I want to see today so I prefer this option!
Best wishes and all my love to mum and dad, Russell and Sarah, Blake and Lachlan, Bron and Alex, Margaret and Lee, Charne, Rod and Grace, and Kylie and Tony - and anyone else I've forgotten. I miss the hell out of you all and I can't wait to see you when I come back in March.
Have a brilliant day!
Sunday, 23 December 2007
Last Travel for 2007
It's been back to boring since Berlin, just more work, some band practice and a couple of gigs.
Well, that's maybe not quite so true.
Truthfully, the week I arrived back from my holiday was possibly one of the busiest I've had all year! After I arrived back at home, I had about two hours to chill out and get back to normal before it was back to band business. Having auditioned several drummers for the new band a couple of weeks earlier, we'd arranged a second audition for one of the guys we liked best for 7pm the day I arrived home. Thankfully, everything went beautifully and we now have a full line-up again! I think we made the consensus after three songs, in fact.
Now, for those who don't know what the transport system here in London is like, let me paint a picture. We have cabs (black cabs and mini-cabs), buses (those brilliant red double-deckers you see on telly) and we have trains: in particular, overlanders and the Tube. I'm simplifying a little, but that's generally all of it.
London is, as you'd expect, massive, so you really need to take best advantage of the available transport to get around efficiently. It can also be quite expensive: cabs are the priciest, followed by the trains then the buses.
For now, I'm going to bitch about the Tube.
Basically, the Tube sucks. Forgive me for unleashing my imagination, but when I arrived I'd imagined one of the largest and powerful cities in the world would be able to manage a reliable underground train system - apparently not. Silly me.
It's not bad enough that it's stinking hot (oh, and stinking) in the carriages and platforms. It's not bad enough that they break down incessantly. No, my biggest complaint is that they stop running just after midnight! If you want to do anything in this city, you're effectively curfewed by the fact that it's nigh on impossible to get home once the Tube stops running.
Okay, it is possible, but as I said this is a rant about the Tube - don't get me started on the buses.
Now, why did I start this little diatribe about the public transport system? Well, there's a specific reason: on Sunday nights, most of the Tube lines seem to stop earlier than usual. As it was a Sunday night, I was faced with the very strong possibility that I wasn't going to make it home at a reasonable hour (as we finished rehearsing at 11pm). As it was, I had to rush hurriedly to the station - only to wait around ages for a train, then find my connecting train wasn't running any more.
Two buses later, I eventually made it home around 1am.
Back to work the next day, I was understandably tired. Of course, no rest for the wicked - the next night was a sugarsmoke rehearsal as we had a gig that week, not to mention a recording session on the weekend. I'm pretty lucky with this band that our singer happens to live five minutes walk from me, so each night we catch a cab home and I'm usually in bed by midnight.
Unbelievably, I had Tuesday night off.
Wednesday, however, was another gig - that's right, on a school night. This time we were on at 10.30pm, but, unlike the last gig where we spent most of our time trying not to be bored, we had plenty of time to grab a nice meal and catch a couple of the bands on before us. This was easily our best gig, we had a pretty sizeable crowd and we played really well - was very pleased with how it went.
Thursday was another night off.
Friday night, on the other hand, was party time! The singer in my new band was having a house warming party and I was invited along, so down to Brixton I went. Unusually for a party such as this, we were all being herded out around 9.30pm to head up to a local club in order to see a band - a Belgian group called Das Pop. They were fantastic too, was really glad we went to see them! I also met the guy I replaced in the band which was, err, interesting. By this point, I was completely and utterly knackered so I made my goodbyes and headed home. Again, two buses later and I was in bed at 3.30am.
Before I went to bed, however, I made a point to set my alarm for 8am as I had to be at the recording studio at 11am and I wanted to be there promptly. Somehow, and I'm not pointing any fingers, but somehow my alarm didn't go off. In fact, when I eventually woke up I was surprised that it was so light before 8am... it wasn't until I put my glasses on that I realised, oh shit, it's 10am. I quickly called Abigail to apologise that I was going to be late, then ran off to one of the fastest showers I've ever had in my life. I then grabbed my bass and ran out the door to brave the public transport.
Okay, now remember my little tirade earlier? Take a guess what happened.
Actually, this day was probably the only time I've had any luck with regards to the public transport! I live about 10-15 minutes walk from my closest Tube station, but as luck would have it a bus arrived just as I passed the closest bus stop, getting me to the station in minutes. The second I stepped on the platform a train arrived. I had to make two connecting trains, and both arrived as soon as I arrived - I couldn't believe it, I was going to make it to the studio on time! I eventually made it to my station with one last bus to catch... and just as I was marveling that my usual hour journey was going to take me only 40 minutes, I walked out in to the air to see my bus drive off.
Yes, there were expletives.
Still, it was only a 10-15 minute walk left and I arrived at my destination only 10 minutes late. But that's okay, as our engineer hadn't arrived yet so things worked out okay in the end.
Recording itself was an interesting experience. As we only had a few hours to get everything done, it was decided to record each track live to save us time. It became quite hectic at times, but in the end we walked out with a CD with three new recordings.
Not content with working myself stupid all week, I decided a bit more punishment was in order - so I caught up with Lee and Margaret to see the new edition of Blade Runner at the movies!
Can you guess what I did on Sunday? If you guessed sleep, you are absolutely correct!
With that disgustingly busy week out of the way, there's only been a few other highlights to talk about. More rehearsals, of course. The Young Gods were touring the UK again in early December, so I went to see them again - and now I'm very pleased to say I've now seen them do Moon Revolutions and Summer Eyes live! I was very seriously considering going to see them again the following night in Brighton, having figured out I could make it there and back on the train - but in the end I thought it best to save my money.
