tally me banana

so i just sent in my LAST TERM PAPER EVER and am going to check out a shared studio space in a little less than an hour. hot dog! seriously though, if i wasn't getting through my fourth cold of the year, things would be just about perfect right now. the whole continual illness thing is really not cool, but i'm trying to deal the best i can with that while still enjoying all the good stuff. maybe the good stuff is causing the illness? naaah.

speaking of: last weekend three of my friends and i got to be filmed in a segment for the travel channel about this water park about an hour south of berlin. my friend marissa came across the casting call for four women interested in doing a full day shoot for this new show about water parks all over the world. somehow they picked us and we showed up at 9:30am last friday with our overnight bags and little clue of what was going to happen. we got started just about immediately, with the crew mic-ing us and filming our (fake) first entrance into the park, chalk full of "ooohs" and "aaahs" and "wow, this place is so awesome!" turns out "reality" television is just minimally scripted advertising. who knew? in any case, we then spent the next 14ish hours going through the park ("did you guys know that this is europe's largest free-standing dome?" --> do not say "yeah, it was built by the germans to construct the zeppelin during WWI" "i heard that this is europe's biggest man made rain forest!" "did you guys know you can get a tan in here because there are filters over the skylights that enhance the sun?") our conversation throughout the day was riddled with such gems. but somehow, it was actually an awesome time. we had to go down the slides about a million times, enough to make me a bit scratched and bruised, but most of the times were just a rockin' good time. particularly after it was dark and they'd plied us with booze. weirdly there are zero safety regulations at this park, which led us to witness some super drunk middle aged polish dudes diving head first down the metal slides. yikes. but none of us got hurt, so that's cool! after the long day of filming we settled down in our incredibly hot tents in an area of the gigantor dome not too far from the slides, so that at 6:45 when the little kids started screaming as they enjoyed the kiddie slide, i was up and at 'em to listen. while i had a great time doing all of this for free, if you happen to venture to the tropical island water park, i would recommend going home at the end of the night.

then on sunday a bunch of friends and i met at mauer park, which is where there's a giant hand-made and flea market every sunday in part of the park and a giant hang-out in the other part, to "perform" a choreographed dance we decided to throw together the week before. we only have part of it choreographed thus far and our speakers were too quiet to really hear much, but we just danced through it a few times and enjoyed ourselves, with a handful of people casually stopping to watch or take pictures. because it's a very crowded park and this is berlin, it really didn't seem to surprise or entice anyone too much that there were six bewigged girls doing a choreographed dance, which i kind of think is the best thing ever.

us at the park:

assuming i hit it off super well with the girl whose studio space i'm going to check out, i told her i'll only be able to start renting it if i get the part-time job i'm interviewing for on monday. so cross your fingers on that count! i really hope that i love this girl and get the job, because then i can start my ideal schedule of 2 days of office job, 2 days of thesis work, 1 - 3 days of fun/art. sounds pretty damn ideal.

okay, off to go see the studio!

oh, right, the title of this post is in reference to the fact that i was invited to go see a tv taping of an interview with harry belafonte. sofia, if you happen to be reading, i immediately thought of you and your dad listening to him on vinyl!

ost/west

i got called a "wessi" today while waiting for the ubahn, which i must say was a memorable first. i was taking a picture of this ad campaign for berliner pilsner, a local beer that currently has billboards all over the city showing snippets of stereotypical berlin scenes with the tag line "berlin, du bist so wunderbar." this particular billboard shows a woman's hand with blue finger nails picking up a pilsner off the ground of what seems to be a kind of grimy club, and you can see her funky heels and leg tattoos in the background. it makes me smile every time i see it, even though i recognize that a)it's a beer ad, and b)i'm obviously a member of the targeted demographic. in any case, this guy walked by as i was taking the photo, and while it's quite likely that he drinks berliner pilsner, he was definitely not part of the specific demographic this ad is aiming for. he was wearing his blue worker overalls (all members of trades that require getting dirty, such as painters, construction workers, movers, etc. wear either blue or white jumpsuit/overall type things. except the really old-fashioned folks who wear black suede pants with sailor-style zippers or buttons and matching suede vests. those ones are the coolest) and looked very east german. i immediately started laughing when i heard him mutter "wessi," which is a vague insult for someone who comes from west germany or west berlin. neukölln, where i live and where i was waiting for the train, was part of west berlin but was a border neighborhood and now has a fair population of east german residents. i learned about the terms ossi and wessi during my high school exchange year, as many of my friends would casually talk shit about the way wessis acted, dressed, and most importantly, viewed themselves as better than their eastern counterparts. to be called this term was just such a funny surprise for me that i think i in turn really shocked the ossi who said it to me with my laughter. i've been called an "ami" before, which is the vaguely derogatory term for americans, but somehow the fact that he called me "wessi" instead was a rather bittersweet victory - i fooled him into thinking i was german, but still somehow out of place.

