Friday, January 31, 2014

10 Things Berlin has Taught Me

If I got you down with my last post - sorry about that! I've been feeling down while looking for work and seriously felt my love for this amazing city wane a bit. But - sorry parents - that doesn't mean we're going home.

We came to Berlin to chew bubblegum and kick ass, and I'm all out of bubblegum.


10 Things Berlin has taught me
Our kiez: Wedding*


10 Things Berlin has Taught MeOn that note, here is what Berlin has given me with an appropriate soundtrack:
  1. How to run with an open beer. Usually for the Ubahn, sometimes just for fun.
  2. Wear layers. Summer. Fall. Winter. Always.
  3. I can drink with the big leagues. I suspected, but now I know. 
  4. Learning a foreign language simply by being here doesn't work. I need to actually try.
  5. Reality TV might not be real, but it is fun to be on.
  6. Getting naked at the German sauna did not cause my eyeballs to fall out, despite the number of naked old people bits observed. 
  7. I can write. If I had never been pushed out of comfortable desk jobs, maybe I would have never tried to make a go of writing for a living. Besides EasyExpat, look for my work soon appearing as a co-blogger on the German-Way, The Frisky and as the new expert at about.com's Germany Travel.
  8. You don't always need to be polite. Seattle passive-aggressiveness has no place in Germany and I am (mostly) the better for it. 
  9. 10 Things Berlin has Taught MeI ate blood and I liked it. In fact, I've eaten many things I would have never expected to like in Germany and enjoyed (except for Sülze - Germs can keep that for themselves).
  10. I can make friends as an adult. And even though they may leave the city, we're friends for life. 
*I took these pictures yesterday after a casual cafe visit with a German friend. So easy, so beautiful....there is so much to love about this city. I need to remember that.




For more general wonderfulness about Germans themselves and life in Germany, check out Liv Hambrett's "What I Know About Germans" now a book in conjunction with Überlin!



2 comments:

Natalie said...

Hey, so glad you're feeling a bit happier and that you seem to have lots of exciting jobs on the go. We have been splitting our time between home (London) and Berlin for the last 10 years and I've decided that the dissatisfaction isn't location specific! Winter certainly doesn't help and losing good friends who decide to return to their homelands makes the whole expat thing tough. If you fancy meeting for a coffee and potentially making some new friends let me know!

Unknown said...

Ah, thanks Natalia! So sweet of people to commiserate on my little pity party and offer their experience. You are completely right that it isn't Berlin's fault I was feeling shitty, but in my reptile brain I was having trouble differentiating.

Please do let me know when you are in town and I look forward to meeting up!

We're Back in Berlin Ja!

We're Back in Berlin Ja!
ebe & ian at Yak-toberfest 2008