The next big event was a sad one: Jon, sugarsmoke's lead guitarist, had decided to head back home to Australia and we were playing one last gig with him at his big farewell party. The venue was tiny and it wasn't anywhere near as well organised as our previous gigs, but it was a fun way to say goodbye. Now it looks like we're on hiatus for a few months until we find a new guitarist.
Which brings me to this week just gone. Yet another one of my favourite bands from the '90s had reformed, this time it was EMF. You know at least one of their songs (Unbelievable), but they've done more (and better, imho) since then. Sadly, their original bassist died several years ago, but his replacement tonight was in the form of Richard March, formerly of Pop Will Eat Itself. Amazingly, when we were at the venue he walked in the door near me and he actually recognised me! (Remember a few months ago I met PWEI in Stourbridge? How cool is that!)
Finally, there was another small gig I went to on Friday night - this time, in Wolverhampton. Yet again, I travel to the Midlands to see a band - this is the third time! Rather than rush myself too much, I took the day off work so I could leisurely make my way there. Well, when I say leisurely I mean I took a coach, which was packed full of people, noisy and hot (thanks to a faulty air conditioner). But that didn't matter, because I was going to see the mighty Ned's Atomic Dustbin once more!
Like the EMF gig, I was meeting up with a bunch of people I've met on various message boards on the web, so after checking into my hotel I headed off to the meeting point and met them all - loads of new people, a few I already knew. After hopping from bar to bar for a while, we finally made it to the venue, at which point I grabbed hold of the railing at the front and refused to leave. I managed to stay there the entire show too, although my poor ribs and knees (and face!) are now facing the consequences. But I don't care, I had such a brilliant time I feel it was well worth it!
The bus ride home the next day, however, was even less pleasant than the ride up. The air conditioning may have been working, but I start to get annoyed when a journey that's supposed to last less than four hours winds up taking more than five. Maybe it's just me?
Any way, that's me pretty much bang up to date now.
Well, that's maybe not quite so true.
Truthfully, the week I arrived back from my holiday was possibly one of the busiest I've had all year! After I arrived back at home, I had about two hours to chill out and get back to normal before it was back to band business. Having auditioned several drummers for the new band a couple of weeks earlier, we'd arranged a second audition for one of the guys we liked best for 7pm the day I arrived home. Thankfully, everything went beautifully and we now have a full line-up again! I think we made the consensus after three songs, in fact.
Now, for those who don't know what the transport system here in London is like, let me paint a picture. We have cabs (black cabs and mini-cabs), buses (those brilliant red double-deckers you see on telly) and we have trains: in particular, overlanders and the Tube. I'm simplifying a little, but that's generally all of it.
London is, as you'd expect, massive, so you really need to take best advantage of the available transport to get around efficiently. It can also be quite expensive: cabs are the priciest, followed by the trains then the buses.
For now, I'm going to bitch about the Tube.
Basically, the Tube sucks. Forgive me for unleashing my imagination, but when I arrived I'd imagined one of the largest and powerful cities in the world would be able to manage a reliable underground train system - apparently not. Silly me.
It's not bad enough that it's stinking hot (oh, and stinking) in the carriages and platforms. It's not bad enough that they break down incessantly. No, my biggest complaint is that they stop running just after midnight! If you want to do anything in this city, you're effectively curfewed by the fact that it's nigh on impossible to get home once the Tube stops running.
Okay, it is possible, but as I said this is a rant about the Tube - don't get me started on the buses.
Now, why did I start this little diatribe about the public transport system? Well, there's a specific reason: on Sunday nights, most of the Tube lines seem to stop earlier than usual. As it was a Sunday night, I was faced with the very strong possibility that I wasn't going to make it home at a reasonable hour (as we finished rehearsing at 11pm). As it was, I had to rush hurriedly to the station - only to wait around ages for a train, then find my connecting train wasn't running any more.
Two buses later, I eventually made it home around 1am.
Back to work the next day, I was understandably tired. Of course, no rest for the wicked - the next night was a sugarsmoke rehearsal as we had a gig that week, not to mention a recording session on the weekend. I'm pretty lucky with this band that our singer happens to live five minutes walk from me, so each night we catch a cab home and I'm usually in bed by midnight.
Unbelievably, I had Tuesday night off.
Wednesday, however, was another gig - that's right, on a school night. This time we were on at 10.30pm, but, unlike the last gig where we spent most of our time trying not to be bored, we had plenty of time to grab a nice meal and catch a couple of the bands on before us. This was easily our best gig, we had a pretty sizeable crowd and we played really well - was very pleased with how it went.
Thursday was another night off.
Friday night, on the other hand, was party time! The singer in my new band was having a house warming party and I was invited along, so down to Brixton I went. Unusually for a party such as this, we were all being herded out around 9.30pm to head up to a local club in order to see a band - a Belgian group called Das Pop. They were fantastic too, was really glad we went to see them! I also met the guy I replaced in the band which was, err, interesting. By this point, I was completely and utterly knackered so I made my goodbyes and headed home. Again, two buses later and I was in bed at 3.30am.
Before I went to bed, however, I made a point to set my alarm for 8am as I had to be at the recording studio at 11am and I wanted to be there promptly. Somehow, and I'm not pointing any fingers, but somehow my alarm didn't go off. In fact, when I eventually woke up I was surprised that it was so light before 8am... it wasn't until I put my glasses on that I realised, oh shit, it's 10am. I quickly called Abigail to apologise that I was going to be late, then ran off to one of the fastest showers I've ever had in my life. I then grabbed my bass and ran out the door to brave the public transport.
Okay, now remember my little tirade earlier? Take a guess what happened.
Actually, this day was probably the only time I've had any luck with regards to the public transport! I live about 10-15 minutes walk from my closest Tube station, but as luck would have it a bus arrived just as I passed the closest bus stop, getting me to the station in minutes. The second I stepped on the platform a train arrived. I had to make two connecting trains, and both arrived as soon as I arrived - I couldn't believe it, I was going to make it to the studio on time! I eventually made it to my station with one last bus to catch... and just as I was marveling that my usual hour journey was going to take me only 40 minutes, I walked out in to the air to see my bus drive off.
