Ugh. I still cannot sleep. I keep waking up around 1am and then just sort of troll around the apartment with nothing to do until dawn. No internet, no phone, no tv, no books. I don’t even have any games on my phone. I found the Nibenlungenlied audio book on my computer, so at least I can get started on that. So I am sitting here at 5am, eating müsli with apples and vanilla soy milk, orange slices, peanut butter „toast“ (we don’t have a toaster, so I have to fry it in a frying pan) and peppermint tea, listening to the adventures of Siegfried.

Hoping today to go to the Tiergarten if the weather is nice. I don’t know what the train schedule is like on Sundays, but there is no way I can walk that far with these blisters.

Der Spülengeist is officially named Vladimir.

Ugh. I officially have a nasty case of „ballerina feet“. Blisters everywhere, bruised toenails, you name it. I even developed a blister under one of my nails. Don’t ask how I discovered this. Let’s just say I need to minimize the walking today. My legs are holding up admirably so far. Knock wood. It’s another beautiful sunny day, and I do want to capitalize on that before the notorious Berlin gloom returns.

Went to the Brandenberg Gate and the Tiergarten today. My feet are officially screwed, just a mass of blisters and raw spots. We took the U-Bahn to Alexanderplatz, and then tried to take the train to the Hauptbahnhof, but couldn’t find it. Had to go to the information booth, which was this weird fish bowl with a portal window the woman had to open to talk to me. While we were on the train, 2 guys got on with trumpets and started playing „When the Saints go Marching In“ and singing in thick accents while panhandling. This town might be weirder than LA. Saw the Holocaust Memorial. The monument itself is amazing, but the tourists were dreadful and treated it like a playground. There was a security guard there whose only job seemed to be to bark „HALLO! GET DOWN!“ at people climbing on the stone slabs. We decided that we want to sample him saying that and turn it into a dance track.

I have the Nina Hagen song „New York New York“ stuck in my head but instead of saying „we are going to another disco, disco after disco“ I keep thinking „we are going to another denkmal, denkmal after denkmal“ So many memorials, statues, and monuments for one city. I have decided the reason I love this city is because she is basically me. She’s old as hell and she’s seen some shit in her day. And then there was that whole goth phase…