13. Thanksgiving in Berlin

We went to Berlin, y'all! We've got a friend- whom I shall refer to as Brunella- living there for a while doing academic stuff of various flavors. Some of you know her and might recognize her in some of the pictures, but I'm going to use Jean Grey to represent her because they're both hot and have sexy auburn hair.

So Brunella was planning on having a Thanksgiving dinner to show her friends in Berlin how we roll when we decide to glut out. Now, Germany is no stranger to lots of food, but it needed to be shown how, way back in the day, the Pilgrims and the Indians, er...Protestant buckle-fetishists and indigenous peoples, urm...crazy crackers and guileless Native Americans, like, ate some stuff in idyllic harmony before going back to playing the colonial repression game the way it's played everywhere else. 

Brunella invited us to this bash, and we were all like, “Hells yeah!” It turned out that an American lady we had met previously, who was living in Paris with her family for academic reasons, was throwing a dinner for others of an American persuasion in the City of Lights. She invited us to come and we did, so we got to have two turkstravaganzas this year. But that diverges from the tale at hand. Come read with me.

We flew in to Berlin-Schoenefeld airport where I had some vaguely philosophical whinging about the nature of our possessions, but then our suitcase showed up and I was fine. That done, our next task was to navigate Berlin's version of the Metro from the airport to Brunella's apartment, somewhere in the bowels of what used to be called East Berlin and is now merely Berlin. Accomplishing this reminded us (as if I had ever forgotten) that not speaking the language sucks. We relied on the stern assistance of various people in official-looking hats to figure out which train to take and how to buy a ticket. I thought of a friend of mine who spent some time in Germany, and his portrayal of their reaction to our not knowing how to do something that is (to them) so very basic: “What? Why don't you know how to...but everyone knows this. Are...are you dumb?” It felt good.

Some small excitement regarding street numbers that we thought weren't there but, in fact, were (just on the other side of the street) followed, and soon enough we were climbing the stairs to Brunella's apartment. She only has to climb four flights of stairs, and at each landing between floors there is a thoughtful chair for the winded. Brunella opened the door and there were hugs.

Ladies and gentlemen, she lives in a palace. This is what we thought as Brunella showed us her digs. This place had rooms. It had a hallway connecting them. The kitchen was bigger than all of Petit Bateau. I felt like a miniature person in the spare bedroom (spare. bedroom.) it was so large. She explained how she hadn't made a pact with Dark Powers to land this place. Berlin- and East Berlin in particular- still enjoys a lower cost of living than most any other major European city. Our adventures with food would later bear this out. Also, the lovely Miss B technically shares this pala- apartment with someone else who happens to spend much of her time in...Munich, or somewhere. Not there. So. Majesty for less than we pay for Le Petit Bateau each month.

Once we dropped off our big suitcase and bags of electronics in the guest room, twas time to address our famishedness. Brunella took us down the street about a block to get some doner kebap. Basically, it's a pita sort of thing, stuffed with shredded vegetables and slices of meat shaved off a tower of turkey that slowly revolved in the window. Along with this we each had a big bottle of beer.

Each of these beers cost about a euro. In Paris they'd be close to ten. 

In accordance with all the stereotypes, when it comes to booze the French favor wine, while the Germans favor...? You guessed it: Pina Coladas. With the exception of these times having a beer at Cafe Borghese while the laundry launders, I had more beer in Germany in six days than I've had in France since September. I remembered how much I love it, though I did miss my IPAs.

By 4:30 it was almost full dark, reminding us that we'd moved up in the world, latitudinally speaking. About midway through our kebaps Brunella's friend joined us. Let's call her Lucy. She was also visiting form France, although she was at the end of her stay; she would be leaving the next day. After introductions, and with full bellies, we returned to Brunella's castle, where we were met by yet another friend, this one a video artist. She chose the name James for this blog, so James she shall be. She had made a film recently as part of a contest, and all the films were to be shown that night for the judging.

This sounded like fun, but as we listened to the talk it seemed as though the films were to be only the beginning of the night, with more soon-to-be-infamous Russian participants joining in on a bar-hopping extravaganza afterward. This sounded like more than our travel-weary selves could handle, so Megan and I bowed out.

