Farewell!

Hi peeps! (I've decided to act as though lots of people are reading even though I suspect the numbers are slight.)

This is basically just a quick hello to say that all is well. I'm missing the homeland, well the few people I care about in it. I don't miss England as such at all. However, despite the slight Heimweh I am still loving Berlin. Am feeling much more at home now, and very excited about the start of uni.

More importantly, I'm off to Wannsee for the Studienkolleg Introductionweek tomorrow! Wahoo! A week of Europe. Funtimes. And after much pondering I've finally come up with an idea for a research project...

The Schengen accord: Open Borders?
A comparison of reactions to the Schengen Agreement on the intra-EU Vienna-Bratislava route (now border-free after years of cold war) and the Ljubljana-Zagreb route (now with a militarily monitored border after years as part of Yugoslavia).

Fit, hein? Hopefully some others will agree and join my group. Although I won't be that bothered if it doesn't klappen, so long as I can go to the Balkans at some point. It's all about the Balkans.

Anyhoo, I'll start to post again once I get back. Hope you're all topfit!

Bryn
xxxx

Uralismus.

Aight people.

Apologies for the previous post, which you should all take as proof that one should NEVER go on the internet while deeply drunk. *ahem* Perhaps I ought to clarify what I meant slightly. The party wasn't heartbreaking, the party was fun. Very much so actually, although I was accidently a total expat again. Never mind, one day I'll speak some Deutsch! The (unfortunately very brief) visit to the most fabulous club ever was also splendid, as was the tanzing in the slightly less fabulous club. The heartbreak was related to summat else which I would describe if I weren't so paranoid about the readability of the internet. Oh shit, I've just realised this could now all sound like it was referring to summat else that other people might think I was talking about. Damn this vicious web of cyberlies! God, I miss the days when having a blog was just me whinging and being honest. Where did those days go...?

Anyhoo, closing that chapter now. :-p

Right, erm, I've now forgotten what I was going to say. Oh yes! My degree! As I mentioned, I've decided I'm going to do Skandilala Studies as my main subject. I'm presuming that I'm allowed to ignore all the rules about how degrees are put together, since that's what Potsdam told Catherine. Well, so long as I am allowed to do that, then I think I have now actually got a timetable! :-) You have to put it all together yourself here because Germans are evidently very self-reliant people. So, after about 20 aeons fighting with the Komentiertes Vorlesungungsverzeichnis (Annotated Lecture Timetable) I seem to have pulled together quite a funky mixture of stuff:

Swedish,
Finnish,
Hungarian,
Skandilala Politik,
Deutschy Politik,
International Relations,
Introduction to Health Policy

It amounts to about 24 hours contact time a week, which I'm worried might be a bit much. All the politiky ones are actually just lectures, and I'm not planning to submit any assessed work for them, just attend and do some reading, which might overlap nicely with Studienkolleg stuff. But still, learning three languages at once might get a bit hardcore, as I really would like to do fairly well in them. Together with the Studienkolleg I reckon this could mean I was working about 40 hours a week. Which is actually loads now I think about it.

Perhaps I should drop a language. But I want to learn them ALL! :-) And if I do Finnish and Hungarian this year then I'll be set for a simply delicious dissertation in my fourth year all about Uralic morphology.

Hmm, we'll see. Anyhoo, I'm gonna go do some reading now, ready for my hopefully-very-fun week in Wannsee. It makes for some delightful bedtime reading:

'Institutionelle Struktur und Governance in der EU'

50p for any non-Germanists who can read that. :-p

Bis cake!
Bryn
xxxx

P.S. I've finally bought Mia.'s new album, 'Willkommen im Club' and it's DEVINE! :-)))

An evening.

Am drunk.

Hello.

Right. Girl's birthday. Fun! German.

!

People were there. Mild frustration, and slight heartbreak but also FUN!

Heartbreak is noteworthy (ish), but I have accidently publicised this blog, thus I cannot actually be honest. This was careless, oder?

Anyhoo. It is now nearly half six. Good night. I wosh I could talk about boyyyyys! Stupid blog! I need a friends only version! Maybe I should go back to LJ?

Bryn
xxxx

P.S. Electro is soooooooo cool. I need vistors NOW.

P.P.S. I love these kebabs!

It's getting hard to think of titles for these things...

Hello all! (If anyone is actually reading...which I can't tell. If you are, please comment sometimes so I feel less like I'm cybertalking to myself. I can, and do, talk to myself perfectly well in several languages without the use of the internet.)