Yes, there were expletives.
Still, it was only a 10-15 minute walk left and I arrived at my destination only 10 minutes late. But that's okay, as our engineer hadn't arrived yet so things worked out okay in the end.
Recording itself was an interesting experience. As we only had a few hours to get everything done, it was decided to record each track live to save us time. It became quite hectic at times, but in the end we walked out with a CD with three new recordings.
Not content with working myself stupid all week, I decided a bit more punishment was in order - so I caught up with Lee and Margaret to see the new edition of Blade Runner at the movies!
Can you guess what I did on Sunday? If you guessed sleep, you are absolutely correct!
With that disgustingly busy week out of the way, there's only been a few other highlights to talk about. More rehearsals, of course. The Young Gods were touring the UK again in early December, so I went to see them again - and now I'm very pleased to say I've now seen them do Moon Revolutions and Summer Eyes live! I was very seriously considering going to see them again the following night in Brighton, having figured out I could make it there and back on the train - but in the end I thought it best to save my money.
The next big event was a sad one: Jon, sugarsmoke's lead guitarist, had decided to head back home to Australia and we were playing one last gig with him at his big farewell party. The venue was tiny and it wasn't anywhere near as well organised as our previous gigs, but it was a fun way to say goodbye. Now it looks like we're on hiatus for a few months until we find a new guitarist.
Which brings me to this week just gone. Yet another one of my favourite bands from the '90s had reformed, this time it was EMF. You know at least one of their songs (Unbelievable), but they've done more (and better, imho) since then. Sadly, their original bassist died several years ago, but his replacement tonight was in the form of Richard March, formerly of Pop Will Eat Itself. Amazingly, when we were at the venue he walked in the door near me and he actually recognised me! (Remember a few months ago I met PWEI in Stourbridge? How cool is that!)
Finally, there was another small gig I went to on Friday night - this time, in Wolverhampton. Yet again, I travel to the Midlands to see a band - this is the third time! Rather than rush myself too much, I took the day off work so I could leisurely make my way there. Well, when I say leisurely I mean I took a coach, which was packed full of people, noisy and hot (thanks to a faulty air conditioner). But that didn't matter, because I was going to see the mighty Ned's Atomic Dustbin once more!
Like the EMF gig, I was meeting up with a bunch of people I've met on various message boards on the web, so after checking into my hotel I headed off to the meeting point and met them all - loads of new people, a few I already knew. After hopping from bar to bar for a while, we finally made it to the venue, at which point I grabbed hold of the railing at the front and refused to leave. I managed to stay there the entire show too, although my poor ribs and knees (and face!) are now facing the consequences. But I don't care, I had such a brilliant time I feel it was well worth it!
The bus ride home the next day, however, was even less pleasant than the ride up. The air conditioning may have been working, but I start to get annoyed when a journey that's supposed to last less than four hours winds up taking more than five. Maybe it's just me?
Any way, that's me pretty much bang up to date now.
Tuesday, 27 November 2007
The Final Days
Okay, so once I was able to move again on Friday I took a trip into Alexanderplatz to the TV Tower although my mushy brain didn't properly register the weather conditions: overcast, rainy and fog. Great idea, let's try to see the city through that! I did my best, though, and it was a nice view - from what I could see, at any rate.
Considering I was technically on a holiday, I don't feel too guilty about spending the rest of the day just relaxing and spending time chatting to my fellow hostel dwellers. Plans were afoot for the following day anyway: I'd noticed a flyer for an alternative tour of Berlin, offering to show the sights of the city not normally covered by the regular tours. It sounded good to me (and was recommended by at least one person), so I rose early and arrived at the meeting point by 11am - coincidentally, the very TV Tower I'd visited the day before.
After waiting a while for more people to arrive, we eventually departed on the U-bahn (the underground train system) to our first stop. I'm afraid my memory is not so good at the best of times so I don't remember the area, but I do know what we saw - lots of street art. The first was one building entirely covered in murals, one side commenting on the pervasiveness of the media in our lives, while the other was about corruption in politics. It was really impressive and extremely well done, as was the next destination.
As it turns out, the area we were in used to be an extremely dangerous area of the city - our guide said he would never have dreamed bringing anyone there 10 years ago. As it turns out, a group of street artists decided to do something to try and improve the area. Their idea was to turn the ground section of one of the area's apartment blocks into a massive mural of 50 faces, ranging from the anonymous to the famous (such as Jimi Hendrix and Ghandi). Surprisingly, this tactic actually helped turn the tide of the area and it's now a much nicer area. The art itself is amazing - extremely colourful, most are very vivid and it's a testament to the very talented artists who helped transform the area into something to be proud of.
As we were promised a chance to traverse the city in the manner of a true Berliner, our next stop was a popular second-hand clothes warehouse where you pay for items by the kilogram, rather than by the individual items. Not being a fashionista myself, I only took a brief look through the place (although I did stop to take a closer look at some of the jackets) - but I still walked out empty handed.
Next on the itinerary was a visit to a man-made waterfall that also provides a terrific vantage point to see the entire city. The water wasn't running due to it being winter, but the view was well worth it. It was still bit grey, but nowhere near as bad as the day before! After this we all decided to grab some lunch, so we wandered down to a local currywurst stand. For the uninitiated, currywurst is basically a sausage (or two) chopped up, sprinkled with curry powder, doused in tomato sauce, then more curry powder - with optional chips on top. This is proper German food, so being the occasionally adventurous type (I can hear the scoffing from there, thank you very much) I partook in a portion - and it was pretty good.
With lunch consumed, we were back on the U-bahn to the next stop - and easily the most dangerous. As we gathered in the morning, our guide (who, I might add, was an Aussie!) mentioned we were going to be breaking into an abandoned prison (in use during the '60s by the Soviets) on the outskirts of the city - but he assured us that not only was there a legal loophole making it highly unlikely we'd be in any trouble, but also he had his phone ready to call his lawyer in case of said trouble.