They left, and Megan and I puttered about. I found myself just walking around, entranced by the series of rooms that spanned multiple steps apiece. Megan took a bath, a luxury denied her for lo these many months. Eventually we went to bed before our hostess and Lucy returned home, and our wisdom in not accompanying them was borne out when we found out the next day that the two of them hadn't gotten back until about 6:30 that morning. Now, some of you may be thinking that it was our loss that we hadn't gone with, for surely there were some crazy tales and wild happenings to recount? You would be right in that, and from what they told us there would have indeed been good stories to tell. But if we had gone on that adventure then we would have been in poor shape to handle the madness that was to come later that day. For this was Sunday, the day Brunella had declared to be Thanksgiving in Berlin!

Once everyone was up, caffeinated, and showered (the shower never runs out of hot water, Jims and Gems), Burnella got to work on the turkey and such, while Lucy got ready to go down to a flea market she'd heard tell of. I went with Lucy to see this thing, while Megan stayed behind to engage in another of the joys denied her in Le Petit Bateau: cooking in a fully appointed kitchen.

Lucy and I took a couple trams to get to this thing. The flea market was as flea markets have been since time immemorial. There were stalls full of an organized array of merchandise like hats and gloves or old records or military surplus-style clothing. There were also stalls where it seemed as though the person in charge had piled the contents of their garage and put it on in display in the stall. I saw a giant collection of polaroid cameras in one stall; battered, beaten mannequins in another; mismatched furniture enough to furnish many a student apartment all over the place; and what appeared to be a collection of Playmobil figures alongside fishing accoutrements and an array of bargain-basement, out-of-package, um, intimate massage devices in a third.

In case you've ever wondered who's been
 hoarding all the accordions...

I bought Megan a shiny ring because, like owls and ravens and other intelligent beauties, she likes the shinies. Of course, as soon as I finally chose one, I found one at the very next stall that I liked more. Luckily, it was also twice as expensive so I didn't need to beat myself up too much. Lucy was apparently much more of an expert at navigating these things (I don't think I had actually been to a flea market since I was 15, when I bought a ring I still wear to this day) than I was. She found gloves, a hat, and a thing that was sort of like a pre-wrapped scarf and sort of like the neck of a giant, floppy turtleneck and had been designed by Dr. Seuss. Eventually we had to head back; Lucy had to leave in barely two hours to catch her plane home. As it was she would only catch the beginning of the Thanksgiving fun.

We made our way back to Brunella's to find that great things had been going on. The turkey cooked in the oven. Last night James had dropped off a couple bags of frozen mushrooms that had teamed up with a pile of spuds to become a tantalizing bowl of mashed potatoes. Stuffing had sprung into existence in the way that it does; I'm still not exactly sure how such a mismatched batch of ingredients becomes one of the most delicious edible farragoes on the face of the planet. Megan's green beans thing sat next to a pumpkin pie, both of them making eyes at bowls of cranberry sauce and gravy.

As these items moved from the kitchen to the living/Brunella's room, the afternoon/evening's guests began to arrive. In addition to James, the video artist from last night, we were joined by (in no particular order) Marina, Alena, Masha, Olga, Sasha, Kyril, and Nikolai. If one were to think, from the names, that many or all of these folks hailed from somewhere in the Landmass Formerly Known as the Soviet Union, one would be correct. I loved these guys and gals. If I had been more on top of it I would have gotten permission from each of them to be more explicit in their inclusion here, like I did with James. As it is they're going to get lumped together a lot, but you should think of that lump as a giant ball of fun and friendly. 

Sadly, no kids' table. Or, you could look at it as all being the kids' table.

Table set, guests in attendance, bottles already uncorked and poured, everything was in readiness.At first, being the closest thing to Male of the House (I was the guy that would be sleeping there), I was nominated as the turkey-carver. But I've never carved a turkey. I mean, I figure I could do it, but I'd make a mess of the thing. So Megan and Brunella were going to do it together.

So sweet.

But then Lucy, deciding they were being too showboat about it, took the knives and got down to business.

Less sweet, more meat. 

