Berlin Bar Reviews

Oscar Wilde could not have expressed
the nature of beauty better.

There are plenty of reviews out there for people who want something particular from bars, or want the quick-fix Berlin bar guide. Consider these sporadic-at-best bar reviews to be something more of a slow burn. These are just places I go to and what I think of them.

Zimt und Zunder The best bar in Berlin, bar none. It’s my local, so I would say that. It’s also reasonably cheap, with beer at €2.50 a bottle (500ml). It also has a barmaid that I would go to prison for. Other than her, it’s pretty light on girls, so don’t expect too much action in that regard. The tunes are just what the bar staff wants to hear, and given that they’re pretty well integrated with the clientele, it feels like a cosy but cool front room of a house party you’re crashing. In the six months I’ve been going there, I’ve not heard English from the staff once, and that makes me almost as happy as the barmaid’s voluptuous figure and great norks.

Weekday nights (bar Mondays) can get pretty raucous, and a good way to describe it would be as a young person’s old-man pub. It’s the same crowd in there all the time, and while they’re cliquey as hell, they’re never unpleasant. There’s table tennis, table football and a handful of chess and backgammon sets to keep you entertained. Watch out for pub quiz night – if it’s happening, DO NOT go in. In typical German style, the pub quiz is a sober, not-to-be-fucked-with affair that involves MS Excel documents being projected onto the walls. On these nights (of which I have only seen one so far) you must be silent and respectful of the participants, and whatever you do, don’t you dare have fun.

Meat. Such as may be found in a meat market. Laugh all you
want, but don't pretend you wouldn't.

Monarch

Described by my flatmate, Chris, as an ‘alt meat market’ – solely because he couldn’t bear the thought of picking up a chick in a regular meat market – this is a place to pick up chicks in glorious superficio-colour. Indeed, Chris is now going out with a girl he swapped emails with there (he believes exchanging digits isn’t cool enough, the twat). If he can do it, you can too, trust me, ‘cos he’s the dullest fucker I know.

As meat markets go it sits neatly between the kind of shit-pit goth/rock dive that are common here, and the neon 80’s super-disco-uber-dance-mega-party locations that you kind of assume are here. At €3 a beer (330ml), and €1 entrance fee most nights, it’s not hideously expensive either. Go there, stalk the female toilet queue (yes, that happens here) and get laid, ‘cos you sure as hell didn’t come for the music.

The vanguard of every DJ's wardrobe. It says, simply,
cunt.

Lagari

I don’t have a clue what this place is like at any other time than Sunday evenings – of course here that’s a perfectly legit time to go out and get drunk – but I’d like to. Sunday nights are kind of English nights. In fact, last time I was there, they were dishing out shepherd’s pie. It’s probably the most ex-pat place I’ve been to. Even more so than dedicated ex-pat nights. It has a Parisian jazz club vibe to it, but without all the smelly French people. It has stand-up comedy, in both German and English, as well as live music all night, and various guest improv performers. Better than this, the beer is cheap (€2 for Sternberg (500ml)), and the feeling incredibly homely, which I suppose is because it might as well be a bar in England (albeit very good one).

However, I have something of an issue with this place in that it’s the kind of joint that’s ‘totally down’ with clique. It’s all artsy types and fragile egos, and as such isn’t the kind of place in which it’s easy to fool around and have fun. You’re here to watch the music, goddamit, and if you’re not here to do that or hang around arty types looking cool and discussing philosophy in a beret, or which aggressively priced Japanese fractal T-shirt you’re going to be wearing on next DJ set, there’s little reason to be here. Whilst I wouldn’t normally spit on these people if they were on fire, there is a certain coherence to this assemblage of predictable meat baggery that’s very comforting.

Hangin' out.

Schmittz

Not so much a hang out, as a pre-hang out meeting venue. Handily placed on Tor Strasse to allow for easy access to numerous hot spots in Berlin, this place is really just a hole in which to slowly get drunk and chat nonsense. There’s nothing special about it, bar the convenient location and relatively inexpensive beer (not to mention the proximity to a spatkauf for cheeky jager shots). Well worth finding and knowing for when you need that meet up location that’s going to let you relax without everyone around you telling you how cool Berlin is. Be careful around football time, as it shows all the major matches, and you don’t want to be stuck in that shitstorm.

Drinking in Berlin

Oh, god. What a week. I feel like all of my organs are bowels. As if there’s nothing in me that isn’t made of shit. This works as an emotional metaphor as well as a physical one. In fact, I feel so emotionally derelict I actually got angry the other day. This doesn’t happen very often. Chris had a go at me for being a fat lazy cunt. I had a go at him for being a regular lazy cunt, we hugged, it was all better.

Why do I feel like this? Why have I become this shambling meatpuppet of a human? One word…

Booze.