naja. berlin, du bist so wunderbar.

a version of the ad i was photographing:

and then it was march

so, i meant to take a little break from blogging during the weeks around christmas while i was home in albuquerque, and then somehow that turned into a little three and a half month break. oops.

since early december i spent a really lovely two and a half weeks in albuquerque, experienced the utter firework-ridden insanity that is new year's in berlin, celebrated my 26th birthday with a fabulous golden party, had a brief relationship with a very slender scotsman named stuart, and finished my remaining coursework for my program. that last bit is probably the most surreal, since i've kind of felt like i'm on this strange vacation since classes ended in mid-february, when really they're never going to start again. the german academic calendar is such that classes end and then you have six weeks to do research and write term papers before the next semester starts. however, since i'm not taking any classes next semester but will just be writing my thesis, the beginning of next semester doesn't actually affect me. once i turn in all of my term papers and receive grades for them i have to pick up this piece of paper with all of my professors' signatures and hand that in at this particular office along with my thesis proposal and advisers' signatures. once that's all approved i'll be mailed a date 5 months down the line, which will serve as my only deadline for my thesis. totally strange and kind of unnerving, but this basically means that i'll be setting my own academic schedule from here on out. gotta get crackin'.

another exciting thing that's happened since december is the start of a five month weekly sewing class. i'm taking it at what's called the volkshochschule, or people's high school, where they offer government run, cheap classes on anything and everything you can think of. my class is in a neighborhood southeast of mine, deep in neo-nazi territory, and 90% of the folks in the class are older women with thick east berlin accents, who don't really know what to do with me, this strange young foreigner. it's pretty fabulous though, and i'm so stoked to go each time and make slow but exciting progress on the 50s housewife style summer dress i'm making for myself. it's also kind of a sociological experiment and a good way to practice german and remind myself that i'm not just living in this little international bubble full of 20-something hipsters.

speaking of which, i am more in love with this city every day, particularly my little bubble, which is admittedly filled largely with international 20-something hipsters. i walk around my neighborhood just staring at the shops, the colors of paint, the fonts used on buildings, the graffiti, the public art, the people walking down the street, the dogs, and i feel like my heart beats faster with happiness and excitement just realizing what an amazing and beautiful place this is. i go sit in a cafe or go to a market or an art opening or a show or a dance club and i find myself smiling uncontrollably, feeling like this is it, i'm living my dream. maybe it wasn't ever a concrete dream, and maybe it's not perfect, and still some days i just want to go back to america and get away from it all, but mostly this place and the intense beauty and opportunity it provides just make me feel like each day is exciting and engaging and somehow amazing. sometimes i get so anxious with the desire to do do do and create and design that i feel like i can barely think straight. and then i have to remember that while i maybe want to just buy a sewing machine and make aesthetically pleasing things all day and wear colorful socks with loafers that make me just want to jump with joy at the very sight of the perfect combination i've just created, i'm still in school. and i still have papers to write and a thesis to start. so i'll do those things. and be engaged with them, and interested in them, and hopefully round out this stage of my academic career with flying colors. but i'm realizing more and more each day that what moves me, what makes me feel giddy and dizzy with joy is not academia, but color and design and creation, and i fear i'm losing the inner struggle against this love. so, come next fall, when i hand in my thesis, my next life stage may involve fabric and photos and paint rather than an office and a computer and 9 - 5.

or maybe not. this is just what's getting my heart beating right now, and it's pretty damn exciting. dear berlin, for now, you're the best.