“We can continue to screw up our image just fine all on our own, thank you,” A party spokesman said.
With comrades like these who needs enemies?
“Seine Zeit ist einfach vorbei.”
Category Archives: Home Cooking
Poor But Sexy But Drunk
Traditional Kneipen (neighborhood pubs) are dropping like Fliegen (flies) these days in Germany.
The latest statistics indicate that their number has dropped nationwide from 48,000 to 36,000 since 2001.
But thank goodness Berlin and Berliners are standing up to buck the trend. While the number of Kneipen in other cities like Hamburg has dropped 48.1 percent during this period, the number of new Kneipen in Berlin rose 95.8 percent. Damn. You can’t set the bar much higher than that.
“Mit dem Wirtshaus verschwindet eine Einrichtung mit hohem sozialen und kulturellen Stellenwert aus den Gemeinden.”
German Peace Movement Thanks Grass
When not smoking it, I mean.
Literally dozens of German peaceniks hit the streets for Easter peace marches over the weekend calling for all things peace-like and supporting everything from peace visionary/poet Günter Grass to anti-death penalty protestation in front of the war mongering US-Amerikan Embassy in Berlin (Amerikans (they are Amerikans) not to mention Israelis (they are Jewish) no like peace, speak with forked toungue, kill Indians and Palestinians and conspire to do many, many other bad things all the time even right now as we speak).
Epiphany time: If only the rest of us could finally open up our hearts and learn from their shining example and give peace a chance and start living together in harmony together the world over, hand in hand, so-to-speak, with goodness and niceness for all. The world would be a better place, you know. You f*#!%ers.
“Du bist geblieben, was Du freiwillig geworden bist: der SS-Mann, der das 60 Jahre verschwiegen hat, aber den Bundeskanzler Kohl anpöbelte, weil der Hand in Hand mit einem amerikanischen Präsidenten einen Soldatenfriedhof besuchte, auf dem auch 40 SS-Gefallene liegen.”
Artistic Productions Like This Cost Money You Know
We’re artists. So give us your, I mean our money.
This is what Germans get for a billion euros of arts subsidies each and every year. Jiminy Crickets. I don’t even want to think about what they’d be getting for less.
Please, Berlin. For the love of all that is holy freakin’ cow. Keep those subsidies coming.
“Der Kulturinfarkt: Von allem zu viel und überall das Gleiche.”
Another Shocking New Revelation
“Germany is a nation of grumblers.”
Wow. And this guy should know. He’s a German himself.
I mean, I knew that they were a nation of moaners and whiners and that they liked to complain and gripe and lament a lot and that they regularly deplore things and eat their hearts out bemoaning matters while greiving and bitching and moaning (as opposed to just moaning without the bitching part), but I honesly had no idea that they were grumblers, too. Hey, live and learn.
“Anyone who follows all the daily debates in Germany that are critical of capitalism and growth could come to the conclusion that we Germans don’t want to be successful anymore.”
I Thought He’d Never Leave
Contrary to popular belief, Germans have a great sense of humor. What they’re not terribly good at, however, is imitating other comedy formats, something they insist on doing time and time and time again. Harald Schmidt is a prime example of this and – glory hallelujah let the saints be praised – they’ve finally gotten around to cancelling his show for good.
He has been Germany’s late night Tonight-Show-David-Letterman-Conan-O’Brien-like clone for many, way too many years and I’ve never understood why people here pretend that he is funny, but, then again, maybe that’s just me (uh, who else is it going to be?).
I’d give you an example of some of his highbrow, sophisticated humor (see above), but that would only make me feel more aggressive than I do already so go out there and dig up something on YouTube yourself if you absolutely positively have to and good luck with the translation because it won’t be worth it.
Geh mit Gott, Harald, aber geh.
Gentrification Giants 1 – Subculture Vultures 0
An evicted group of about 20 subculture artist/activist types chained to the remains of Berlin’s graffiti-covered Tacheles alternative scene “living space” ruin is about to be forcibly dragged out kicking and screaming into German reality by black-clad gentrification special forces troops right here live on TV, I hope, but nobody can tell me when. Or on which channel or anything (maybe later in the Internetz?).
The group is defending “one of Berlin’s last bastions of alternative subculture, and are fighting eviction ahead of plans to develop it (the Tacheles) as an office and luxury apartments complex” and has to be dealt with accordingly, of course. After years of pussyfooting around with them first, I mean.
I would advise them not to let the door hit them on the way out but there are no doors at the Tacheles as they were surely used as firewood long ago during one of those quaint, Stone Age let’s-not-freeze-to-death-tonight gettogethers so popular with artist types there and elsewhere here in Berlin.
Tacheles “is just the latest in a long line of public spaces that have been lost to private investors” and will surely be missed by all, myself not included.
Darko stands behind an iron gate, his bare chest daubed in red paint with the words “victim of bank.”
PS: This German subculture is not to be confused with this other German subculture here.
Just Say No
As usual, I mean. Berliners in Kreuzberg (or at least that active, left-wing kind) aren’t interested in finding new solutions for urban living, thank you. And they’ll even threaten you with violence if you try to establish “temporary cultural space” to attempt to do so (go ask BMW Guggenheim Lab). Kreuzbergers don’t do culture. Temporary or otherwise.
And speaking of resistence… The rest of the country is pretty much Kreuzberg all over again (only on a much larger scale) when it comes to saying no to the Internet (some call it the Internetz).
This isn’t really a news item or anything, but now certain German businessmen types are actually starting to get worried about their country “sleeping through the Internet” age like it does.
They have come to discover that their fellow Germans provide “too few qualified professionals, suffer way too much from risk aversion and are caught up in a tightly structured regulation frenzy.” Like I said, this isn’t anything new. But the real question is: What are you going to be able to do about that? Not a damned thing, of course.
Das Internet ist ein globaler Treiber für die Wirtschaft. Doch in Deutschland bremsen Fachkräftemangel und hohe Anforderungen an den Datenschutz die Firmen aus.
Germany In Grave Danger Again
It’s all over but the crying now. Or whining, if you prefer. German Wetter (weather) just keeps getting wetter!
A new study tells us that the number of “devastating” storms, heavy rains and other weather-related “natural catastrophes” has tripled in Germany since the 70s! Wow. Have there actually been three already?
Scarier still is that the climate model for the next thirty years (this in a country that can’t get the weather forecast for tomorrow right, mind you) calls for even more “heavy precipitation” that will most likely lead to – oh my God we’re all going to die – flooding! That’s right, the f-word. Oh the horror or something. And you thought it couldn’t happen here.
„Für die nächsten 30 Jahre rechnen Klimamodelle in Deutschland vor allem mit einer Zunahme der Sturmintensität und mit mehr Starkniederschlägen, die zu Überschwemmungen führen.“
Germany’s Energy Turnaround Rocks
They never promised you a rose garden (actually, they did). It looks like Germany’s Energiewende (the energy turnaround = shutting down nuclear power and waiting for solar and wind energy to pick up slack) is going to have its price, too.
And it looks likes the first installment will by about a seven percent increase in energy costs for private housholds. But Germans pay these increases gladly, I think. At least for now (seven percent is just the start, of course). It’s back to the future. It’s for the common good. Or it’s for saving the planet or something.
Uh, like why don’t they just have “the state” pay for it. Oh, that’s right. They already are (the taxpayers are, that is).
Stromtrassen, Umschlagwerke oder intelligente Stromzähler kosten den Staat Milliarden. Draufzahlen muss am Ende oft der Verbraucher – offenbar bis zu sieben Prozent in den kommenden Jahren.
