Sunday, June 5, 2005
Yes, I’m still alive out here in Berlin. Just been busy. But here’s the update:
I saw a strange Einstürzende Neubauten show at the NBI club on Friday. They played their instruments (mostly laptops and other electronic cleverness) in silence upstairs near the bar. All of the speakers — tons of speakers — filled a small basement room with an absolutely deafening sound. They strongly recommended only going down with earplugs, sound-dampening headphones, or fingers-firmly-in-ears. So I stuck my fingers in my ears and got thoroughly vibrated by the dense, cacophany and rumbling noise clashes. Interesting, anyway.
Otherwise, I’ve been doing some of the usual sightseeing stuff — Checkpoint Charlie Museum, Mauergedänksmuseum, Fernsehturm. And reading a pile of books, which is actually kind of nice… Just sitting at a café or restaurant for a while, reading. Some of the word collections I’ve had the most fun with have been the Penguin 70th Anniversary chapbooks. I’ve got about a dozen of them, so far, from Richard Dawkins to Robert Graves to F. Scott Fitzgerald to Melissa Banks to Will Self. They’re great single-sitting reads and a good way to read some new authors, though I think they’re only selling them in Europe right now (or, rather, only Britain, though Berlin stores get a few on import). Whatever happened to the chapbook? It seems like such a good marketing concept… Instead of paying $15, you pay $3 and get a good 60-page read.
Anyway. That’s some of what’s been going on. Nothing too dramatic, but it’s nice to spend time over here (of course).
Oh, and in about a week I’m going back to Barcelona. Then I might join Haley in Warsaw for a few days. We’ll see. All up in the air, still.
Josh… OUT.
