life on planetm

chasing the zeitgeist

My love affair with Berlin began over two decades ago… You know you feel at home when you start comparing rates for a single ticket and a day card without even checking to see if there is an option for a menu in English.  And you realize before the announcement is repeated in English that your quick, easy U-Bahn trip to KaDeWe is not to be.

But the bus is easy to find and there are advantages to travelling above ground.  You check out the window and see you are headed for “Zoo” so all is good.  When you finally get dumped off at Potsdamer Platz, you smile.  For most people in Berlin in 2012, it’s just a handy hub with an U-Bahn and an S-Bahn in the heart of the city.

To explain how a regular tourist day in Berlin yesterday held so much extra personal meaning for me, we have to time travel back to November 1989.  To the village of Haarlem, outside Amsterdam.  That was back when I couldn’t afford a proper hotel room and Amsterdam was too expensive for my budget so I was commuting in every morning to see the sights.  We had been there for most of the week so on Friday morning when the server came over at breakfast telling us the Berlin Wall had fallen, I just looked skeptical. 

She could see I was thinking, “I thought you spoke really good English.  What happened?  What is missing in this translation?” <note to kids – this was BEFORE the internet;  no one knew the Berlin Wall was coming down, especially people who had last seen the news in English via an expensive Time magazine purchased weeks before>

Then she brought over a newspaper and on the front page there was a picture of people dancing on the Berlin Wall!  And we were on our way to Germany!!! 

Life has a way of working out.  We had gone over our budget in Italy and Switzerland so I suggested to Scott, while standing in the train station in Bern scanning the railway timetables, that we change our plan and go to the Netherlands first since Amsterdam would give us an overnight trip on our Eurorail pass and save a night’s hotel room and Munich would not.  I am sure we would have found our way to Berlin again even if we’d already “done” it but it was one of the greatest moments of serendipity of my life.

We decided to not ditch my friend Greg and hang out with him in Celle, in northern Germany, over the weekend and head to Berlin on Monday.  We missed our chance to dance on the Wall but we got to watch everything unfold on the BBC, talk about reunification with actual Germans at the party Greg organized for the Saturday night and head off to the train station with everyone holding real jobs and unable to drop everything to go to Berlin extremely jealous.

Since we were travelling poor, we ended up in a sleeping car with a family who appeared to be from East Germany on their way to western freedom.  It was very poignant.  But didn’t prepare us at all for our arrival at Zoo.  The Germans don’t have words that short so the real name is Bahnhof Zoologischer Garten.  Zoo was the train station in West Berlin and the main entry point in those days.  I am sure it was normally busy but when you stepped into Zoo Station in November 1989, it was a zoo literally!

But there was such a feeling of euphoria in the air that no one cared about lineups or delays.  You just went with the flow and soaked up the experience of being in the middle of history – one of the very few times you risked being hugged by a stranger rather than hit by a stray bullet.  I will talk more about this incredible time and my return for the 20 year anniversary but for now we will continue with yesterday 🙂

For those of you not up on German history, Potsdamer Platz was one of Europe’s busiest squares in the 1920’s and it was the sight of the world’s first traffic lights.  It was the heart of Berlin until it was divided so it was the first hole made in the Wall in 1989.  The Wall didn’t actually “fall”, rather it just had holes punched in it and the concrete carried away until it was essentially gone.  So, when we arrived in 1989, there were four holes in the Wall, the only symbolic one being Potsdamer Platz.

But there were no tourist signs yet so we wondered how we would find it.  In those days there was one stop on the U-Bahn in East Berlin – so people were piling onto the U-Bahn at that stop and coming to West Berlin to check it out.  The West Germany government had also given each of them 100 D-marks to spend so everywhere you went there were offers for 99 D-marks!  And so many Trabants and plastic shopping bags.  People in war zones should really learn about the power of the plastic shopping bag to unite populations 🙂

The Berlin U-Bahn was giving the Tokyo bullet train a run for its money and it was impossible to move on any train so we decided to just go with the crowd and get out at a random stop and then try to head in the right direction toward the Wall.  Another non-decision that had unexpected benefits.  We found the Wall – it was hard to miss!  And just began walking along it wondering if we would find Potsdamer Platz.

We finally found a hole in the Wall.  It looked really busy.  We wondered if it was Checkpoint Charlie.  We looked at the ground and thought we saw the echoes of tram tracks (that was supposed to be the forensic evidence – tram lines crossing from East to West from the good ol’days before World War II).  But we weren’t really sure.  So we kept walking along the Wall.  And then we came to Checkpoint Charlie.  And we knew we had just found Potsdamer Platz!