I have changed my mind about what degree to do. It has now become perfectly obvious to me that I simply must study Skandinavistik/Nord-Europa Studien. You get to do two languages: one of Swedish/Danish/Norwegian, and one of Finnish/Icelandic, as well as stuff about the Culture and Politics and shit of Scandinavia. Sounds well fit. And alongside I could still do a few hours of Sozialwissenschaften every week as a Beifach. Since I'd only be doing the first year of it, it's overwhelmingly language work. Yay! New languages make me happy. And FINNISH! Fit. That way I could do Finnish at uni, try and find someway to actually get half decent at Hungarian and then do a fourth year dissertation on Uralic languages. Plan? Plan.

I am also happy to annouce that I received post today. This makes me feel very at home here. even better the post was a BanhCard and a fabulous photo collage from Claire. These both make me happy as friends and trains are both very special to me. :-) All I'm waiting for now is my stupid German Sim-Karte from bloodyrubbish Simyo. Despite ordering it over two weeks ago it had still not turned up, and then yesterday I get an email saying it had been returned due to an incorrect address. Fools. The Handy I ordered on the same day got here just fine. AGES ago. Humph.

As a final thing of note: I stayed up all night! Drinking! But mainly being OUT. As in in a place that's not my flat, not as in being gay. I find this very exciting. To have been in a bar until gone seven makes me feel very much like a city-resident. Especially as it was a Tuesday night. That worst of nights. I'm so hardcore.

Anyhoo, comment people! Otherwise I'll hang myself.

Love you!

Bryn
xxxx

Dancing in Cyrillic and Reservoirs of Art

Oh, my goodness, what a fabulous weekend!

Yesterday evening was Russen Disko, a crazy clubnight playing a mixture of Russian and Ukranian pop music. It was started by Wladimir Kaminer, a Russian autor who has lived in Berlin for years and is a bit of a local treasure, and it's really rather famous, getting really good reviews in guides'n'stuff and still being popular with locals and Eastern expats alike a few years after starting. 

Well, it did not disappoint. Honestly, I tanzed like a loonpot! I think the teapots of cocktails we had consumed before coming out - made of lovely German Korn spirit, at just £3.50 a bottle - may have had summat to do with this. And once it got going, the floor was packed. Argh, it was so cool! It's at this club/restaurant/thing on the same road as my flat, like seriously close, called Kaffee Burger, which is decorated in the most fabulous DDR style, including ancient floral wallpaper and bad commi light fittings. It was so perfect. The only bad thing was that being lightweight Cambridge students, (I went with a few fellow expats) we left at about half two, at which point there were still a lot of people only just coming in.
I'm defo gonna have to get into partying all night long, I mean I have done it quite a few times before. My flatmate didn't get in until gone six this morning and then slept until half six this afternoon. Nice one.

Right, so then today was also amazing. Me and Rosalind, one of the aforementioned expats, decided to Do Something with our Sunday, so she came over here for planning. After looking thorugh a few of the listings, we decided to go up to a former underground reservior in Prenzlauer Berg, which is now used for artsy things, where there is currently a sort of Soundart Installation. It might sound pretentious, but it was actually AMAZING! Seriously, it was really creepy and moving and weird. The reservoir itself was totally freaky, a concentric network of big brick tunnels, and this amazing space had loads of speakers all over the place playing really interesting atmospheric sounds. It was all done to play with the space and kinda confuse your senses. Argh, it's impossible to put into words how cool it was. It was just such an overwhelming sensory experience. Full marks. We were in there for ages and it only cost 3€! There was
actually even two of them...another one had big plates of glass and metal functioning as speakers, which was fun. I love modern artsy things, so much better than paintings of fruit and wars.

So, then we wandered round Prenzlauer Berg a bit. I still hadn't been up into the heart of that bit of town and OMG it's so bloody nice. Like, Germany does Paris or summat. And it was really cold and crisp and felt deeply festive. Marvellous. And we played on this terifyingly odd merrygoround thing.

Good times. I like Berlin.

Biccies and Piccies

My mouth is sore. :-(

Because I went to LIDL and bought loads of biscuits!!! :-)

After my disappointment at the rubbishness of the nearest Aldi compared to my one in Ipswich, I went of on a hunt for a LIDL. And it was fabulous. I love LIDL. As well as the biscuits (99 cents for a 500g bag, bargainasm!) I bought MORE potato salad, and some salami, and some funny little Frikadellen things with cheese in the middle. Yum.

Even more interestingly, on the way to LIDL I got kinda lost, a nd thus got a nice walk around Friedrichshain, which is hardcore communist. Some of the buildings are really nice (if you like communist architecture, which I kinda do) and some of them are well scuzzy. But it all felt suitably commi. I also kinda forget that most of the city and all of the area around it were actually in the DDR, and that the DDR was communist and kinda nasty. It just doesn't seem to tally with my idea of Germany as really western and Berlin as really liberal.

Hmm. *muses*

Bryn
xxxx

P.S. Here are some photos of my flat, finally:

Success!

