The Second Language

In MILANO
So... as it turns out, the world is really big. And I am very small. Somehow I only just now realized this.
Correction, it should be "a Milano"... mi dispiace.
I really wish at this point I had remembered more vocabulary from my Italian class. But I have retained a surprising amount of the language in general. Either I just look natural here or just friendly, but like three people asked me for directions today, while I was lost. But only sort of.
I figured out how to use the subway, woot.
AND, I made it to Il Duomo. Which. Is. Beautiful.
Immediately I was basically assaulted by this dude who gave me a "free" bracelet then asked for a "donation" which he got angry when I didn't give to him.
But I got lots of pictures of puffy birds and statues and the cathedral. Jesus. Literally. I just couldn't even comprehend it.
Then I wandered down the streets around, which were full of lots of very beautiful and expensive things. Maybe someday I'll have enough money just to be able to walk in the door of one of those places. I was relieved to find good old H&M, actually like three of them within five blocks.
And I can tell you a secret, the new thing is these puffy down jackets like everyone already has, but they're of this material that's shiny and almost metallic. And metallic everything is in. Like, even the old ladies are doing it.
Just a heads up.
So, tonight I'm going to go to this club, Gasoline, which looks pretty sweet, and try not to get lost, or really drunk, or abducted, or raped, or die. Wish me luck.

Lonliness and Large Buildings Go Hand in Hand

Visited some large buildings. And one of the many Jewish memorials, which was very powerful and haunting. I don't have the pictures from my sister's camera yet, though. I'm not sure if I can make the trip to the Leibeskind Jewish Museum...there's only so much of thinking about the Holocaust that I want to do when I'm on vacation. But it's so beautifully sad...
My other sister Laura joined us here today and we all went out for dinner where, for practically the first time ever, the waiter guessed the order of our ages.
Then as we were leaving he came over and put my scarf on and buttoned up my jacket for me....strange....
Anyway, I'll be detouring to Milan after Christmas, flying, or training, rather, solo. EXCITING
I'll finally not feel like a damn idiot and be able to sort of speak the language. A data learn the language.
AAAHhhhh I'm soooo fulll.
Now time for The Godfather, Part One.

Not Pimpin' So Hard

Hmmm... many an event hath made its path ere I last posted.
And I've been reading The Fellowship of the Ring too long today. I suppose I didn't come to Berlin to be in Middle Earth. But how that hefty tome sucks me in!
Anyway, let's try to ignore for a little while my overwhelmingly nerdy obsession with elves and the Elder days and come back to the present. I'm trying to snap out of it with an electro-dance playlist. Strange cultureshock.
So first I would like to just say, the clubs here are so fucking boss. Either that, or the ones I've been to in Austin are just real shit. Probably both are true.
For one, here they never close. Jesus. I came home at sixish, and people there were still going strong. You can totally just stay there all day. And I would, if I wasn't sort of a sleep-o-phile.
Another, for lovers of electronic music, this place is Mecca and oooooh god. We heard a few groups play before M.A.N.D.Y. and they were all vvery nice. And the lights in this place. Okay, the place was two stories, the lower having windows that look over this sort of lake or river and over to lit up city buildings, very romantic. Then upstairs, there is a strip of ceiling extending down the walls that is set with LEDs behind a sort of foggy sheet, so that the entire thing can light up. It runs in these patterns, and with the music, it was so damn sexy I pretty much wet myself.
Also, people seem to have much better manners here. Like, for instance, people don't automatically assume it's okay to touch you just because you looked at them. No creepy fat dudes asking you stupid irrelevant questions or following you around, nothing. Awesome. The only strange encounter I had was when I was sitting down near the bar and a guy came up and said something in German, which I didn't understand, and then said something like "I just want a sip" and took a gulp from my drink. Then walked away. Weird....
I wish I could have taken more pictures but the people were a little snotty and didn't want any cameras, so I didn't want to risk being thrown out.
Basically, if I end up stuck in Austin for quite some time with no business plans, I'm definitely starting up a club that maybe doesn't suck balls. And we won't be letting in any creepy men.
It'll be situated conveniently between YouShi and Krazy Burger. Keep an eye out.

The Casualties of Micro Water-Creatures

So news for the past couple days.... apparently I can't drink the tap water here or something.... Or maybe it was just a combination of being jetlagged and hungover but I was pretty sick a couple mornings ago. But everything was okay after I threw up. Hah. Then ate a giant breakfast of cheese and bread which was delicious. Post-vomit vittles.
So anyway, we went around this shopping area with a lot of different stores, most of which were way too expensive. I thought it was very interesting that Diesel and Gas were both located on the same corner. Although, I'm not sure how Gas would fly in the U.S.
We found the American Apparel on the street, which was sort of disappointingly small (though not as small as our store) and relatively unattractively merchandised. I got the feeling the employees thought we were stealing or something because we were wandering around the store and I was touching all the hangers like hmmm so that's how they hang the bandeaus...
There was actually a separate store a little ways down for the California Select vintage stuff, which was much more interesting.
And of course, there was H&M, where everything is so tantalizingly cheap and just barely straddling the line between shit and fashion gold.
There were also a lot of really good vintage stores around, my favorite being this one where everything was organized by color. Soo many fur coats. They're so beautiful I forget about all the PETA stuff and how at one point that used to be something's skin.
We also discovered Monika's bike, which she had lost track of in a sort of crazy night a week ago, locked up just fine in the street. Minus the back tire which had been squished when her coworker sat on it.

Windows See Both In and Out

NEU: What I ate. Feels so good to be full of nice clean food...