The building itself was a fair way out of the city and involved a 10 minute walk beyond the train stop, but we arrived and proceeded to navigate the many dangerous barriers, fences and other paraphernalia erected to keep troublesome trespassers out. If you've seen Prison Break or Escape from Alcatraz, it was sort of similar to that.
Actually, it was a rather pathetic little plastic fence that had been trampled to the ground and was easily stepped over, but you should never let the truth get in the way of a good story, right?
Inside was remarkable - aside from the broken glass everywhere (and the cold), there was loads more graffiti art inside. It looked like it'd been home to a few raves in its time, although I have no idea if there had been - at least one section looked tailor made for a DJ booth. We proceeded to scale the stairs (avoiding the very dangerous elevator shafts) until we reached the top floor. Hidden up here in one darkened area was a room that looked like it contained a massive bath, but our guide wasn't entirely sure what it actually was (or, consequently, what it was used for).
Not content with seeing the city from here, we then climbed a ladder to the roof - the absolute top of the building. Now, regular readers of my journal should be well aware of my shitscaredness of heights (yes, I just invented a word) - but it's amazing what a peer group will do for one's courage. Up the ladder I indeed went - to an absolutely amazing 360 degree view of the entire city. On one side was the city centre, with the TV Tower proudly standing erect at its heart - to the other side was a formidable industrial area, belching smoke and undoubtedly lots of other nasty gunk into the atmosphere. From here we were also able to notice several bemused occupants of neighbouring homes, so at this point it was decided to head back down and on to our next destination.
One short bus ride later and we were at an area that was badly bombed throughout the war and had yet to be repaired in any way - except for one building: it had been completely transformed into a huge skate park. It's slightly surreal to wander past the remains of buildings that are barely standing, only to be confronted by one not only intact but filled with kids on skate boards and inline skates. Next to this was another condemned building that was favoured by various itinerants and grafitti artists, so we took a quick look inside - after we were warned the locals were very proud of this building and had acquired the services of a gang of punks to help protect it. No sign of them today, though.
Now, although I'd already seen some remains of the Wall a couple of days earlier, it turns out I was slightly gypped: there is a much longer section (1.3 kilometres worth) still intact by the river, which helped serve as part of the death zone. This was where we headed next, to walk along the back section of the wall inside the very area we would have been shot dead not 20 years ago. Adorning this side of the wall was some of the most amazing street art I've ever seen, including one amazingly detailed reproduction from a Spawn comic.
If this wasn't enough, we then had a makeshift ladder presented so we could climb up the Wall and have our picture taken!
By now it was becoming quite dark, so our next stop was our last - a large artists' collective that started life as a condemned squat. We didn't get to spend much time here, but we did take some time to have one final drink together and rest - I'm not joking, we seriously traversed almost the entire city in a day. It was brilliant. If anyone's going to Berlin, I highly recommend this tour!
As this was my last night in Berlin, I wanted to make it a big one - so I headed back to the hostel to see if anyone else had big plans for the night. As it turns out, nearly everyone did! As usual, we spent most of the evening hanging out in the cafe taking advantage of the super-cheap drinks and watching videos on the computer until it was time to leave - at 12am.
The plan was to hit one of the clubs in the city, which involved a couple of train trips. As you can imagine, trying to corral a good dozen or so half-drunk travellers from around the world took a bit of effort, but we made it in the end.
As it turns out, the club was... well, crap. We were warned by a couple of girls on the train that the place we were going to was rubbish (they were heading to an American Cowboy bar which sounded great to me), but we weren't able to convince anyone else so an R&B bar it was. Ugh. Please note my extreme distaste for this poor excuse for music. Thankfully there were several levels with different types of music, so a handful of us ended up in one room that was playing something that was at least listenable.
Eventually, this same handful grew tired of the club and decided to head back to the hostel. After grabbing our jackets, we headed outside to discover something completely magical - it had started to snow! I've never seen snow before in my life (oh, okay I lie - I saw it when I was _very_ young in Canada, but I barely remember it so I say it doesn't count) so I was absolutely enthralled. The small group I was now with consisted of myself, a Canadian girl and two fellow Aussies - we were all entranced.
Before heading home, we all decided to grab a bite to eat at a nearby currywurst stand (twice in one day, not bad eh!) before heading out into the snow to pummel each other with snowballs. This is going to sound really stupid, but for some reason I wasn't expecting snow to be as cold as it was - not surprising, really, considering it's _ICE_!! Lucky I had my gloves with me.
We eventually called a truce and hopped in a taxi back to the hostel which was an adventure in itself. By now the snow was really coming down quite heavily and the car was having a bit of trouble sticking to the road, but in the end we made it back - this time, to an even thicker layer of snowball material! Needless to say, lots of target practice was had on the short walk back to the hostel - I even got whacked in the side of the face by a German girl who was out with her own friends having their own snow fights.
By this time I was having so much fun I was really sad to have to leave - even worse, I had to get up at 8am to get ready to make it to the airport in time (I went to bed around 4.30am or so). I rose in time, had a shower, checked out and headed to the train station.
My plan was to catch the same train I caught in to the city back to the airport - the S9. As it's a fairly regular one, it arrived within 10 minutes and I was already falling asleep as it started to roll off. As the journey was a good 45 minutes or so, I let myself drift off - occasionally checking the scenery so I could see how the outskirts of the city looked during the day. After a while I noticed the TV Tower again and thought to myself how close the airport must be to the city... and then it struck me, it isn't. The hair on the back of my next stood to attention as we rolled in to the next station and, with utter horror, I saw the notice board announce the train I was on - the S41!!
Now, before you go jumping to conclusions, let me assure you I _definitely_ got on the S9. Let me finish the story first before my near-legendary ability to board the wrong trains gains more strength.