Hoorah! I've finally managed to get Telefon-Banking to work for long enough to be able to tell the Postbank that I have moved. I find this very comforting. Deutsche Bank started their long awaited attempt to buy Postbank today. And I'm a customer! It's probably a bit sad for me to feel excited about this, but I am. I was reading all about it in the Tagezeitung (fabulously leftist newpaper to which our flat has a subscription) today and felt very HERE. T'was marvellous.

In other news I have finally finished "decorating" my room, by which I mean I have stuck photos and postcards all over the walls. And I did my first loads of washing today. Feel very at home now! :-)

Am now having a rave-for-one listening to Beirut Nights, the best online rasion station ever.

http://loudcity.com/stations/beirut-nights-radio/files/show/indexvhinoss.htm

Gute Nacht!

Bryn
xxxx

P.S. I'm going to Russen Disko tomorrow. This is exciting, as it's famous, and like ON MY ROAD.

Expat life

I have accidentally turned into an expat. Oops. I have seen lots of English people over the past few days. And am about to go see another.

I feel very culturally inauthentic.

Cue linguist-angst.

In fact, when I was with said English people the other day at the Kulturbrauerei (old beer factory that's been turned into trendy melange of bars, clubs, theatres, cinemas etc...) I met someone who'd been TO MY SCHOOL. (As a pupil, not a visitor.)

Like, wtf.

Anyhoo, I am soon going to begin a process of rebecoming German, as I now have a student Montorin. Her name is Julia, and hopefully she will tell me the following:

a. How university works here, no fucking idea.
b. How I change course, they've given me the wrong one.
c. How I make any friends and thus avoid being a loser/recluse.

Right, I am now going to empty the washing machine. Coz my life is excting like that.

Bryn
xxxx

P.S. I was cultured yesterday! I went to the official wall memorial, very sad, and then two galleries! They're free on Thursday evenings. I was actually only meant to go to one, but got to see the outside of another because I went to the wrong one...down the other end of the city. Oops. What japes!

Phones, paper and Bier are good. Banks. Are. Bad.

Right, I'm going to make my three postive comments first. Then rantrantrant. *emotionally prepares for rant...advises you to do the same...especially if you are a bank*

1.) Ich bin ein Berliner! I finally registered with the authorities today, meaning I now have my beautifully stamped (they love stamping shit here) certificate confiming my address in Berlin and my right to stay here. As an EU citizen they can't stop me staying, but still feel the need to spend time processing me all the same.

As it turned out, I very nearly forgot to go to my appointment because I was so busy playing with my new phone (see point the second). Cue mad dash across town (well, a few U-bahn stops away anyway) to stunning Commi-licious Karl-Marx Allee, which is where the main Stadthaus for Berlin Mitte is. When I got there, just on time, I asked where I had to go at one of the many desks. I must have missunderstood her slightly, because after several minutes rushing around downstairs in an underground network of disorientating white corridors desperately trying to find Platz 5, I bumped into a pair of security guards who were in equal measures amused, suspicious and helpful. Anyhoo, I eventually did get to Platz 5 and after a few minutes of signing things and watching the lady photocopy my passport several times and stamoplots of documents, I was handed a couple (stamped) pieces of paper and that was it. I was a Berliner. Still am. Fit.

2.) My new phone is so lovely! It's all pretty and shiny and plays music and I think I may be slightly sexually attracted to it. No more on that note.

So, should anyone want to ring me on my German mobile (or more likely send me a text) then my number is now: 0049178 1890239

The sim card isn't here yet so I'm using it with my English one at the moment. However, as of a few days I'm not gonna be using my English phone very much, so communicate with me by email, Facebook, German phone or Skype. That should be options enough!

3.) I went to Treptower Park with the Flatmate this evening and sat  by the Spree drinking Bier. It was so nice. I love Berlin. I really wish I'd been here for summer...it must be so cool down there when it's warm. (Lol, totally missed the contradiction there as I was writing!) I also love the big statues of holey men they have in the middle of the river down there.




4.) And now for the quick little rantette. ARGH FUCKING GERMAN BANKS! I have moved. D.h. I no longer live in England. I want to tell you this. LET ME TELL YOU. But no. I go to the branch. "Oh, do it by telephone banking." I attempt this. After being repeatedly dropped by the system and thus spending loads of money doing nothing but logging in I give up and ring customer services, only to be infomed I can't do it via them as I haven't logged it. The lady at customer services says I should do it online, but I have now attempted this three times and everytime it has said "an error has occured, please try again later." I did try later. Same problem.

So, I have now exhausted all four possilble means of contacting my bank. All four of the them were easily availble and fairly easy to use...but sadly none of them actually WORK.

England is simply better at banks/money.

And that's saying a lot, as I get bloody pissed off at my bank in England too.

Arm, aber sexy?