No one should probably read this.
Just letting you know. But I felt the need to write it somewhere.
My dream last night was perhaps one of the worst I've ever had. I blame myself, because I get bad dreams whenever I sleep too long. And speaking of sleeping too long, I think I just slept for longer than I ever have in my life....17 hours. Straight. I think this only confirms my theory that I was meant to be a hibernating creature.
Now that I've started I'm not really sure I can still write about it. Yeah, thinking about it, I don't think I'm ready for that kind of honesty about the horrors of my subconscious coming into the light of the world wide web.
I keep seeing double-decker buses drive by as I'm sitting at this cafe (I basically chose it because I could understand what the name of it meant, Milk and Sugar). Wasn't that in some Smiths song, if a double decker bus killed the both of us... Maybe. I just remember because of the Erelend Oye mix on his DJ Kicks cd. I do like it I do.
I feel like I should be posting pictures now, but I forgot to take some this morning. I'll add those a little later when I get back to her place. I can't open the lower door and buzzing up to the neighbors scares me...
Being here and not being able to understand anything makes me feel so small and so young again. I guess it's good once in a while to sort of get a reality check and realize I'm not this sort of social mogul or whatever I thought I was. Social mogul. Ummm.... But it's easy to start feeling stupid or like everyone thinks you're an idiot when you can't understand anything. But, we're probably all going down to Italy together in a week or so, my sisters and I, so at least then I will get my own little power trip at being able to sort of understand and speak the language. Hopefully.
My left eye isn't opening all the way...weird. My body is very confused.

Trainthinks

The train station. Hookahs when you need them. And McDonald's.
auf course.

Some things I was thinking on the train. Which, by the way, seemed to be full of retarded people. Literally. Sorry. But wow. I slept a lot and there were these kids running back and forth yelling in German. So weird.
I felt pretty retarded myself a little. I managed to already get lost when I was trying to get to my train. But it wasn't entirely my fault... Anyway everything ended up okay somehow. But here's what I wrote:

And right off I feel stupid for first of all being mislead at the airport for the trains, and for some reason never quite being able to figure out how everything is organized here, and then for catching myself wondering if "they" think the same things as us. I guess in a certain way that would make sense, how thought can be relative according to where you live, but probably in general not. But who knows really? I guess that's why I wanted to be bilingual. It isn't so much an interest in language as in brains. I feel that's what it always comes down to with me. Brains. Guts. Farts. dick. HA!
My nose is runny. And I would like to put in my contacts. (I did a little while ago and the left one HURTS I think my eye morphed in flight) I don't really feel like I've been traveling for...16 hours. Strange. But it is different.
I can never get a tangible grasp on where things are and how far away they are unless I watch every second of it. Planes are tricky. Maybe that comes because of a childhood full of road trips. Fuck flying. We drove everywhere.
The van has been places. God I wish I could talk to it. But I would hope it's not mad or frustrated.

Two Legs Look So Good Together

My world seems to be an indecipherable mess lately, and though it's not unpleasant, I'm so ready to just say "fuck it" and get on that plane to somewhere else. Lauf. Umm.... bitte? The only german I know is from Run Lola Run.
I recently watched a Peter Greenaway film called A Zed and Two Naughts, which was just as stunning as the other films of his I've seen, and very haunting. The soundtrack in particular gets to you. And this one cutaway that was repeated of this green landscape. Somehow his films always manage to combine image and sound in a way that can only talk directly to your brain. Sometimes words are so frustrating. Or maybe I'm just bad at using them. Sorry. I can't imagine all the mental pain and suffering I've caused words by mishandling and molesting them. I'm such a pervert.
But something that always gets to me is watching animals decompose in time lapse. Somehow I seem to run into this more often that you'd think. It's like a horrible motif in my life. I think the first time I really remember was watching a Nine Inch Nails music video. Giggle. yes. but really, those are fucked up. All of them are nauseating in different, incredible ways. But what I really can't stand is how when animals decompose, especially mammals, the bacteria eating them up and digesting them and making gases make them look like they're breathing in time lapse. But they're dead. I mean, I guess it's sort of an amazing metaphor for the life within death and how things live on by feeding of the death of others but god. Sometimes I can't deal with nature.
Maybe I'm just afraid.

It Was the Dog. I Swear.

Sometimes I feel like certain movies too accurately describe my life. But maybe that's what they're supposed to do. I think that's what I'd like to do with my movies, if I ever get so far as to have enough money to do so.
I guess maybe that my life goal sometimes seems to be to explain myself, and hopefully in doing so, explain other people. But...then what happens? What is there after everything is explained?
Sort of feels like the same question I think about when I think about two people spending their lives together. After so many years of explaining, what is there left? Is there a point where there's nothing left to say? Is that okay? Is it comforting?
I would like to think, and I'm sure a lot of people like to think that everyone is this endless universe of thoughts and ideas and nuances contained in a human shell. But that's probably not true. Once the knots all come out, you're just a ball of yarn. And who cares?

I was going to make a list of pet peeves, but I feel like that only leads to feeling irritated. So I'll list a few just for my own satisfaction and in between each one, put something that makes me laugh. Just so no one gets confused, things that make me laugh are marked with a + while pet peeves are -. Ok, ready?
::
-wet socks
+dumb faces
-people scratching themselves with long fingernails
+pretending to be a zombie
-my forehead getting wet
+fainting goats
-over confidence
+farting
-the word "pickle"
+boston terriers
-instruments that are out of tune
+people doing impressions
-anthropomorphized animals
+Falco
-misuse of apostrophes
+the ski hood dance
-cartoons with unnecessarily large noses
+rabbits eating
-the font "comic sans"


Well, now you're one step closer to knowing me completely, utterly, and exasperatingly well. I give you three weeks.