May 2015 – Ben Böhmer

Leben

Oh, I almost forgot.
I created life.

Viktalia was born 13.05.2015, weighed 3060 grams and was measured to be 53 cm long, although the midwife didn’t stretch her out completely so we usually add a centimeter and a half to that.
Much like both parents do when asked about their own heights.

‘Leben’ means both ‘life’ and ‘to live’ in German. It is a nounable verb and a verbable noun, which I think is nice.

Pasteller Berg

We live in Pasteller Berg, an area of Berlin where buildings have pastel colours. I don’t know how familiar you are with Berlin, but it’s either brick-coloured – old, worn, crusty brick-coloured – or steel-concrete-glass-grey. Or pastel. We live the pastel life.

Paul Lincke Ufer

One of my favourite places in Berlin lies in Kreuzberg along the canal. I have no idea what the canal itself is called, but it has two shores: Maybachufer and Paul Lincke Ufer. The latter is my favourite, mainly because it is situated on the northern side of the canal. Thus it receives sun at times during the day when I am most likely to get out of the apartment.

Along the shore you find plenty of people sitting on the benches and on the slight, 2m wide edge of sparse grass (equal amounts of grass, dirt and dogshit) they drape themselves on blankets and in beer.

The Paul Lincke Ufer is also littered with ample public houses where you can quench your thirst, if you’re not the type to grab a bottle at the nearest Späti. Which is a nother fine feature of Berlin – you can hardly walk anywhere without accidentally walking into a Spätkauf and coming out with an opened bottle of beer in your hand. It’s some sort of German Metropolis Magic.

Gallivant About

Hats abound.

Rundfunk

Brutalist architecture encased in a labyrinth of flag poles. Totally void of people on a saturday afternoon, which only added to the imposing North-Koreaness of the scene. If you have seen one communist public square you have seen them all, be it in the former eastern Germany, North Korea or China. Take my word for i; I have been in *one* of those places.

Sebastiao Salgado

A display of catious optimism about the future of our planet.

Do Tourists Dream of Slaughtered Sheep?

One of the greatest dreams I have known is for the conduit for my soul, the origin of my being, the container of my person, to be stripped of all living biochemical substrate and be sold to tourists.

Gravity’s Favour

Gravity’s a bitch. You go a whole life living with her, thinking you know what to expect. You know all her little quirks. How she cradles you under the duvet. How she goes sideways first, then backwards, then in small spirals all over the place when you’re drunk.

You think you know her.

Then… BAM!!

You see someone moving vertically while you only get to stay on the horizontal plane.

She’s still doing her part in tearing down the building though. Slowly. Half a rotten brick by half a rotten brick.