Ich bin ein Berliner!

It’s 7:30 am and winter-dark outside. I’ve been awake for awhile due to a random sleep pattern partly attributed to jetlag, partly to a rather annoying viral illness. It’s oh so quiet except for the resident cats chomping on their dry food, the other occupants of the Airbnb (my daughter and her boyfriend) are doing what is sensible and sleeping.

It’s been a slow, small trip so far. Small in a sense of minutiae in moments and no grand or heroic adventures. Very wintry in that way that hunkering down in colder climes brings forth. Perhaps some reflecting and regrouping, or hibernation more likely. This is in sharp contrast to the Southern Hemisphere midsummer I left one week ago. But I, with a dreaded lurgy on board, have embraced this opportunity to be in my “recreation leave” in a way that will lead to a vernal awakening.

It’s not that I have been bedbound (though I have clocked up some serious zzz’s). I have since arrival in Berlin had some excursions into the icy outdoors but to be fair these have mostly been to find interesting sustenance. I have been to two christmasmarkets and partaken of the Glüwein (mulled wine) and kitsch. I have experienced a Christmas Eve snow flurry like minute beanbag beans being blown hitter and thither, that have melted just as they settled on solidity, just as you recognised their form before their dissolution.

Yesterday we stopped into a bagel and book shop in our local hood. An Australian barista (they’re everywhere here) ensured a great flat white and there were various bagel options with various toppings and names… my favourite on the menu “the Australian Jew” (your bagel choice topped with salted butter and Vegemite – bam!). Most of the books were in English which again is both comforting and concerning… am I in Melbourne or Berlin?

We had our Christmas meal at an overpriced and overheated vegan restaurant over the other side of the city. Simple locally sourced vegetables presented in interesting combinations and paired with suitable wines. I particularly liked the celeriac in a rich goulash gravy with fluffy dumplings. The vegan and vegetarian visitors are well catered for in Berlin. I think it is known as the vegetarian capital of Europe, and that does appear to be well deserved.

Friedrichshain is our local ‘hood for this Berlin holiday season. It is a gentrified East Berlin area that is also under the spell of the counterculture and hipster influences that have flourished in the post-wall times. I like the concentration of life and living that the Brisbane suburbs and even the inner-city, just don’t have. I can say that when it’s midwinter and I’m here for a short time and the grey low hung clouds are not oppressing me, the visitor that I am.

As Silvester (that’s New Years in German) rolls around its time to begin the perennial reflections and resolutions. I had already declared 2019 to be a year for Australian travel with a full understanding the irony as I begin the year in Germany. But if I give it a little twist to say I won’t exit my homeland and will make shorter sojourns within the vastness of Terra Australis, it does have validity. I plan to finalise some more home renovations and recreate balance in work and non-work life. That’s a good start.

Wishing you all a Happy New Year!