 Explaining the tradition of going around the table and saying something that you were thankful for took a bit of doing. When a couple of them said, “I am thankful to be here.” I wondered if they thought we were reminding them to say thank you for being invited 

But then, none of them was speaking their native language. It astounds and humbles me when I see folks, for instance, speaking English, German, Russian and, say, Estonian with pretty much conversational proficiency in each. Some of the English was at times a bit stilted, but I was in no position to be at all judgmental. They were awesome enough to stick to English for the benefit of folks like me who couldn't speak anything else. So perhaps “I am thankful to be here” was the best they could do to formulate a statement of gratitude for their existence in this place, with these people, at this time.

Some coaching was required in the use of certain condiments. The gravy needed little explanation (though there was some surprise when they learned that it went on the turkey, mashed potatoes and stuffing in one long ladling), but the cranberry sauce was a bit of a stumper.

“It goes on this?” asked one, pointing at his stuffing.

“Yep.”

“And this?” The turkey.

“Sure. Put it on whatever you want.” The ambiguity of use, coupled with the novelty of the stuff in the first place perhaps accounted for there being plenty left long after the gravy boat had been scraped empty.

Even in the US, you can come across strange ground when Thanksing your Giving in a new place. I was raised to think of cranberry sauce as being much like jello, while in some houses it's more of a thick sauce (as it was here) and in still others it's like a tart relish-looking affair. 

Stay classy, cranberry.

But the meal was a success. Luckily the Russians appeared as their pseudo-historical forebears did, coming across Brunella's threshold in waves like Cossacks across the steppe, because we didn't have room at the table nor plates enough for everybody. So as one group cleaned their plates (then washed them) another would sit down. Eventually Megan whipped some cream, Brunella cut the pumpkin pie, and dessert got et. More bottles gave up their corks, and after dinner games began.

The first we played was called Loup Garou. It's a French game (the name means Werewolf), but it has strong similarities to other games I've played. While you can buy a deck of snazzy-looking cards to play with, like other games such as Pictionary they're not strictly necessary.

One of the players is the werewolf, another is the leader (I'm going to call him or her the Game Master in honor of all my D&D homies), and the rest are villagers. There are some other roles that people can play, like the Witch or the Hunter, but they're not required and they can get in the way in a smaller group that's unfamiliar with the game. Now, nobody other than the werewolf and the GameMaster (GM) knows who the werewolf is. The point of the game is to figure it out before everyone is killed. It breaks down like this:

Each night as the village sleeps (lights out, everyone quiet, eyes shut), the werewolf kills a villager. During the “night” the werewolf silently indicates to the GM (both of whom keep their eyes open) which villager is to die. The next morning (lights on, eyes open) the GM announces that someone has been killed and says who. That person doesn't have to leave the room (that's no fun), but they're not supposed to take part in the investigation. They're dead.

The rest of the villagers have to figure out who the werewolf is (who is right there in the room with them, looking  and acting perfectly normal). Why was that particular person killed? What might they have known? Someone makes an accusation. The accused will naturally deny it, but then, they would, wouldn't they? Before the next night falls, the village decides on who they think the werewolf is, and they kill him. Then night falls. If they chose correctly, when the sun rises the next day no one else has died. But if they chose wrongly, the werewolf has killed again and they know they put an innocent person to death. The game continues, the number of villages dwindling, until the werewolf is killed...or it devours the last villager.

Normally, this game is alternately lively and silent. During the day bluffs, denials, and accusations run rampant, while camps advocating this person or that person's execution grow like mushrooms. At night it is deathly silent, as the villagers strain to hear any clue about whether the person next to them is silently mouthing, “Steve. Kill Steve.” to the GM.

Here, in this place, with these people, at this time, things went differently. When the lights went out half the people in the room howled. When the lights came on after the first “killing” the accusations were few. It's hard to get into the spirit of the thing at first. You are, after all facing your friend and saying they're the killer. Even though that's the point of the game, you're essentially accusing your friend of lying to everyone. So at first it took one the people that had played it before (Me, Megan, Brunella) to get people going. Slowly, the Russians got the idea and we had some debate over who to kill that second night. When night finally came again, the howls redoubled. There were growls. Laughter. A couple (maybe three?) people in one corner started making out.

It was a good game.

The next game was called Blind Cow. I found this out, both that we were going to play a different game and that it was called Blind Cow, as someone was tying a blindfold on me.

The hat adds style.