To be fair, the guilt has lifted somewhat, as I honestly don’t think it’s my fault; there is almost no way to avoid getting repeatedly and destructively drunk in this city. I’ve had three days off the sauce, thanks to a dear friend who’s given me the opportunity to go ‘off pissed’, for want of a better phrase, but still the issue remains. I sat down to a nice meal with her the other day, and without realising it, ordered and drank a beer. Only post fact did I work out what was wrong. This place takes an awful lot of self-control to deal with.

Mmmmm, vulnerable and fun!

I guess it comes from being English. It’s a pretty simple equation, and not one that I’m going to labour, but we’re used to having to cram our drinking into a set amount of hours. We’re also used to a culture that frowns upon ‘going out on a schoolnight’ (a phrase that comes close to being as inane as “only 5 more sleeps until holidays” – sleep is uncountable, you fuckwits.) The end result is that I drink. I drink like an absolute dick.

Anyway, do the maths… we’re used to drinking say, 10 pints in 6 hours (not accounting for spillage, breakage and general twattery). After 6 hours, we go home, sleep it off, and everything works out fine. Ish. Come here, and take the same mentality, and you’ll wind up like me. A night out lasts a helluva lot longer than six hours. In all seriousness, be aware of that if you come to Berlin.

Even if you have a plan, it WILL go wrong.

I am simply saying, briefly and without too much preamble, “Watch yourself.” The drinking culture here is far more, well… cultured, than we’re used to. Take some advice: eat something before you start drinking. Take on plenty of water. If you’re coming from England, bring some milk thistle.

He's much more believable since his gritty reboot.

Overall, though, if you avoid the stag dos and whatnot, you’ll find that a majority of the boozeries are really rather civilised. It seems needless to say, but the range of bars here is pretty staggering, but for the most part they’re chilled and you’ll just look like a dick if you start chanting football noise or leering overtly at the local assortment of tart.

Smoking in Berlin:

Most bars will have some kind of smoking room or rauchzimmer and particularly late on in the evening many places can fill up with smoke pretty quick. Old school!

Bar sports in Berlin:

You’ve got three choices here. Table tennis (tischtennis), table football (Fussbal) or leering at women. If you’re no good at any of those, be prepared to be excluded from much of the evening’s activities. There are a couple of pool halls dotted around, and the real bonus here is that they’re rarely in use, so you can have a reasonably fun night just playing pool somewhere like Feuermelder.

Not to add insult to injury here, but those are incredibly
manly legs. Still. might as well, eh?

Outside drinking in Berlin:

Most bars will have an outside ‘bit’ but rarely will you find a beer garden or anything more than a few green tables set out on the roadside. Try the Eastern Comfort for a change of pace, or Generator for something resembling a beer garden.

Irish bars in Berlin:

There are a couple here, and all are expensive and shit. If you’re after premiership football or some other sporting event that isn’t shown on German TV, try Belushi’s in town or Oscar Wilde’s.

I’ll be posting some individual bar reviews in the future, so hopefully that should give you a better idea.

Anyway, for now, take my advice. Take it easy, and don’t wind up like me: broken and full of shit.

Museums in Berlin

So, apologies for having ignored this the last couple of days. I have been drunk. Less intensely drunk granted, but it’s been no easier on my liver. I guess I’ve been coquettishly flirting with a nuclear power plant as opposed to my usual of dry humping an atom bomb, but the effect is just the same: I’m gonna wind up sterile at some point in the future.

In between my bouts of cursory consideration for my body and rampant desire to get wasted and fall in love, I have been going to museums. Not as many, if I’m honest with myself, as I should have, but enough to warrant making noise about. Here are four places worth visiting:

My kind of museum.

National History Museum: you’ve been here before, sure, but when does natural history ever get boring? It’s basically the same as the last natural history museum you went to, but in German. You might not get the full experience, but you’ll get pretty close, as there’s plenty of quality translation. Highlights include a fucking great big dinosaur, an air-conditioned freak show of formaldehyde and fish, and a taxidermy wing that would make even the most disturbed of serial killers weak at the knees. 

DDR Museum: organisation can rarely be a good substitute for truth, but in this case it would be nice to feel as if someone hadn’t just crapped through a desk fan and let the pieces lie where they fell. Consistently surprising, and occasionally emotional, this museum offers an awful lot of information for such a small place. The only real trouble is that you do need a little time to piece things together, as there’s very little narrative of the East German regime. It’s one of the few commercial museums around, but no less enjoyable for it.

Sculpture, tat, random art and post-
modern tourism shit at Tacheles.

Kunsthaus Tacheles: not that I’ve been all the way through it, but this art house, for want of a better translation, is floor upon floor of piss-soaked commercialism. Even if you’re not buying, you’re still buying into something, and that’s appropriate given its history as a monument to commercial failure. The history is interesting, even if you don’t find the classical architecture or über-cool art quite as engaging. 

