Berlin. Culture capital.

FOXTROTS 

Fox – sly.  Trots – left-leaning (Trotsky) plus its more insalubrious meaning.  Foxtrots – leading the industry in a dance. 

2006 November 20

Berlin. Culture capital. 

When there was East and
West Berlin, the west was regarded as hedonistic – living for today because no-one was quite sure what tomorrow would bring. 

When the socialist powers in east
Europe collapsed one by one, then left a unified
Berlin. No longer was it supported by the west German government. So it has steadily lost that carefree attitude, but it has gained confidence as it became once again the capital of united
Germany. 

We note that some authorities run around
Europe naming odd cities as the Culture Capital of the continent. (In 2007,
Luxembourg and
Romania’s Sinui; in 2008
Liverpool and
Stavanger.) 

For me it is
Berlin. And ironically most is in the east and around the pride of what was
East Berlin – the street of Unter den Linden. During a recent weekend visit, I stayed at the Park Inn (a misnomer; it has 1000 rooms), right on Alexanderplatz, another part of the city being redeveloped. 

My weekend was an opera on Friday, dinner in Hackerscher Markt on Saturday, and a recital on Sunday morning (with Daniel Barenboim no less) and sekt – both in the Staatsoper. In between a visit to the impressive newly-reopened Bode museum on the Museum
Island. And the DDR museum – on life as it was in
East Germany. Plus more restaurants and, of course, a stroll up Unter Den Linden to the Brandenburg Tor and the Reichstag. 

And in between, the imposing buildings of the Humboldt University and the State Library – all in beautiful buildings, and the churches just behind Unter den Linden. Past the Adlon hotel – a splendid hotel but now known more for its balcony over which Michael Jackson dangled his child, and for its general manager just departed after it was found he worked (well) for East Germany’s secret police, the Stasi. 

In fact, most of this was within an-albeit-longish walking distance. 

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