Thursday, April 12, 2012

Spiegel Online Downer

By Reinhard Mohr in Spiegel Online: %26quot;Twenty years after the fall of the Wall, Berlin has become less of a social laboratory and more of a beer-drenched tourist paradise.%26quot;





spiegel.de/international/…00.html





I must admit that I am a bit confused.





Regards, Gary




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Some people will always complain: if the place is %26quot;hip%26quot; it is because it hasn%26#39;t been discovered by the plebs. For them, Berlin is much better with high-levels of unemployment, poverty and some %26quot;hipness%26quot; they think it has.





Well, I belong to another party. I WISH Berlin was a little more like Majorca, Paris or NYC (in the number of tourists and conferences it drew). I don%26#39;t care if it is (also) labelled as a cheap party city, as long as I am not expected to pub-crawl myself - there are three opera houses in that %26quot;Mallorca%26quot; as well as several of the world%26#39;s most important museums, galleries and an interesting (although painful) history that has left scars in the city%26#39;s landscape.





And I am one of those who think that hipness is something you find in yourself, not because you think you%26#39;re a cool Berliner with an attitude. If you%26#39;re hip, you%26#39;ll be also hip in SLC; if you%26#39;re not, snobbing tourists in Berlin will not help you become one.





[Is %26quot;hip%26quot; a hip word, or does it expose what kind of an unfashionable nerd I am? Well, I am a proud Berliner nerd!]




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I found the article to be a bit odd. The fact that the writer seemed to be making fun of people remembering the Berlin Air Lift and the Candy Bomber actually annoyed me. I wish MORE people knew about the Air Lift, as so many people do not have a clue about it let alone that it ever happened.





Let the tourism industry expand so that the city can make some money. Hopefully entrepreneurship will grow along with it and the unemployment will drop. Sure the city is in flux, there is nothing inherently wrong with that. The writer must want some kind of frozen in time Berlin. How boring would that be?




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The article is a typical example of gross exaggeration for comedic effect and connecting the dots where there%26#39;s not any real connection.





Yes, there are some British lager louts around Hackesche Markt, but no it has absolutely no effect on my quality of life, anyway.





Yes, some tourists flock to Kollwitzplatz to eat and brunch at outdoor cafés, but so do many Berliners. It%26#39;s become a Berliner thing to do in all but the coldest, nastiest weather.





Yes, itinerant Roma musicians are a plague, but they were infinitely worse about five years ago.





No, Oranienburger Strasse was never %26quot;world-famous for its paid female companionship in high-heels and lace.%26quot; In the mid-90s it did attract a fair number of ladies and wannabe ladies dressed like something out of an action hero comic book, but, aside from a few hardy leftovers, they%26#39;re long gone. And, yes, the %26quot;scene%26quot; has moved on as the tourists moved in and the area was gentrified. Scenes do that.





The city is in constant transition, and %26quot;dass ist gut so.%26quot;

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