Ahh... So I haven't made a post in about 10 days as I've had a reasonably hectic schedule. I had to hand in one out of three essays due in by the end of term, plus bank holiday weekend meant that I had a massive amount of relaxation to get stuck in to. Plus, I spent this weekend in Berlin! My gorgeous friend Elle persuaded me to take the trip with her and as I'd never been before, along with the stress of work, I was well up for it. She did, however, deny me the fact that we would be travelling there and back via coach. 18 fucking hours on that sweat trap. I was close to tears on the way back; I got so aggro that I clambered over a sleepy Elle (who slept very comfortably, despite her protests, using my chest as a pillow device) and made myself a sleep area in the aisle. I slept like a baby, for all of 4 hours. Never mind the bruises on my hips due to the manic German coach driver who drove as if something seriously bad was about to happen but never failed to stop every hour for a leisurely loo or tea break.
In light of all the shitty travel arrangements, I honestly had such a great time in Berlin. I met such a wonderful bunch of people who made me laugh till I cried and drink till I was numb.
On the Friday afternoon we went to the DMY International Design Festival, which was pretty awesome. It was basically a lot of product design but the concepts from some of the companies were really intriguing;
This key board was literally just a sheet of paper - no visible wires, just the jar type thing you can see, but you were essentially just touching the flat paper. On my turn I played the only piece of piano music I can remember from my childhood (Greensleeves...) to which I gained a small audience - obviously out of pure confusion.
There was this table with these really sweet notebooks on them with this 'Draw Me' label attached. Each page of the notebooks had a brown rectangle on a lighter brown page and every person who had drawn inside had made a picture using the rectangle. I drew a dog - my creativity reaches new highs.
This image I have made larger only because the detail is spectacular. This is concrete, guys. A solid block of grey concrete that has been carved and printed to look like fabric. It is so realistic that I didn't believe it until I tried to lift the thing myself. Phenomenal.
On the Friday night we all decided we were going to go on a bar crawl over the city, which was great because it ended in a club right by our hostel. However, because we are fashion students, the amount of time it took to shower, do our hair and makeup, get dressed and have dinner meant that we were running late and missed the first couple of bars in the crawl. We were not going to let this get to us so we decided to take matters into our own hands and make our own bar crawl. A couple of drinks in we wandered into a cocktail bar that was reasonably casual, it had a dance floor and played commercial tunes and we were in the mood for a dance so it was perfect. It is my only regret in life that what came next was not recorded in any way shape or form; there is no evidence but I can swear on my own life it is 100% the truth. Peter, a new friend, is a dancer and he's pretty great. So he was casually showing us this five or six step dance routine he learnt on a cruise, a kind of mechanism to get the passengers moving around a bit. So there we were, on the dance floor, only about 6 of us friends among random Berlin natives as well as other tourists, and Peter was just just doing the routine over and over and we were copying him. All of a sudden, the rest of the people who were dancing clock our synchronized dancing and decide that it looks like a laugh and join in. The whole dance area joins in the routine. We started a flashmob, bitches. Of all the dreams I have in life, starting a random flashmob has always been way up there, along with being a superstar. That memory will stay with me for always.
Not only did Pete start the flashmob, but on the way to the next club on the underground there was this DJ who'd brought his decks into the station and Pete decided to show Berlin what he's made of. We had the whole frickin' station cheering - this random man came forward, proper dance battle style but Pete was the clear winner.
We spent the Saturday doing cultural things like a walking tour around the city and had a really nice barbecue in an old warehouse where some artists were displaying their work - and Sunday we went to a massive flea market which was just lanes and lanes of awesome junk:
After going through the market we walked across this field to this amphitheater that had been built into a hill. I don't know who to call to get this started in London but I'm getting the fuck on it - they had karaoke at the outdoor amphitheater and it was great. It was like having 5 minutes of fame - there must have been a thousand people in the audience, singing along, clapping, arm-swaying. The waiting list to sing had been closed by the time we tried to sign up but I wish I wish I wish I could have got up there; Elle and I were going to duet 'Ain't No Mountain'.
Overall I had a really great time - I wore my Lita's out on the Friday night and they got some well deserved appreciation.
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