Wouldn't mind getting
inside her national dress.

The German History Museum: so this place is emotional. I got a helluva kick out of being there and enjoying both the serenity of the architecture and the quality of the exhibits. At time of writing it has a German police exhibition, covering pre, mid, and post war. When you get to the top floor – a place dealing with the logistics of wartime Germany – things get a little more real. The power of this exhibition, if you’re into voyeurism, is not in the exhibits, but in the emotion present in those viewing them. It may have just been the day I spent there, but there were a lot of wistful old German men and teary-eyed old German women. I didn’t belong there, so I left.

Scenesters. Cunts.

Daisies: a place to go in Wedding that, frankly, kicks ass. Not strictly a museum, but a little slice of something at least real. Ish. A pokey little dive, this will be the place you tell your mates about when you get home. Formerly an old Turkish men’s club, this place is currently run by two painfully cool New York scenesters with, apparently, enough balls to tackle the German bar bureaucracy obstacle course. You go girls!

There’s a metric shit-tonne more to do in Berlin, and hopefully I’ll cover it reasonably soon.

English Products in Berlin

I was talking to Chris the other day about the great Branston Pickle scare of 2010 that caused moronic consumers (in the truest sense of the word) to go out and buy up all the Branston they could find. God, people are idiots.

There's something about lingerie...

Anyway, it got me thinking about the things in Berlin that are hard to get hold of. When you go to a different country, you always have to make a few substitutions in your diet/lifestyle, and to be honest, Berlin is pretty good for expat shops such as this, but if you want to do without getting wallet raped in the process, here are a few things I’ve picked up.

British stuff in Berlin

Bacon sandwiches: American bread, ketchup and American bacon is about as close as you’re going to get in somewhere like Netto. Still, it’s a pretty close facsimile to the real thing. It doesn’t have the same kind of mystical curative minerals and vitamins as a ‘real’ bacon sarnie, but it’ll probably get you through a hangover. You might have a bit of trouble if you like English mustard in your sammiches, because there’s not much that compares. In fact, the last pot of mustard I bought here resembled nacho sauce. Yeah, I ain’t gonna eat that.

Scones. Fuck yeah!

Tea and biscuits: teabags (of an English variety) can be easily purloined in Asia Markt in town. It’s PG Tips, but hell, it’s better than the crap foreigners call tea. Finding something resembling a digestive biscuit can be a bit of a pain in the ass, however. Still, there’s more than enough random biscuitry in this country to keep you going, just try something new for once.

Buying Meat in Berlin

Mince: now, as English people, we’re kind of reliant on minced meat, but here you’re more likely to find half a pig marinated in some kind of green gloop than a small packet of mince. However, if you’re clever (like me), one of the best purchases you can make is a hand blender. Costing anywhere from €10 to €40, they’re really worth the buy. In order to make your own mince (from whatever cut you want), just get a cut of meat from the butcher and give it a blitz in the blender’s chopping attachment. Damn I’m clever.

Pork, the meat of kings.

Sausages: don’t expect sausages to be anything like the British banger. Frankly, they’re a helluva lot better than the tubes of anus-and-eyebrow you get in England. Still, as crap as they are, trying to recreate a fry up without then just isn’t cricket. The closest I can find is weisswurst. They’re veal and pork, with a few herbs, but probably much lower in faecal matter content than you’re used to.

Ham: for a country swimming in pork products, It’s amazingly hard to find a plain slice of ham. Most places like Netto and Kaiser will sell some processed ham, that works for sammiches, but nothing of amazing quality. For cooking, speck (lardons) is in bountiful supply, so you don’t have to worry about that. I got sick of bloody salami within a matter of weeks, and regardless of the number of names the stuff has, it all tastes exactly the same.

Cheese: a major bone of contention with Berlin and I, finding a decent cheese is a problematic to say the least. It’s almost as if they think that cheddar isn’t the best cheese in the world by far. You can get pretty much every other cheese – goat’s cheese is pretty good here, as is French cheese. Kaiser sell Cathedral City, which is as close as you’re gonna get.

Baked Beans: Kaiser sell ‘em. Apparently. I fart enough already, so I don’t really need ‘em.

This is what happens when you get Marmite involved
in your life. It's a metaphor.

Condiments

Marmite: check out this place for Marmite and other assorted pickles. Expensive and wanky, but at least you get your Marmite. Obviously, if you like Marmite, you’re not my kind of people. 

Mustard: as I said before, mustard can be pretty tricky. It’s incredibly cheap though, so try a few, and when you get sick of them, get someone to bring over some Coleman’s powder or try this.

Vegemite: buy it at Australia World, which I think is solely online now, thank god.

