Berlin
Trip Start
Feb 2008
1
11
26
Trip End
Ongoing
Berlin,
Germany
Sunday, March 30, 2008
We had left marks place in Pankow and headed east, to karl-marx strabe where we met with dragon.
Dragon, whom we had met the night before in a reggae party, who knew Naloa in Bremen!
We arrived and set our stuff down, Dragon had a large room for us to sleep in and we chucked our bags away. The same night, we three and Dragon left for Basson's place, a Swedish music producer, living in the buildings/warehouses around the Reggae place. We chilled with him over a joint and listenened to his music collection, he was set to tour Europe in a couple of days playing free partys and other alt
Cimi supa fly in the U-Bahn
. events.We took the S-Bahn back to Karl-Marx strabe and Dragons house. And slowly passed out to the sounds of Dragons music...
The following day I awoke early to meet Pierre and Sacha at Alexander Platz, Pierre had organised a trip to Grunwalt (I think) an area south west of Berlin, where a ruined US army radar instalation was. We took the S-Bahn nearly all the way to the end, and walked perhaps 2.5km to this base. The two hills, one of which the base is situatated on were created after the 2nd world war by collecting all the rubble around Berlin from the fighting.
We circled the base, sorrounded by three sets of barbed wire fencing, and even asked the people at the main gate, who were repairing the broken fence, if we could enter. They refused. So we scouted around the side, normally patroled by dogs in the bases time, and found a weak set of fencing, and three holes behind that one. Climbed over and broke into the runined base. Pierre had told of a great acostic dome, at the top level of the base, with served to house the radar equiptment.
We walked into the building and realised we had not a light between us, and had to resort to feeling with out feet, and using a single gas lighter and the flash on my camera
And paz supa fly in the U-Bahn
! Needless to say, the going was slow at time, and almost freaky, as the corridors, otherwise in pitch black, holes in the floor, were lit up for a split second as the flash pased over them.After walking in a small circle, we then decided to climb up a level, having lost the location of the stairwell to the blackness within. We climbed up a rung of steel towards the second floor, where light guided us to the stairwell, and upwards to the first roof.
I took a couple of videos up here, so you can get a better view from that, needless to say, it was an amazing sight, we were standing on a huge building, upon a man made hill overlooking the whole of Berlin on one side, and the other a wide open forrest, with the odd church steple.
The two radar domes on this floor had seen better days, some missing their entire bottom layer, although, as the wind whiped through them, they vibrated to the tune. We headed for the top dome, here a hard lined dome at the top of the base, only a small door frame cut into one side of the dome let the light in. In this room, every sound was echoed around, seemly bouncing of the walls. We chilled in the room, smoking a joint between Sacha and myself while experimenting with sounds, and making a few videos on my camera
Video of base outside
.After a short storm passed up, creating deep vibrations in the dome, we headed back down the dark stairwell and out into the light.
We set out back to Alexander Platz, and parted ways, I had to help Dragons sister move house, and Pierre had to help his girlfriend move too! Walking up the stairwell to Dragons house (nearly on the top floor as always eh) I bumped into Dragons freind who lived opposite him, he too was moving house, and so I helped with the last peice before cooking in the flat before we left.
We waited till 9pm when Dragons sister phoned and asked for our help, Dragon, waiting for another friends girlfriend to pick up some musical equiptment had to wait, but sent us three ahead to help.
We found the place some time later and right away started to unload the boxes they had into the bottom floor of the flat. Of course, once we had unloaded the van, did we find out the true scale of the job, Dragons sister had moved into the top floor (its that top floor popping up again) of the flats, and we had to load all the boxes and other assorted goods. Although not a bad thing at all, but somthing to throw yourself into and get some exercise too, plus afterwards (and about two thirds through) we had a joint and couple of beers to counter balance any health gains from this task
Long zoom of the city
.Dragons father then took us out for a small drink and a bite to eat, very kind of him, and we all relaxed and chatted between us. Afterwards, on the way back to Dragons house, paz and cimi parted ways and left Dragon and myself to make it back to his house, and quickly fell into a heavy sleep.
We had then a day to secure ourselves a new home to stay at, Dragons family were coming over, and also Naloa from Bremen. We set out from Dragons house in the morning and arrived at a local internet cafe, which using we discovered a guy, Guurt in Frankfer Alle or something (I cant remember how to spell that). Although after speaking to him, he informed us, he would not be home untill 12 midnight and not to come before then.
We packed and said our goodbyes to Dragon, although we are now set to meet him on monday or tuesday soon, and set out for our house. Having found the street where we had to be on, we located a local kabab shop which allowed us to store our bags, giving us time to roam the city unhindered.
Cimi and myself headed back to the "mad" cafe from earlyer, although having found it closed we wandered the streets, and soon were drawn into a bar by the sound of live music
At a distance
. Having worked our way to the front of the bar, we observed a four piece band, playing improv music, as the singer and other members of the band rotated with musicians in the crowd. Cimi and myself soon made conversation with one of the musicicans playing tonight. Soon Cimi had got herself a small slot on stage with the band in a few minutes! Cimi on stage sang three completly improv songs, playing with the other musicians on stage, the rest of the audience I found had warmed to her by the third song, based on the structure of house of the rising sun, but with spontainious lirics.
We also met a few people, Alex and his girlfriend, two muscicans who invited us to meet with them another day and jam. And also bumped into Stuart, an Essex man, living in Berlin the past 15 years. He offered us his flat, if we needed a place to crash, and gave us his number.
We assembled at 11:45 outside the kabab shop, and collected our bags, bumping into three guys who sorted out somthing for us, and smoked a joint with us outside as we tryed to comunitate with them between broken english and german.
We found our destination for the night and rang the bell. We had been told to wait untill after twelve, but Jakoba, who answered the door, had no idea who we were, yet still invited us in to their home :)
We waited, eatting kinder sweets from the kitchen, as I typed this blog...mmm full circle.
Anyway, now our host has arrived, and we are sitting in the kitchen eating yogurt and chatting, so...Good times and goodnight,