I immediately jumped up and got off so I could try to work out what the hell was going on. A took a look at the train map and realised I was indeed half way back into the city on one of the loop lines, so my first step was to get back to a station that could get me to the airport. Luckily, a train heading that direction promptly arrived and I hopped aboard. Quite naturally, I vigilantly verified each station was taking me closer to my destination until I arrived at the first intersection I could change at.
Back on the platform, I approached a guard to ask when the next S9 would arrive - to which the answer was not any time soon, it had been cancelled for the day! At least this answered why my original train suddenly transformed into something else - I guess that's what the announcements I couldn't understand were trying to tell me. He then assured me the next train to arrive was going to the airport, so I had nothing to worry about - and I didn't. It arrived within 20 minutes, I made my flight with plenty of time and arrived home by 3pm.
Needless to say, I really enjoyed my week away. It was lovely to be able to forget everything that's been building up here over the last nine months and just chill out, relax and have fun. I'd really love to go back to Berlin too, I feel like I only barely scratched the surface of the city, but the lure of so many other places to visit is too strong to ignore. It's both a blessing and a curse of this side of the world, there's so much to see and do - you never know where or what to do first!
With my holiday behind me, normal life was calling - almost immediately, in fact. I barely had time to sit down after arriving home than I had to head into the rehearsal studios to help audition new drummers for my new band. I'm glad to say we think we've find the right guy, we're having a full rehearsal with him on this coming Sunday night so we'll see how it goes.
But that's not all: Monday night I had rehearsals with my other band, which started disastrously but quickly turned around. We've also half-written a new song which I've had a very strong hand in, considering it's entirely based around a bass riff I came up with a couple of weeks ago. Of course, this rehearsal was to prepare us for our third gig on Wednesday night, which was our last one with our current guitarist.
Tonight was (thankfully) a night at home, but the rest of the weekend is just as chaotic: Friday night I'm going to a house warming party, Saturday we're in the studio recording all day, then Sunday is the aforementioned rehearsal with the new drummer. I'm hoping I'll be able to fit a sleep-in somewhere in the middle there.
Considering I was technically on a holiday, I don't feel too guilty about spending the rest of the day just relaxing and spending time chatting to my fellow hostel dwellers. Plans were afoot for the following day anyway: I'd noticed a flyer for an alternative tour of Berlin, offering to show the sights of the city not normally covered by the regular tours. It sounded good to me (and was recommended by at least one person), so I rose early and arrived at the meeting point by 11am - coincidentally, the very TV Tower I'd visited the day before.
After waiting a while for more people to arrive, we eventually departed on the U-bahn (the underground train system) to our first stop. I'm afraid my memory is not so good at the best of times so I don't remember the area, but I do know what we saw - lots of street art. The first was one building entirely covered in murals, one side commenting on the pervasiveness of the media in our lives, while the other was about corruption in politics. It was really impressive and extremely well done, as was the next destination.
As it turns out, the area we were in used to be an extremely dangerous area of the city - our guide said he would never have dreamed bringing anyone there 10 years ago. As it turns out, a group of street artists decided to do something to try and improve the area. Their idea was to turn the ground section of one of the area's apartment blocks into a massive mural of 50 faces, ranging from the anonymous to the famous (such as Jimi Hendrix and Ghandi). Surprisingly, this tactic actually helped turn the tide of the area and it's now a much nicer area. The art itself is amazing - extremely colourful, most are very vivid and it's a testament to the very talented artists who helped transform the area into something to be proud of.
As we were promised a chance to traverse the city in the manner of a true Berliner, our next stop was a popular second-hand clothes warehouse where you pay for items by the kilogram, rather than by the individual items. Not being a fashionista myself, I only took a brief look through the place (although I did stop to take a closer look at some of the jackets) - but I still walked out empty handed.
Next on the itinerary was a visit to a man-made waterfall that also provides a terrific vantage point to see the entire city. The water wasn't running due to it being winter, but the view was well worth it. It was still bit grey, but nowhere near as bad as the day before! After this we all decided to grab some lunch, so we wandered down to a local currywurst stand. For the uninitiated, currywurst is basically a sausage (or two) chopped up, sprinkled with curry powder, doused in tomato sauce, then more curry powder - with optional chips on top. This is proper German food, so being the occasionally adventurous type (I can hear the scoffing from there, thank you very much) I partook in a portion - and it was pretty good.
With lunch consumed, we were back on the U-bahn to the next stop - and easily the most dangerous. As we gathered in the morning, our guide (who, I might add, was an Aussie!) mentioned we were going to be breaking into an abandoned prison (in use during the '60s by the Soviets) on the outskirts of the city - but he assured us that not only was there a legal loophole making it highly unlikely we'd be in any trouble, but also he had his phone ready to call his lawyer in case of said trouble.
The building itself was a fair way out of the city and involved a 10 minute walk beyond the train stop, but we arrived and proceeded to navigate the many dangerous barriers, fences and other paraphernalia erected to keep troublesome trespassers out. If you've seen Prison Break or Escape from Alcatraz, it was sort of similar to that.
Actually, it was a rather pathetic little plastic fence that had been trampled to the ground and was easily stepped over, but you should never let the truth get in the way of a good story, right?
Inside was remarkable - aside from the broken glass everywhere (and the cold), there was loads more graffiti art inside. It looked like it'd been home to a few raves in its time, although I have no idea if there had been - at least one section looked tailor made for a DJ booth. We proceeded to scale the stairs (avoiding the very dangerous elevator shafts) until we reached the top floor. Hidden up here in one darkened area was a room that looked like it contained a massive bath, but our guide wasn't entirely sure what it actually was (or, consequently, what it was used for).
