You know… now that I’ve started this, I realise I have very little to say…Ha! See, the scientists were right, social media and short-form content have made my brain shrink, and now it’s harder to express anything beyond short (witty) sentences and a curated picture… we’ve become cave people again. I have become a cave people again.

So what to write about… The weather! It’s snowing here in Berlin, the first real snow of the winter. We’ve had a few dustings here and there, but today it’s really coming down. I’m listening to FALLING by Julee Cruise, I think it was used in Twin Peaks? Anyway, it feels kind of thematic.

And being from South Africa, snow still feels kind of magical. In a bustling city like Berlin, it always makes everything slow down a bit. It literally freezes the city in time, which is wonderful.

I’ve realised I really struggle with Berlin. It’s a weird place, lots of positives but also a lot of negatives. Or maybe not negatives… When we first moved here, I read somewhere that Berlin either makes you or breaks you. You either are or aren’t a Berlin person. And I have to admit, I think it may well have broken me. Dramatic. I just don’t think it’s for me.

“The difficult second album” is a phrase used to describe a musician’s experience in trying to follow up their first (often successful) album or recording… Since moving from South Africa to Berlin, I’ve often felt like I’m in my ‘Difficult Second Album’ phase, my underwhelming follow-up moment. Ugh, lachrymose much? Wow… snow really gets one into a reflective mood, it seems.

Perhaps it’s this time of year? I’ve always felt like the first week of January is the armpit of the year. Awkward and neither here nor there. And now I’m just writing down short sentences again… just like on the socials…

Okay, so there it is, my difficult second album of a field note.

The post Note 002 – The Difficult Second Album first appeared on Greg Karvellas Theatre Director.

On days like this, I like to go for a walk, counterintuitive maybe, but I figure it’s a case of “the only way past is through”, just bundle up and face the real-feel wind chill, minus-five weather, and take it all in. Maybe find a nice coffee shop, all steamed up with the breath of a thousand other depressed people looking for refuge in the cold and dark, and have a pastry and (hopefully) a nice cup of coffee for under five bucks. Berlin gets a lot right, but sadly coffee is hit and miss.

What Berlin does really have is an endless supply of strange little shops that are so niche sometimes, and sometimes are open for two days a week with limited hours, it’s hard to understand why they exist and how they exist. I mean, just financially, and in terms of paying rent. Around the corner from our apartment is a store that only deals in bespoke-made guitar pedals, another store deals in mini little jars of sand, another is a sound museum, and another deals in designer psychedelics and mind-altering substances that are in a cat-and-mouse game with the German government.

It’s one of the things about this city that I love: that really there are endless rabbit holes to go down, if you just take the time to walk in and/or open the door, you may just find something magical, weird, or totally unexpected.

So, not all doom and gloom.

The other evening, after meeting a fellow theatre human from South Africa working on a show at the Neukölln Oper here on tour, we met for a beer to catch up. After our beer, we walked them to a theatre where he was taking in a show, and right next door we found a totally hidden gem of a little theatre bar restaurant. We wandered in and, in my fairly okay German, asked for a table, and sat down and started to take it all in. It felt like we had found a secret.

It was basically empty, except for the four really lovely people working there, and the jazz singer and pianist who were singing sad, soulful jazz on a small stage. The decor made no sense, but then it was filled with candles, masks, and any number of strange things. Just wonderful. I could have sat there for hours.

So all to say, it’s not all that bad. I am constantly reminded that Berlin, like life, often just requires a little more effort to find what you’re looking for, and being open to discovering something you didn’t expect.

The post Note 003 – Something You Didn’t Expect first appeared on Greg Karvellas Theatre Director.