Oh shit, I'm poor. Why did I spend over 100€ on a phone, 55€ on a BahnCard and 40€ on a (-n admittedly rather fabulous) jacket without thinking through my finances? That was careless. And I keep eating out. Oh, and I bought all those (admittedly relevant to my dissertation) books in that hypnotically enormous bookstore! Shit. No wonder I have no bloody money! Stupid city life eating my finances.

So, I now have about £150 to live on for the next 20 days. Very doable of course, but totally puts paid (ho ho) to my idea of a month spent perusing museums and browsing chic boutiques. It also brings into question my current project: buying a hatstand. I really want one. No, need one. The wardrobe is already full because coats are big, and the room will look so complete once it's here. And this defo means buying a sofa bed is gonna have to wait. Thankfully it turns out that I can keep the mattress on my floor. This is now my bed. (And if I say so myself, it actually looks rather splendid when combined with the charaming Syrian rug I'm using as a bedspread.)

Oh darn, stupid money. I am really most peeved. And above all, stupid bloody Ipswich for hating students. If only I'd had a job this summer I'd be totally fine. I really thought I was gonna have enough to live on here, but it seems that this summer of unemployment is going to have repurcusions for a looooong time.  Stupid disgusting Ipswich. How dare it do this to me.

And the worst thing (well, apart from the fact almost my entire loan has gone on paying my Mum back the £1000 I had to borrow to move out here *glares at Ipswich again*) is that as soon as I get my 600€ next month I have to spend 270€ on rent and 250€ on Uni fees. So that leaves 80€. Shit. Never mind, I get my nice fat wad of moving expenses towards the end of Oktober. Then I should be able to exist slightly more. And once I'm settled in at Uni, I shall attempt to find a job.

Then all will be well. And I will be happy.

Right, another mug of fennel tea.

Bryn
xxxx

Ich will tanzen gehen!

Argh, I wanna go OUT. But I can't because I don't know anyone, and going clubbing alone could rightly be seen as tragic. There is a whole city of clubbing goodness out there and I'm here on the internet. Sadness.

Sigh.

I wish university would hurry up and start so I had people to frapper la ville with.

Ah well, I guess I'll just go buy some noodles, and stick things to my walls. I bought some pritt-sorta-equivelent-to-blu-tac. And ribbons. For the curtains.

Bryn
xxxx

P.S. I went to Potsdam yesterday and bought a jacket. It's well cool. I am also getting through money at a terrifyng rate. Maybe it's a good thing I can't go clubbing yet...

Hallo alle!

Right then, I promised I was going to start a blog to keep people up to date on life in best city in the world.

And here it is.

It's been a while since I've done this, but since I'm deeply self-obsessed and doing something rather interesting, I suspect I'll get back into it soon enough! I can't really make any promises or predictions about what it will be like or how often I'll post. The nature of blogging means you'll probably just get a few random anecdotes and a lot of musing, with no real clarity as to what my life is really like or how a day tends to pan out. If you're hoping for a timed and dated list of things what I have done then I suggest you hire a private detective to follow me. Or even better get the hell off your arse, turn off the computer and come out here to stalk me yourself. Just make sure to buy a transport pass, as I get a lot of trams and trains...

Anyhoo, shall I actually say something about what I've been up too since arriving here, still rather hung over from a fabulous farewell party, at 1000 German time on Sunday? (Yes, I had got up at 0330 in Ipswich to go into town to get the coach to Stansted. Fun.) 

Hmm, dunno what to say really. Already so many little things have happened to make me feel at home here. The flatmates being nice. The amazing location with trams and an U-Bahn-Station. The day of feeling lonely when I took myself of for a walk in the palk and then felt a bit better, and then went out for a Guinness with Lisa and felt much better. The fabulous trip to Ikea with Catherine, complete with rain-sodden walk alongside a motorway clutching some flatpack shelving. Seeing naked people from my window (the building where I live is mainly gym and the men's showers sometimes have the window open...). My huge ingenuity creating a wardrobecurtain with a fleece throw and some packing string. Oh, so many memories already! 

I guess at this early stage the best thing to say is that I love it. Fear not for me! It's weird. I was expecting to feel very abroad, but I don't. What I do feel is very in a city, which is proving a big change from life in Ipswich/Cambridge. A good change. There's just so many people! I can wait to get to know some of them and start making memories...

It's gonna be a great year. I'll keep you posted.

Bryn
xxxx

P.S I'll put up some photos of the flat soon, so that you can be amazed at how fabulous it is. For those who know Berlin, I'm living here:

Torstraße ###, 10119, Berlin

P.P.S For those who don't know Berlin, that's a really good location.

P.P.P.S You should be able to subscribe to this as an RSS feed, meaning that you won't have to keep coming back and checking, everytime I write something new it'll just pop up and say hello.