Not content with seeing the city from here, we then climbed a ladder to the roof - the absolute top of the building. Now, regular readers of my journal should be well aware of my shitscaredness of heights (yes, I just invented a word) - but it's amazing what a peer group will do for one's courage. Up the ladder I indeed went - to an absolutely amazing 360 degree view of the entire city. On one side was the city centre, with the TV Tower proudly standing erect at its heart - to the other side was a formidable industrial area, belching smoke and undoubtedly lots of other nasty gunk into the atmosphere. From here we were also able to notice several bemused occupants of neighbouring homes, so at this point it was decided to head back down and on to our next destination.
One short bus ride later and we were at an area that was badly bombed throughout the war and had yet to be repaired in any way - except for one building: it had been completely transformed into a huge skate park. It's slightly surreal to wander past the remains of buildings that are barely standing, only to be confronted by one not only intact but filled with kids on skate boards and inline skates. Next to this was another condemned building that was favoured by various itinerants and grafitti artists, so we took a quick look inside - after we were warned the locals were very proud of this building and had acquired the services of a gang of punks to help protect it. No sign of them today, though.
Now, although I'd already seen some remains of the Wall a couple of days earlier, it turns out I was slightly gypped: there is a much longer section (1.3 kilometres worth) still intact by the river, which helped serve as part of the death zone. This was where we headed next, to walk along the back section of the wall inside the very area we would have been shot dead not 20 years ago. Adorning this side of the wall was some of the most amazing street art I've ever seen, including one amazingly detailed reproduction from a Spawn comic.
If this wasn't enough, we then had a makeshift ladder presented so we could climb up the Wall and have our picture taken!
By now it was becoming quite dark, so our next stop was our last - a large artists' collective that started life as a condemned squat. We didn't get to spend much time here, but we did take some time to have one final drink together and rest - I'm not joking, we seriously traversed almost the entire city in a day. It was brilliant. If anyone's going to Berlin, I highly recommend this tour!
As this was my last night in Berlin, I wanted to make it a big one - so I headed back to the hostel to see if anyone else had big plans for the night. As it turns out, nearly everyone did! As usual, we spent most of the evening hanging out in the cafe taking advantage of the super-cheap drinks and watching videos on the computer until it was time to leave - at 12am.
The plan was to hit one of the clubs in the city, which involved a couple of train trips. As you can imagine, trying to corral a good dozen or so half-drunk travellers from around the world took a bit of effort, but we made it in the end.
As it turns out, the club was... well, crap. We were warned by a couple of girls on the train that the place we were going to was rubbish (they were heading to an American Cowboy bar which sounded great to me), but we weren't able to convince anyone else so an R&B bar it was. Ugh. Please note my extreme distaste for this poor excuse for music. Thankfully there were several levels with different types of music, so a handful of us ended up in one room that was playing something that was at least listenable.
Eventually, this same handful grew tired of the club and decided to head back to the hostel. After grabbing our jackets, we headed outside to discover something completely magical - it had started to snow! I've never seen snow before in my life (oh, okay I lie - I saw it when I was _very_ young in Canada, but I barely remember it so I say it doesn't count) so I was absolutely enthralled. The small group I was now with consisted of myself, a Canadian girl and two fellow Aussies - we were all entranced.
Before heading home, we all decided to grab a bite to eat at a nearby currywurst stand (twice in one day, not bad eh!) before heading out into the snow to pummel each other with snowballs. This is going to sound really stupid, but for some reason I wasn't expecting snow to be as cold as it was - not surprising, really, considering it's _ICE_!! Lucky I had my gloves with me.
We eventually called a truce and hopped in a taxi back to the hostel which was an adventure in itself. By now the snow was really coming down quite heavily and the car was having a bit of trouble sticking to the road, but in the end we made it back - this time, to an even thicker layer of snowball material! Needless to say, lots of target practice was had on the short walk back to the hostel - I even got whacked in the side of the face by a German girl who was out with her own friends having their own snow fights.
By this time I was having so much fun I was really sad to have to leave - even worse, I had to get up at 8am to get ready to make it to the airport in time (I went to bed around 4.30am or so). I rose in time, had a shower, checked out and headed to the train station.
My plan was to catch the same train I caught in to the city back to the airport - the S9. As it's a fairly regular one, it arrived within 10 minutes and I was already falling asleep as it started to roll off. As the journey was a good 45 minutes or so, I let myself drift off - occasionally checking the scenery so I could see how the outskirts of the city looked during the day. After a while I noticed the TV Tower again and thought to myself how close the airport must be to the city... and then it struck me, it isn't. The hair on the back of my next stood to attention as we rolled in to the next station and, with utter horror, I saw the notice board announce the train I was on - the S41!!
Now, before you go jumping to conclusions, let me assure you I _definitely_ got on the S9. Let me finish the story first before my near-legendary ability to board the wrong trains gains more strength.
I immediately jumped up and got off so I could try to work out what the hell was going on. A took a look at the train map and realised I was indeed half way back into the city on one of the loop lines, so my first step was to get back to a station that could get me to the airport. Luckily, a train heading that direction promptly arrived and I hopped aboard. Quite naturally, I vigilantly verified each station was taking me closer to my destination until I arrived at the first intersection I could change at.
Back on the platform, I approached a guard to ask when the next S9 would arrive - to which the answer was not any time soon, it had been cancelled for the day! At least this answered why my original train suddenly transformed into something else - I guess that's what the announcements I couldn't understand were trying to tell me. He then assured me the next train to arrive was going to the airport, so I had nothing to worry about - and I didn't. It arrived within 20 minutes, I made my flight with plenty of time and arrived home by 3pm.
Needless to say, I really enjoyed my week away. It was lovely to be able to forget everything that's been building up here over the last nine months and just chill out, relax and have fun. I'd really love to go back to Berlin too, I feel like I only barely scratched the surface of the city, but the lure of so many other places to visit is too strong to ignore. It's both a blessing and a curse of this side of the world, there's so much to see and do - you never know where or what to do first!