I came back in 2000 to see the beginning of the redevelopment of Potsdamer Platz, I walked all the way there and back from the Brandenburg Gate along the dominos in 2009 and yesterday I got dumped off there because they are doing maintenance on the U-Bahn.  It looks very corporate and boring these days but for me it will always be my very first experience of Berlin.

Another touchstone from 1989 is KaDeWe.  Germans like to create really long words – and then use a short form to actually talk about things 🙂  KaDeWe is the Kaufhaus des Westens – the department store of the West.  It is over 100 years old and is the largest department store in Europe.  Over the years of the divided Berlin, it was a gloating mecca of commerce to taunt the East and encourage citizens to escape to western freedom – including the freedom to consume copious quantities of goods you don’t really need…

Yesterday I was at KaDeWe for the nostalgia – and to buy socks.  I will not bore you with my obsession with German hosiery but I came back to the hotel with an entire shopping bag and left the sales ladies at Wolford and Falke bemused as usual.

My first time at KaDeWe was in 1989.  Scott wisely just stayed outside – but I wanted to experience the mayhem.  According to legend, KaDeWe had been used to taunt the East over all the years of the cold war so every person in East Berlin wanted to see what they had been missing.  And it felt like they were all there on the same day!

Yesterday was only slightly less busy than that first day in 1989. This is a pretty Catholic country so there is still no shopping on Sundays and, this being Easter weekend, everyone was rushing in on the last shopping day for the week.  I think being a washroom attendant on the sixth floor at KaDeWe may be the most lucrative job in Berlin!  The sixth floor is the famous gourmet floor.  I had been unable to find a bathroom on other floors so figured I would just endure the line.  The custom seemed to be to leave the attendant a euro – I think the two of them made at least 20 euros while I was standing in line!  They did a great job though.  If you like stuff clean, Germany is your country 🙂

I also indulged in another very German thing – the department store champagne bar!  At KaDeWe, you can actually choose your brand.  I chose Jacquart because there were seats available – and it is good champagne.  I was planning to work on this post while I sipped my champagne but then this gentleman sat down beside me and started talking to me in German.  His name was Rudolf.  If I got the information correct, his wife has passed away but he is a native of Berlin and they came to KaDeWe a lot as a couple.  Apparently she had a weakness for porcelain 🙂

The conversation was a bit of a challenge but we managed to muddle through in a combination of German and English and it was a really nice connection to make in a foreign city.  He wondered what I was doing in Berlin and I tried to explain my history with the city.  I wish my German was better and I could have asked him what it had been like to live in this city your entire life through its tumultuous history.

I finished off my expedition yesterday by walking past another past of Berlin history – the Brandenburg Gate.  This is where I froze to death in the rain watching the twentieth anniversary celebrations in 2009 – while thinking fondly of the countless hours I spent freezing at the Brandenburg Gate in 1989 – the rumour was that they would make another symbolic hole in the Wall while we were in Berlin so we were all hanging out eating würst, drinking beer and waiting with all the TV cameras just in case we could actually get a snapshot of history in the exact moment it was being made.

The weather yesterday was insane.  It started pleasant, turned to rain, was brilliant blue sky sunshine as I walked past the Brandenburg Gate and had turned to snow by the time I emerged from dinner.  Since U2 wasn’t working properly, I decided to try taking an S-Bahn that I hoped would drop me at Alexanderplatz, rather than whisk me to some neighboring town outside Berlin.  Clemens would be proud 🙂  He taught me how to use the schedule in a German train station and I even connected back with the U-Bahn to get home without having to brave the snow!

Needless to say it had been a big day and it was hard to imagine venturing out again as I had planned to try and find a nightclub in my spring coat in the snow…  I do want to do some more exploring in Berlin.  It is definitely one of those über-cool places that seems at the epicentre of the cultural zeitgeist.

But sometimes you just need to spend a Saturday night in your hotel room reading a book and nursing your cold.  Chasing the zeitgeist is exhausting.  The real secret is to make the zeitgeist revolve around you – and whatever turns you on.  Truly cool people do not worry about what other people think or follow their lead.  One of the most valuable lessons I learned from my maverick father 🙂

The sun is shining.  I better shower and get out there.  Who knows how long it will last…  Even the weather here feels like you’re chasing the zeitgeist…

Istanbul has everything!