Stuff in Berlin

Second hand games: hard to find, but Gamestop seems to be the best place in town. However, I have it on good authority that no-one buys games in Berlin. What they do is order from Play.com or Amazon.

Phones: if you’re here for a bit, and want a cheap phone and sim, head over to Media Markt, Saturn or REAL in town, or Neukoln. Your best bet for providers is probably O2, as they have a vast number of shops. The cheapest phone I could find when my mate came over to stay for a bit was €15 with €5 free credit, so it's really not going to break the bank. However, if you want to use the Wi-Fi hotspots in town, you’ll have to go with T-Mobile. As a side note, I’ve noticed that 3G coverage is pretty poor, so don’t rely on that. 

In general though, Berlin is pretty light on chain stores and übermarkets like we get in England. A little extra planning goes a long way if you’re looking for something specific. Having said that, life is pretty sweet here, and the absence of bloated branding more than makes up for the place not having an Argos.

Generator Hostel Review

The chances are that if you’re looking at getting a hostel in Berlin, you’ll encounter Generator Hostel somewhere on your virtual travels. Indeed, a couple of years ago I wound up staying there – most likely because it was first on Hostelbookers.com’s listings to be fair. Having had a cursory glance around various hostel review sites, I can’t see a single review of the place that accurately sums it up. It almost seems as if people writing for the Internet don’t give a shit about what they write, as long as they get paid. Tisk. Hence, I would be somewhat remiss in my duty if I didn’t cover this kind of thing.

So…

Spend too much time in the bar at night, and you WILL fit.

It’s in Fredrichshain, just around the corner from my place, and as such, an automatic recommendation to any of my various bum mates looking for a free bit of floor space. It’s also one of the cheapest places in town, as far as I can figure – certainly if you’re looking to stay in dorms. The reason for this is immediately obvious if you ever see it. It’s bloody massive. And decked out top to toe in neon. How wonderfully retro.

Fucking neon, yeah?

Who doesn't like a neon penis?

And this point deserves note. There’s more than a hint of brothel about the look of this place. It’s almost as if the owners were hedging their bets, just in case the place didn’t work out as a hostel. If you’re in any way keen on looking, gazing, staring or otherwise using your eyes, this may not be the place for you – it is a hell of a lot of neon. In fairness, it’s only the communal areas that are decked out entirely in neon. Everything else merely bathes in the leftover light that can’t find its way into some poor sods retina.

Okay, so I don’t like neon. This is mostly because I feel it highlights my complete ineptitude with girls. I prefer not to peacock – tending to take a more trapdoor spider approach – so I like dark corners (preferably with enough leaf litter to construct some kind of rudimentary camouflaged den). In fairness though, who really does like neon?

Berlin beer gardens

Generator Hostel or, more specifically the bar, has a couple of saving graces, however. Past the relatively modest pricing of the rooms, and easy access to town, it has one thing that a vast majority of Berlin pubs don’t have: a beer garden. If you come from where I do, it’s only a beer garden in the same sense that your toilet is, technically, a water source. Still, needs must. Pretty much every pub here has some kind of outside ‘bit’, but it’s usually just a few rickety benches on the pavement. 

Then there are the more chilled areas. There are a couple of pool and fussbal tables dotted around the place with Internet stations and a popcorn machine as well as pretty much constant (and probably illegal) movie screenings. For Berlin, there’s a surprising amount of non-drink necessitating activities on offer. That said, if you do like your beer, the prices are pretty reasonable, with a stonkingly good happy hour from 5pm to 7pm with beers at around €1.20.

Generator Berlin overall

C'mon. Tell me you wouldn't smash that to pieces.

In general it’s got a far more free-and-easy vibe than other places in town, such as Belushi’s. Hanging out at Generator, you’ll see the full gamut of holidaying types. Far more than many other places I’ve stayed. Watching a stag do consisting entirely of early-thirties men, each weighing more than a fully mature female hippo, collectively hit on a table full of teenage girls is an amusing sight – until they start pairing off and heading upstairs at least, at which point it becomes profoundly depressing. But hey, it's only statutory rape, right?

Either way, it comes highly recommended on a personal level. It’s clean, safe and has enough throughput of pretty young things to make for a fun night out. Competition like the aforementioned Belushi’s is a different type of place.  Those places have a code of conduct that, in reality, dictates the kind of person that might stay there. Generator’s code is dictated by the group of people you find yourself hitting on, no more, no less.

     

Sleepy time in Berlin

Mmmmm... vulnerable.

Now this is really more of a warning than anything else, or at very least a reminder to myself that I need to calm this whole Berlin thing down a little. It's a little past 3:00 am on a Sunday morning, and I'm not in the slightest bit drunk. The only problem with this state of affairs is that my body just isn't having it. 