With my holiday behind me, normal life was calling - almost immediately, in fact. I barely had time to sit down after arriving home than I had to head into the rehearsal studios to help audition new drummers for my new band. I'm glad to say we think we've find the right guy, we're having a full rehearsal with him on this coming Sunday night so we'll see how it goes.
But that's not all: Monday night I had rehearsals with my other band, which started disastrously but quickly turned around. We've also half-written a new song which I've had a very strong hand in, considering it's entirely based around a bass riff I came up with a couple of weeks ago. Of course, this rehearsal was to prepare us for our third gig on Wednesday night, which was our last one with our current guitarist.
Tonight was (thankfully) a night at home, but the rest of the weekend is just as chaotic: Friday night I'm going to a house warming party, Saturday we're in the studio recording all day, then Sunday is the aforementioned rehearsal with the new drummer. I'm hoping I'll be able to fit a sleep-in somewhere in the middle there.
Saturday, 24 November 2007
Don't let the door hit you on the way out, you little arse
Thank you Australia - hopefully soon I'll be able to proudly tell everyone I'm Australian, and not apologise for the xenophobia and other bullshit Little John has inflicted upon us in the name of my country.
Always remember: we are a society, not an economy.
Always remember: we are a society, not an economy.
Friday, 23 November 2007
Friday will be a quiet day
I haven't been on the pub crawl. I decided it's probably the tackiest thing I could do, so instead I went out with a group of people who work at the hostel. We ended up in this small bar called Sofia with a fairly large group of Spanish girls, which was - not unsurprisingly - quite nice.
Yesterday, I originally planned to catch one of the tours to the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp, but one of the guys I'd gone out with the night before wasn't ready to leave in time, so we decided just to head over when we were ready. After a bit of a mix up with which trains to get, we eventually arrived there around 1.30pm.
We split the cost of the audio tour and wandered around. There was loads to see, all of it terrible and disheartening. On occasion we'd come across one of the tours and listen in (which made me wish I'd caught one) and, as expected, it was all pretty nasty stuff.
The most amazing part, for me, was not just experiencing the disgusting cruelty so many people were forced to endure, but hearing and seeing actual survivors from the camp going touring the buildings they'd been imprisoned in and describing the conditions they went through. Not in person, I hasten to add - these were videos.
It must take astounding bravery not just to have survived this hell, but to return and relive those memories. These amazing human beings did their part to help remove this scourge from the planet, and for them and the many others who fought these creatures (one of whom, I'm tremendously proud to say, is my wonderful dad) I remain eternally in awe and in gratitude.
What I really need now is a joke to lighten the mood, but I'm all out of them.
After the trip back, I decided to chill out for a while and grab some food. Eventually I ended up in the cafe of the hostel with a bunch of other people having a few drinks, which lead to us all hitting the city for a night out. We wandered down the road and found a nice bar, then proceeded to chat and drink the night through - well, actually I don't know what time we called it a night. But it must've been late, I didn't get up until 12pm and I have a very, very bad feeling in my head so I can only assume.
Needless to say, I'm going to take things quietly today. It's raining here, anyway, so the tour I wanted to go on might not have been a good idea. I can always do it tomorrow.
Yesterday, I originally planned to catch one of the tours to the Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp, but one of the guys I'd gone out with the night before wasn't ready to leave in time, so we decided just to head over when we were ready. After a bit of a mix up with which trains to get, we eventually arrived there around 1.30pm.
We split the cost of the audio tour and wandered around. There was loads to see, all of it terrible and disheartening. On occasion we'd come across one of the tours and listen in (which made me wish I'd caught one) and, as expected, it was all pretty nasty stuff.
The most amazing part, for me, was not just experiencing the disgusting cruelty so many people were forced to endure, but hearing and seeing actual survivors from the camp going touring the buildings they'd been imprisoned in and describing the conditions they went through. Not in person, I hasten to add - these were videos.
It must take astounding bravery not just to have survived this hell, but to return and relive those memories. These amazing human beings did their part to help remove this scourge from the planet, and for them and the many others who fought these creatures (one of whom, I'm tremendously proud to say, is my wonderful dad) I remain eternally in awe and in gratitude.
What I really need now is a joke to lighten the mood, but I'm all out of them.
After the trip back, I decided to chill out for a while and grab some food. Eventually I ended up in the cafe of the hostel with a bunch of other people having a few drinks, which lead to us all hitting the city for a night out. We wandered down the road and found a nice bar, then proceeded to chat and drink the night through - well, actually I don't know what time we called it a night. But it must've been late, I didn't get up until 12pm and I have a very, very bad feeling in my head so I can only assume.
Needless to say, I'm going to take things quietly today. It's raining here, anyway, so the tour I wanted to go on might not have been a good idea. I can always do it tomorrow.
Wednesday, 21 November 2007
Another brick...
I arrived safely yesterday and found my way to the hostel fairly painlessly. Well, except for the slight confusion figuring out which train to get... oh, and that little run in with the ticket inspector, which saw me narrowly escaping a fine for an unvalidated ticket. Typical, less than two hours in the country and I'm already a fugitive of the law.
Like London, it was pitch black at 5pm so it didn't make a lot of sense to go out sight seeing last night. Instead, I checked into the hostel, said hello to a couple of fellow travellers and headed out for some food and a few drinks with one of them (and a brief look around, of course).
Waking up this morning at 8.30am reeking of cigarette smoke (never, ever forget how wonderful the smoking bans are!), I quickly had a shower and tried to figure out what to do and see today. After perusing some of the pamphlets for the various tours around the city, I discovered a nice walking tour was leaving just down the street from me - in 20 minutes. Rushing out the door with my bag, camera and warm clothes, I caught the U-bahn to the station and made the tour in plenty of time.
Oh yeah, it's frickin' freezing here! Last night it was apparently -2 degrees. Today it was 5 degrees. I am ever so thankful I decided to buy gloves and a new beanie on the weekend, I think I'd be a block of ice otherwise.