I think I am quoting my new friend Firdevs correctly 🙂  She is a native of Istanbul and a great ambassador for her native city.  We met on my first night in Istanbul.  I arrived via a very turbulent flight.  There were moments when I envisioned the headlines, “Swiss Air Flight 1804 enroute to Istanbul has plunged into the Bosphorus.”  At least it would have been a dramatic ending.  We saw the Bosphorus unfolding before us, straddling Europe and Asia, as we hovered in the air awaiting our final instructions to land.  It is a truly breathtaking sight.  A proper backdrop to my most dramatic plane journey to date.  There were THREE rounds of spontaneous applause when we landed!

Once I left the airport, it became clear why it had been such a bumpy ride.  It was cold, windy and pouring rain.  I thought I was in Vancouver 🙂  I was very glad at that point for my extravagance in having the hotel arrange transport for me from the airport.  I was whisked away into a luxury vehicle and just got to sit back and enjoy the ride as my driver braved the elements to deposit me right at the door to the hotel.

I decided to be a wimp the first evening and just hide in the hotel.  That was how I met Firdevs.  She was very gracious and seemed concerned whether I could wait for her to return from room service before I ordered my dinner.  One of the great perks of being on vacation is that I can do anything in slow motion, a luxury I never get at home.  So I was happy to wait for her return.

And it was well worth the wait!  She is protecting me from the advances of Turkish men (I have only been here two days and have already had a marriage proposal and broken some guy’s heart!) and is a friendly face at the end of the day to share my stories.  She is also introducing me to Turkish wine.

Luckily I was reading the HSBC ads when I arrived at the airport in Paris.  Thanks to HSBC, I learned that Turkey has more acres of vineyards than South Africa.  And my new guide is teaching me that Turkish wine is delicious. 

I am just about to head over to the Pera Palace Hotel to have high tea – Firdevs’ recommendation since she used to work at that hotel.  It is where Agatha Christie wrote parts of “Murder on the Orient Express”.  When I was a child, I read every Agatha Christie murder mystery published so having high tea in “her” hotel brings my past and my present together in a manner I never would have imagined huddled on a sofa on the small town prairie devouring Agatha Christie and imagining what it would be like to be on the Orient Express.  You can still take the train.  It’s on the list and will no doubt make it onto this blog at some point.

Only into day two, I totally understand why everyone raves about Istanbul and Turkish people.  They are the world’s best salespeople.  They are so friendly, gracious and warm you just keep buying things from them.  Firdevs knows.  Every night she gets me to order at least one more glass of wine than I planned on.  But chatting with her is so enjoyable it is impossible to say “no”.  

So today’s thought… come to Istanbul!  Stay at the Marmara Pera.  And ask for Firdevs.  You will have a new friend – and the best possible introduction to Istanbul 😉

the advantages of extra parents ;)

Long before my friend Sarah actually had children of her own, she explained to me the concept of children being raised by the village, rather than individual nuclear parents.  She used to work for WHO so spent a lot of time in villages in Africa, rural Asia, places most of us never set foot in.

It’s a concept that doesn’t necessarily sit so well with many North American parents, the most insular people on the planet.  But there are a lot of virtues to the concept.  It takes a lot of pressure off the actual birth parents.  It exposes children to lots of different viewpoints and ideas, which will come in helpful in life as your tiny North American nuclear family is highly unlikely to provide all the material you are going to need to successfully navigate our increasingly global, pluralistic world.

While there is much that can be said about this concept in theory, this post is an homage to the two people in my life who played a gigantic role in my youth and supplemented the skills of my parents in a way that was so masterful it took me years to fully appreciate it.

They are about a decade older than my parents and Elaine is currently in hospital.  I am going to write a personal note to her as well but I decided it would be cooler – and more grandiose – to celebrate our relationship on a public scale via the world wide web.  There is no doubt she deserves to be famous – and maybe this can be part of her legacy.

It all began when my mother re-enrolled me in figure skating at age 11.  She had decided the teacher wasn’t good enough so it had been a few years and catching up was a bit awkward.  But awkward things can be worthwhile 🙂  Elaine had a daughter a year younger and she and my mom struck up a friendship sitting in the ice rink waiting for us.

I am not sure how it all evolved.  Her husband, Glen, was a very successful farmer and my dad had just ditched his real career to go farming (one of his dreams) at age 30 and there were lots of people predicting his demise (they obviously didn’t know my dad :)) so Glen was a marvelous mentor.