 I can't remember why I started letting someone tie a blindfold on me. I think it was a pretty girl; I have always been a sucker for a pretty girl trying to restrain me in some way. Except in a legal one. Aaanyway, once I was blind, people started touching me briefly and then fleeing. The goal here was for me to catch someone, figure out who it was any way I could, and if my guess was correct I got to doff the blindfold and they had to put it on.

There are ways that this game could go so R-rated. People are trying to get you to grab at them, mostly so that the rest of the people can watch the Blind Cow flail around wildly. Megan in particular seemed to be doing an elaborate dance. 

Very pretty. But once the Cow has a victim, they can use whatever means necessary to figure out who it is they've caught. I, of course, was a gentleman. I figured out who the young lady I finally happened to catch was purely by the sleeves of her shirt and her hair.

While the girls mostly flitted up to the cow, touched a shoulder, and fled, the guys got frisky. They would get up close, say “Boo!” and gallop away. They started using a long scarf as a lasso, trying to wrap it around the Cow's leg and trip them. The Cow's flailing and the flirting-with-danger flybys of those teasing him/her began to threaten the table still laden with the remains of dinner. Wine was spilled; Brunella's laptop nearly took a tumble.

It's all fun and games until someone goes face first into the floor.
 Then it's a madcap carnival ride to the hospital.

Like a frog in a pot, the crazy amped up gradually so I didn't notice it happening until there was a Russian on the floor in the hallway with a waterbag over his eyes. One of the ladies wrote on his bare chest with lipstick while another poured candle wax on him. The party began breaking up, not because everyone was too tired but because Brunella's could no longer contain the level of energy being wielded.

"Look ma! College!" You might say.

Brunella, Nikolai, Sasha, James, and Alena took Megan and me on a tram ride to a place called The White Trash Fast Food restaurant. Apparently this place used to be a Chinese joint, and they still use that stereotyped bamboo-esque font for their title. Two giant golden lions guard the doors. Inside, little lanterns and screens are still in place.

 The place is broken up into three, maybe four different levels, though they're not quite stacked like floors. They're more like slightly overlapping terraces. A band was playing by the bar when we went in, though we angled away from that and towards a darkened booth with room for us all. Steins of beer appeared accompanied by shots of vodka.

The menu to this place is fantastic. A few quotes (we stole a couple of them):

(the kids' burger plate) “Just like Daddy's burger. But half the size. Unbelievably cute and not so filling. Now that your not so stuffed, you kids can drink more beer!”

(Their general recommendation): "...at White Trash Fast food we recommend drinking, cause it's good for you, and it makes people like you, but most important, it makes it easier for you to like people.”

(In reference to their Vegetable beef soup): "Our favorite soup giving power and sexual energy...Eat it and take care of business."

I would have gladly eaten this. For Freedom.

We had a plate of chili cheese fries (“This is the real shit, our fat-ass fries, drenched in chili, melted cheddar and mozzarella, home-made salsa...Yum yum! Ya, it's so disgustingly good, it makes you fat, just like in reality TV”) and when that was not enough for the seven of us we got a plate of onion rings.

After a bit I wandered around the place, ostensibly looking for the bathroom but really just being nosy. Aside from the lanterns and levels, aquariums dotted the place along with all sorts of bric-a-brac on the walls. I found a darkened staircase leading down. There was a whole 'nother level to the restaurant, closed at this time of night, that shared the basement with a tattoo parlor.

There was also one of these. What, you thought you'd get through
 a blog post without me referencing Star Trek somewhere? Pfft.

After we finished the food and drank the beer, we realized that it was quite late. I'm not sure exactly how late, because the sun had gone down around 4:30 and ever since then it had looked like it was midnight. But I was exhausted. The tram ride home seemed daunting, so we hailed a cab. Blessed, blessed Brunella wielded her German (the woman speaks, like, a thousand languages).

The hardest part- for me- about learning German
 would be making my eyes glow like that.

Before I knew it we were back at her place, climbing her stairs, plodding down the hallway (still had dots of candlewax on it from where poor Nikolai thought he would just lie down for a minute and got pounced on) and flopped into our beds. Sleep took us, and our Thanksgiving in Berlin came to a close.

So ends this entry, but not our stay. We did more, and saw more, and ate more. But that is another story, and shall be told another time.