I think one of the key things about Berlin is that it's very much a party town, but not in a amiable mother kind of way – that allows you to stay up late at the weekend, and merely tuts regretfully when you come home with a skinful. No, this place is more of an S&M dominatrix – she'll chain your balls to a fence, and beat you until you like it. 

I cry when I don't get what I want...

For example, no-one seems to have a bloody job in Berlin. Indeed, I'm not exactly Mr 9-5, but the effective result is that every night is balls/chain/fence night. Even if you're not planning on going out, and have sauntered over to your mate's house to catch up, have a bite, and find out how her recent trip to France was, you'll still wind up shitfaced in her local, pulling out one of your two lame magic tricks at the local goth at four in the morning.


Of course, you go to sleep at about 7am, wake up at 2pm for 'work', vowing never to touch another drop of Berliner in your life, and somehow wind up at the local beer festival within mere hours. 


By 'you', I meant 'me' (or, rather, 'I').

...I cry every night.

You see, it's terribly easy to get into a routine that absolves one of any kind of cognitive activity or responsibility here. As long as you don't run out of bog roll, you're kind of alright. Everything that offers vice – pubs, kebab joints, dealers, clubs, Spatkaufs – never bloody closes. I can leave the house right now and buy enough booze, fags, drugs and crisps to pave my way straight to oblivion. Now contrast that with trying to buy – god forbid – something useful, like a screwdriver, guitar strings, or a bike pump, on a Sunday. You can't do it. 


Then there's other people's parties. Now, I sleep like I've been shot in the face with a 12-gauge, but even I have trouble sleeping through some of the, frankly incredible, noise created by our lovely neighbours. You pretty much get a daily reminder of what it means to be human: sex noises (clearly fake and embarrassingly short this evening), babies crying, kids partying, fogies having barbecues and, I dare say, I've heard one or two people dying thus far.    

Insomniac fridge food is the kind of
thing that gives you the shits
just by looking at it.

The result is a city that doesn't sleep. Not in a romantic "New York, New York," sense, but in an oily, panicked insomniac sense. It'll stay up all night, occasionally getting up, looking in the fridge, getting depressed and going back to bed.  


So, like I said, my body just isn't having it. I had a lovely, reasonably wholesome day today, and I'm being face-palmed by my body clock for it – the big hand no less. You have been warned. 

The cost of living in Berlin

The cost of living in Berlin is far more than simply a monetary one. We all have to pay the piper eventually, but it seems that my liver is handing over Euros like it’s being mugged by a stripper. The primary cost is your health, and Berlin is not enormously healthy for people like me. The main reason is not the beer (of which I drink lots) or the drugs (of which I do none), but rather the attitude. It’s not the kind of whey-hey-let’s-get-fucked-off-out-faces take that you might have if you’re coming here for a stag do, it’s more of a glib hey-look-there’s-booze-let’s-drink-it kind of angle. Still, there’s plenty of things worth knowing about the price of in Berlin.


The price of booze in Berlin

Berliner is one of... erm... sorry, what?

With Booze here, it’s more about how much one should drink, than how much one can drink. Beer, the local drink du choix is cheap. You can buy it in a supermarket for about 40 cents a bottle (500ml). There’s not a helluva a lot of difference between the various brands, but pils like Becks and Berliner are the biggies, with helles (light in colour, not in strength) beer being less popular, but arguably tastier and a little less ruinous in general.

Now, when you go out, the price of booze varies hugely. The cheapest pub beer we’ve seen thus far is €1.80, and the most is €3, which sucks balls. Because so much of the drinking culture is about being outside, one thing you can do is head to the nearest Spatkauf (literally ‘late purchase’) and pick up a beer there, as you wander between bars. No-one seems to care, or even notice, so it’s a good way to save a bit of cash.

Draught beer (bier vom fass) is, generally, a far more expensive way to drink, but in my opinion a far more civilised one. Certainly in Berlin, it’s all about bottled beer (flashenbier). Shots range from 50 cents to €3, and you’ll usually have to pay a little over the odds for (generally pretty shitty) wine if you’re drinking in a pub (€3-4).

Hmmmm. Vulnerable.

What you have to remember is that nothing really gets going until midnight, and you’re going to be out and about until probably 4 or 5 in the morning, even if you’re not that much of a party animal. What this means is that you’re likely to be drinking a significant amount more than you might otherwise be in your country of origin. Watch out for that, it’s an absolute killer. On a regular night out, once I get over the initial fear of looking in my wallet, I find I’ve spent upwards of €40. This is mostly because I’m a complete dick when I get drunk, and in addition never like to be without a drink in my hand (it’s an insecurity issue). Given that pretty few of the bars have any kind of entrance fee, I reckon you could do it for half that and still have a great night.


The price of food in Berlin

Pretty much sums up German food, right there. "Oh, sorry sir
you didn't want it swimming in vomit?"