I didn’t really care about the specifics.  I had spent most of my life being a gypsy child (my first six birthdays all happened in different places with different people).  Here was a Scottish clan.  They had roots and family reunions.

Glen and Elaine had been to university and listened to me in a way I had never experienced before with an adult.  And they had so much knowledge to share.  And they gave me confidence in my opinions.  They were so interested in me!

It took me a couple of decades to really understand and appreciate the tremendous impact they had had on my life.  They were so much more than my parents’ best friends in my teens.  They were part of my extended family.

Everyone should have an Elaine in their life.  She is so gracious and affectionate you almost think she is acting.  Who could be that truly wonderful?  But it’s just who she is.  And she never disappoints you.  When you arrive at her house, she will greet you with a hug.  She will pull frozen goodies out of her giant freezer and put on the coffee pot.  She will ask what you have been up to and really listen and ask questions.  If you get lucky, she might even play the piano and sing show tunes.  I think about her a lot more than she probably realizes.  And the guidance she provided when I was an impressionable teenager has served me well all over the world and definitely contributed to my success and general happiness.

It’s already obvious if you’ve been reading my blog the tremendous affection I have for my proper birth family 🙂  but I have weaseled my way into a few other wonderful families over the years – and it has provided so many amazing memories I can’t imagine not being part of each one.  Not too many people split with their husband – and still get his mother’s mind-blowing German Christmas cookies – a dozen different variations all carefully protected in bubble wrap and shipped air mail by my ex – every December.  I still love them all – and they know…

And, just in case Glen and Elaine aren’t sure – I have now loved you both for 38 years and counting… thanks for all the incredible memories – and so much more…

remember to be part of your own species…

I am one of those Type A people far too willing to work who takes way too much pride in being organized, efficient and getting stuff accomplished.  We are very useful to the planet 🙂  But we are a sub-species and can go astray and forget the rules of our tribe.

I am trying to learn to slow down sometimes and make sure I smell a few flowers…  and, more importantly, that I don’t turn into one of those crazy people who has regrets on their deathbed.  A long time ago I heard a phrase that is likely a clique, “no one ever complained on his deathbed that he hadn’t worked enough!”

At the time, I was working almost every moment so it gave me pause for thought.  I was still pretty young and my deathbed was likely a long way off but just in case I got hit by a bus, I started to try and remember to make my life about more than just work.

It’s still a struggle at periods like the present when my clients are gunning for regulatory deadlines and I am trying to think how I can feed myself (including groceries and clean up) in less than half an hour without resorting to TV dinners.

But next week is the drop-dead date so closure is starting to happen and I can potentially chill for a couple of hours each day.  I seized that opportunity yesterday.  It was one of those moments of serendipity.  I had mentioned working from anywhere in the world, including while watching the hippos play in the Grumeti River in Tanzania while I ate lunch and beat off the monkeys trying to steal my bread.  I have photos from that trip as the background on my laptop so on my way out I asked the executive assistant if she wanted to see the hippos…

I had no idea she had had dreams of being a zoologist, was involved with rescue animals and had always wanted to go on safari…  Not only did I once again experience the extra spark from connecting to another human being, we had this fantastic conversation about animal behaviours and how so many of them are not so different to human animal behaviours.

I was going to work a night shift and it was already close to dinner hour so I decided to stop by one of my favourite restaurants to get fed before the night shift started.  One of the owners, Erik, came over to say “hi” and I told him I had been there with friends on my birthday but it was a Monday so neither of the owners had been there – but I had told my friends about them.

And he told me he hadn’t been there because he had had a kid!  Unfortunately the kid didn’t know it should hang on until Mar 12^th to have the best possible birth date – but, as I told Erik, Mar 11^th is still pretty good 🙂

And the encounter with Erik completed the day’s experience.  As he pointed out, his is a “relationship business”.  I need to keep reminding myself to make contact with my own species.  To be part of its social norms.  To not just run past in a hurry but instead to connect and share.  To hear people’s stories.  To learn about their secret dreams.  To find out they had a first child.

Being involved in the world and paying attention is what kept my grandmother young and vibrant I think.  It’s how you get to be the 90 year old talking about taking care of the old people – who are all younger than you.  But haven’t spent their life keeping track of details for 200 different people – and being annoyed if you get anything wrong…  We are supposed to be the zenith of the animals –she was just using that brain we have all been given 😉