The tour was a good four hour, five kilometre walk that mostly focused on the eastern side of the city (history buffs will know this was the Soviet side until recently). Our guide was a really friendly American girl who's gone native, and she detailed a great amount of the history of every place we visited. Photos will be posted when I get back, I promise - there was some good stuff!
The Pink Floyd freak in me was most excited by a visit to Potzdamer Platz which, in addition to being one of the most infamous areas of the Berlin wall, was also the site where Roger Waters performed his massive star-studded staging of The Wall, just months after the actual wall was dismantled. Interesting enough, part of the area is just an empty block of land. There's a lot of this around the city, actually: there are still disputes over the rightful owners of these areas - the Potzdamer Platz area in particular was forcefully taken from a famous Jewish-German family by the Nazis in the '30s, and it was only recently that reperations were given to the descendents of the original owners.
There's a lot of pretty spectacular architecture around, although the vast majority of it is recreated from how things looked before it was all bombed to pieces. Of course, the most infamous of all structures is the wall itself, which thankfully no longer exists beyond a few small pieces. That said, there are plenty of reminders of its presence if you know where to look: the most obvious being the cobbled path that winds throughout the city to mark where the wall intersected east from west.
One of the other memorable areas we visited was the memorial to the millions of Jews killed in the Holocaust. Only recently constructed, it consists of 2711 (I think it was) concrete blocks uniformly spread over a five acre area. No two blocks are apparently the same height, and the ground they are embedded in is also non-uniform, so it's a bit of fun to walk through. The guy who designed it made it this way specifically, but refused to offer any explanations to what they mean - instead, it's up to individuals to make up their own minds as to its significance. Not surprisingly, I have my own theory - but I'm not going to share it with anyone.
Not far from this is the area where Hitler's bunker lies, where he committed suicide during the final days of the War. The original attempt to build new apartments over the top of it were scuppered when the ground was found to be too unstable to build on, so instead the bunker was filled with concrete and a car park was put there instead. Oddly, this seems a fitting tribute to the psychopath who destroyed so many lives.
After the tour, I considered my options and decided to head back to the hostel to figure out what to do for the rest of day. And rest, I'd been on my feet walking for over four hours straight!
I still haven't decided what to do yet, but I'm strongly considering going on one of the pub crawls offered - it seems like a decent introduction to the night life here, plus it'll give me an opportunity to meet some new people.
As for the rest of the week, there's plenty of other tours to do, museums to see, shops to visit... too much. Should be fun, can't wait to find out what I end up doing!
Like London, it was pitch black at 5pm so it didn't make a lot of sense to go out sight seeing last night. Instead, I checked into the hostel, said hello to a couple of fellow travellers and headed out for some food and a few drinks with one of them (and a brief look around, of course).
Waking up this morning at 8.30am reeking of cigarette smoke (never, ever forget how wonderful the smoking bans are!), I quickly had a shower and tried to figure out what to do and see today. After perusing some of the pamphlets for the various tours around the city, I discovered a nice walking tour was leaving just down the street from me - in 20 minutes. Rushing out the door with my bag, camera and warm clothes, I caught the U-bahn to the station and made the tour in plenty of time.
Oh yeah, it's frickin' freezing here! Last night it was apparently -2 degrees. Today it was 5 degrees. I am ever so thankful I decided to buy gloves and a new beanie on the weekend, I think I'd be a block of ice otherwise.
The tour was a good four hour, five kilometre walk that mostly focused on the eastern side of the city (history buffs will know this was the Soviet side until recently). Our guide was a really friendly American girl who's gone native, and she detailed a great amount of the history of every place we visited. Photos will be posted when I get back, I promise - there was some good stuff!
The Pink Floyd freak in me was most excited by a visit to Potzdamer Platz which, in addition to being one of the most infamous areas of the Berlin wall, was also the site where Roger Waters performed his massive star-studded staging of The Wall, just months after the actual wall was dismantled. Interesting enough, part of the area is just an empty block of land. There's a lot of this around the city, actually: there are still disputes over the rightful owners of these areas - the Potzdamer Platz area in particular was forcefully taken from a famous Jewish-German family by the Nazis in the '30s, and it was only recently that reperations were given to the descendents of the original owners.
There's a lot of pretty spectacular architecture around, although the vast majority of it is recreated from how things looked before it was all bombed to pieces. Of course, the most infamous of all structures is the wall itself, which thankfully no longer exists beyond a few small pieces. That said, there are plenty of reminders of its presence if you know where to look: the most obvious being the cobbled path that winds throughout the city to mark where the wall intersected east from west.
One of the other memorable areas we visited was the memorial to the millions of Jews killed in the Holocaust. Only recently constructed, it consists of 2711 (I think it was) concrete blocks uniformly spread over a five acre area. No two blocks are apparently the same height, and the ground they are embedded in is also non-uniform, so it's a bit of fun to walk through. The guy who designed it made it this way specifically, but refused to offer any explanations to what they mean - instead, it's up to individuals to make up their own minds as to its significance. Not surprisingly, I have my own theory - but I'm not going to share it with anyone.
Not far from this is the area where Hitler's bunker lies, where he committed suicide during the final days of the War. The original attempt to build new apartments over the top of it were scuppered when the ground was found to be too unstable to build on, so instead the bunker was filled with concrete and a car park was put there instead. Oddly, this seems a fitting tribute to the psychopath who destroyed so many lives.
After the tour, I considered my options and decided to head back to the hostel to figure out what to do for the rest of day. And rest, I'd been on my feet walking for over four hours straight!
I still haven't decided what to do yet, but I'm strongly considering going on one of the pub crawls offered - it seems like a decent introduction to the night life here, plus it'll give me an opportunity to meet some new people.
As for the rest of the week, there's plenty of other tours to do, museums to see, shops to visit... too much. Should be fun, can't wait to find out what I end up doing!
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