This whole dirt-cheap supermarket thing in Berlin is a godsend. There are places like Lidl and Netto pretty much everywhere, which generally means your weekly shopping is going to be pretty cheap. If you’re interested in going a little more upmarket, Kaisers (at least the one near us) is a bit nicer, has some ridiculous hipster employees and costs a little more on most things. It’s still pretty reasonable, but the actual produce is not really much different. Here’s what we pay for some stuff (as of August 2011).

Bread: €0.80

Milk: €0.54

Muesli: €1.80-2.50

Three-pack frozen pizza: €2.90

Fresh orange juice: €1.50

Cheese (250g): €1.90

Chicken breast (600g): €2.80

Eggs (6 pc): €1.90

Tomatoes (400g): €1

Bananas (6 pc): €1.90

Tinned tuna: €0.75

So nothing is hugely expensive in a supermarket, but in little corner shops and convenience stores, you’re going to be raped through the eyeballs for near enough anything. In fact, it does seem that the smaller stores just tack completely arbitrary figures on their produce. You’re going to be paying around 100 per cent more for something in a convenience store, but hey, when you’ve got a hangover straight from Beelzebub’s anus, you’ll pay almost anything for a Pot Noodle.


Eating out can be as cheap or expensive as you like, and you can easily find a nice enough eatery for under €10. Head into tourist town though, and you'll see that figure multiply before your eyes, as you're force-fed low grade wine and 'traditional' German fare. The golden rule applies here: if it's got pictures on the menu, it's not a great restaurant.


The price of electrical goods in Berlin

I wonder what she's doing now.

The only thing that is noticeably different in price from where I come from, other than beer, is the electrical goods. For some reason, they’re hideously expensive. Places like Saturn or Media Markt offer the best prices on new TV’s, hi-fi’s, computers etc… but it’s still daylight robbery. Having said that, I am off out today to choose from the vast selection of very reasonably priced hand blenders in Saturn.

Rental prices in Berlin

We've gotta have a tidy up at some point.

Renting a property is really pretty cheap. Myself and Chris pay €800 per month, all in. To be honest, you could probably get a really nice place for nearer €500 without bills. In general, ex pat rental sites would rather fuck themselves with a broomstick than offer you a genuinely hassle-free service, but we managed to luck out with a company that make life very easy: berlin99.com. They come very highly recommended. And are unique amongst rental companies in my experience, in that they’re not complete and utter cunts. One final point on renting a place if you decide to try going through craigslist or something, when they say unfurnished (or rented ‘cold’), they really mean it. Often you’ll be looking at some pretty meaty startup costs, even down to things like light fittings. I didn’t have the balls to rent through craigslist, but the prices there look pretty darn cheap.

The price of travel in Berlin

Add caption, you say? I think it's already
been captioned in your mind

Yeah, this mostly sucks ass. A single ticket into town is €2.30, and a day ticket is €6.30. Having said that, there are a huge variety of ticket types if you know what you’re doing. We don’t, however, so trying to negotiate the reams and reams of ticket listings is about as easy as trying to read an upside down map in Arabic while it’s on fire.

Travel outside the city is equally expensive unless you know what you’re doing. A ticket to Prague (about 4/5 hours away) is €124 if bought on the day, and the cheapest I saw it for in advance was around €80. I can't organise my way out of a wet paper bag, so I went for the pricier one. Here’s a tip if you’re looking to travel by train outside Germany: if you get on a Hungarian/Bulgarian/Romanian train, turn around, and get the fuck off it immediately. The last train I got on – in Prague no less – was a Hungarian one and it not only smelled like some Hungarian bum had shat in your nostrils, but I’m pretty sure he was sat next to me for half the journey. I say half the journey because I got hoity-toitied out of my seat by an elderly French couple, and had to spend the rest of the journey outside the toilet. Still, at least it smelled better than that Hungarian.

In general, though, things life here is pretty cheap. Certainly cheaper than London, for my particular lifestyle. Admittedly my lifestyle consists of playing WoW, eating salad and baked potatoes, smoking like I actually want  to die, and drinking enough beer to bring about 2-3 day long hangovers.

Meeting Girls in Berlin

As a single, straight man in my early thirties, the thought of meeting a nice (or otherwise) German (or otherwise) girl (or otherwise) in Berlin is one that’s rarely too far from my mind. I have fallen in love with three girls thus far: a barmaid and two checkout girls. While those particular desires are likely to remain unrequited until my German language skills increase, I have been out on a number of what could only be described as ‘pussy hunts’, with a groups of men for whom picking up chicks is a firm priority. I, however, play the long game. Practically tectonic in fact, so I will usually wind up watching the ‘hunt’ from the sidelines.

Here’s a few types of interactions I’ve observed:

The Hideous Berlin Drunk

Mmmm, vulnerable. 

Barely capable of voiding their bladders without assistance, these girls are bolstered by more than a little sauce, but stymied by their general vacuousness. The end result is something that, were you to meet outside the confines of one of Berlin’s many booze halls, you would take for a well-meaning retard. This kind of girl will probably cost you around 6-7 Euros an hour, solely by virtue of a smile that says “I’ll sleep with you if you buy me one more drink.” That drink never comes though. These girls travel in pairs. Like alcoholic velociraptors in lipstick.

The “I’m waay too good for you”

Look at her. Just not worth the effort.

Not wholly unpleasant people, but from a penetrative point of view, your todger will remain drier than your mum’s psoriasis. Generally more interesting than most other bar meat you’ll be nibbling around, these are usually artists, and the attitude comes not from being enormously fit, but from being intellectually superior in some way. Granted, this may be true, but we’re not here to discuss the philosophy of art, we’re here to play with each other’s genitals, either figuratively or literally. Personally, I think it’s a defence mechanism of some kind. Not that that matters what I think, because the fact is that you’re not going to be getting the honey unless you brave the beehive, so to speak.


The slightly minging Jewish girl

I'd give her my final solution... in the face!!!!

This is a speciality of my mate, Mike. Indeed, he’s somewhat stepped up his game now that he has a bit more of a taste for the sauce. If there’s one thing that Jewish girls like more than Tiffiny jewellery and Matzos, it’s a guy with prospects. For a guy without prospects, Mike certainly does a good job of convincing people he’s got some. Whether it’s something to do with Mike’s Jew-seeking penis, or just an abundance of them here, I don’t know, but he certainly seems to have reasonable luck with them. The obvious problem arises in the morning, when they befriend you on Facebook, and you realise that they’re actually a bit minging, and you were hideously drunk last night. Still, קיין לעכער ס אַ ציל, right?

The ‘regular’ German girl

Technically attractive I suppose, but the face just says:
"I used to be your uncle."

Now, it’s no news that I don’t really find German girls all that attractive. Of course, that’s a wild over-generalisation, and I don’t mean to offend, honest I don’t but they’re a little… well… masculine for my tastes. It’s not that they’re bigger, or even taller, but it’s something to do with the features. Broad shoulders, small bottoms and big hands makes for a rather intimidating potential fingerbang recipient. Still, there is something attractive about this kind of ‘normal’ German girl that draws me. The main indicators of these girls is a level of English lower than the irritating near-native speakers, reduced levels of fuck-giving, and in general, they’re toting a bottle of beer (flaschenbier) rather than a glass of wine or long drink. I guess the attraction is a cultural one. There’s nothing quite like going native, especially post fact, when you try to convince yourself that you didn’t just have a meaningless one-night stand, you had a cultural exchange of fluids.

The Berlin ex-pat

Okay, so the thighs are pretty gross, but they
smell of fish, chips, pie and mash all
rolled into one. Home.

I’ve met a few of these so far, and the main distinguishing feature is that their German is infuriatingly good. One forgets, when one is away from home, how nice a homely girl from home is. One thing I’ve struggled with here is that there is a natural irritation barrier that will often get crossed by ex-pat chicks. They’ll rattle on about how interesting such-and-such museum is, and how you simply must try such-and-such club. What they forget is that I don’t give a shit. Not even the little kind of shit you get with a big fart sometimes. Sure, I’d be more than happy for you to spout this nonsense at me in a different environment – it saves me the hassle of having to talk – but don’t you get it? We’re both English, we’re both in this Berlin bar, we’re both drunk enough to find each other attractive – this is destiny. Admittedly, it’s not the most profound destiny, but if there is such a thing as fate, he definitely wants me to put my fickle finger in you.

Barmaids

Tell me that's not marriage material!

German barmaids are divine. That is all.


The one with the boyfriend

 I nicked this. Is that even allowed?

Okay, so this is not a uniquely Berlin thing, and if anything, a majority of Berlin bar fodder is unattached, or at least so lightly attached as to be, for all intents and purposes, single. The ones with boyfriends that don’t have stickers advertising their mentally conjoined status can fuck off to the same place that the single girls who say they’ve got boyfriends can fuck off to, and they can all die together as far as I’m concerned. No, there seems to be a general level of promiscuity in Berlin that makes me think that if I were more of a man, and not the romantic fool that I am, I might actually have a chance of spoofing my wad up some of these chicks. It’s not promiscuity in an Essex (that’s an area of England where the only requisite for random sex is the possession of functioning or near-functioning genitalia) sense, where sex is the goal, but rather a more glib attitude to it. It’s just a thing, yeah?

Please note, this is about girls you find in Berlin bars, not German girls in general.

Where To Live in Berlin?

1945 Berlin, just to show you where the wall was.

So knowing where to live in Berlin is fairly important if you ask me. Finding the right area for you is something that will really enhance your stay. When I first started thinking about it, I quite fancied Spandau. While I have been there before, and found the place delightful, I now realise that would have been a massively dick manoeuvre. It’s miles from anywhere, and wouldn’t give you a fair impression of the city. So where is good? Personally, I think I've landed on my feet, as where I live suits me perfectly, but I reluctantly concede that people are different,  so maybe this will help you find the place you're looking for.

Living in Friedrichshain

So I live in Friedrichshain, and I bloody love it. It suits my needs perfectly, and I have what I believe to be the best bar in town just around the corner (Zimt und Zunder). However, it is a little dull. You’re not in the thick of it like you might be with a place like Kreuzberg. It feels very working class, and importantly, quite German. Simon Dach Strasse is the main pub/club/eatery street in the area, but frankly, it’s a bit shit. There are only really a handful of actual bars, and what’s left is just a bunch of cliquey dives and pretty middle-of-the-road restaurants.

By contrast, Friedrichshain has the best park in town. It’s massive, chilled and has a decent running track. If you like the idea of lounging around in the sun watching wannabe circus performers waste their lives, then this is the place for you. If, like me, you enjoy the ambience of activity, but are far too doughy and poorly co-ordinated to actually engage in anything of a sporty nature, you’ll feel very welcome there. With volleyball courts, a fitness centre, climbing walls, and a confusing array of fitness equipment dotted around the place, it suits the kind of exercise nuts that find their way into Berlin.

While it doesn’t annoy me overly much, as it’s hard to get annoyed in such a place, seeing all the already-too-thin German girls running around only exacerbating their condition is frustrating to say the least. While I’m on the subject, it’s worth noting that Fredrichshain girls are not fit. Apart from the barmaid at Zimt und Zunder, but she’s mine, so leave off. 

<< The Berlin Metro map: handmade by retards. Try this for a better view.

Living in Kreuzberg

I know Kreuzberg less well than Friedrichshain, but in all honesty, you don’t need to know it that well. This is the area you’ll find yourself in if you’re one of these. In which case, you fully deserve whatever you get in life. Indeterminate sexual preference? You’re halfway there. Low-cut “male” vest top? You’re all the way. Skinny jeans, plimsolls and a dick hair-do and you’re balls deep in what I can only describe as the sweat-stained armpit of Berlin. It’s the equivalent of walking into a nice eatery and having your meal served to you in the toilet: why you would want to do it, I don’t know, but you’ll see a lot more dicks, that’s for sure.

However, at least you’re in the thick of it, and the quantity and range of bars is second to none. Living there would, to my mind, be a daily annoyance, but that’s because I’m a reactionary anti-popularist.

Living in Prenzlauer Berg

Prenzlauer Berg is a ‘nice’ place. Prams, prams, baby shops, quaint, characterless eateries, and more prams. Fuck that shit. Prenzlauer Berg is ‘nice’ in the same sense that receiving fellatio from a family member is ‘nice’. Unless you have a kid, or desperately want to be near an Apple Store, don’t move here, for god’s sake. This is mostly just an annex of London.

Smack in the centre is a place called Kollwitzplatz, which can go suck my balls. There’s a helluva lot of baby-peacocking here. “Ooooh, look at my baby. She’s just been accepted at the International Banking and Animal Noises University for the Under Fives.” Being forcibly pushed from the street by a snooty mother with a pram that could probably double as an international space station is something that will only ever get my heckles up.

No, I don’t like it. Pretentious and very much indicative of the aspects of this city I dislike, I find it difficult to get the enthusiasm to go there often. I’m sure there’s some lovely spots, but I didn’t come to Berlin to live in Wandsworth.

This map was created by estate agents. Estate agents are all cunts and can die. 

Living in Mitte

The only real exception to the above is Schönhauser Allee, although personally, I prefer to class it as Mitte. Mitte literally means “middle”, and that’s exactly what it is. There are parts of Mitte that suck up tourists like a gigantic laughing hoover, and there are bits that are pleasant enough to spend a day ambling around. The museum quarter is here, as is the main square and the tourist trap.

There’s little reason to head into town on a regular basis, unless you’re the type of twat that buys designer crotch-drop leggings, but will only be happy paying well over the odds, goddammit! In fact, on my little bike ride home the other day, I tried to work out exactly why one would walk into a majority of these shops. It sure as hell wouldn’t be for the clothes, which are about as generic as it gets. Come to Mitte, feel like a tourist. There’s nothing wrong with that from time to time, but I imagine living there would be a little incongruous with the feel of the rest of Berlin.

Sadly for me, I’ve run out of time, and have to get back to my daily grind of mashing out shitty words for shitty people, and generally ruining the Internet for everyone.