The Emigrant At Table
So before I forget utterly what I ate in Montpellier, and so that you can grab some good grub next time you're down there, the obligatory post on food.I got in real late, which was a shame, because...
View ArticleStatus Report
In a few hours, I'll head down to Kopfbahnhof, that remarkable rail-only travel agency in Schöneberg, and pick up another Berlin-Montpellier-Berlin train ticket. I'll spend Bastille Day going from here...
View ArticleA Night At The Elevator
Or, rather, half a night. Readers who've been with me a couple of years know about Blaise Lawless, the painter with the best name in art, who lived here for a couple of years before giving up on Berlin...
View ArticleThe Emigrant's Dilemma, Chapter 9: Once More Into The Breach
Monday is July 14, and, as you all no doubt know, is Bastille Day, the French version of the 4th of July. I once spent an extraordinary Bastille Day with an old friend from Alaska in Paris, where we...
View ArticleThe Emigrant's Dilemma, Chapter 10: The Week of (Almost) Giving Up
I don't believe in omens, do you? Or, phrased differently, should I?Sunday, everything was looking good for getting the move together. I printed out my latest U.S. bank statement, and had gathered...
View ArticleThe Emigrant's Dilemma, Chapter 11: Next Steps
In the end, it came down to this: with a thousand euros snarled in PayPal, with another needed check not arriving, and with the conservatism of French landlords requiring that I not use an agency, it...
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Art In The Afternoon
So what's a guy to do after a day's apartment hunting has come up dry, he's a 30-minute walk from his hotel (and in no hurry to return to its barren location on a traffic circle in the middle of...
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Montpellier Thanks America
Down near the train station in Montpellier is a small park. In it is this monument.The place is marked on the map as Square Planchon, and this inscription (sorry, it's only partial) is another clue...
View ArticleBamalama
Yes, the obligatory Obama post. Of course I went. I'd seen Clinton in...'94?...and couldn't remember a word he'd said and wanted to see if Obama could do better. Opting for comfort (a relative term in...
View ArticleFood Again (And Drink)
Before I utterly forget everything about last week, I should stick some of my food notes here. One big difference between this trip and the previous ones was that after my first night, I moved into a...
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Meanwhile, Back In Berlin...
Owing to the PayPal debacle last time I was there, and the loss of $1500 worth of work due to one screw-up or another, it'll be some weeks before I can get back to Montpellier to continue looking for...
View ArticleGreat Timing
If you've been around Berlin, you know what Bionade is: a soft-drink made with natural fruit flavors in ingenious combinations. And if you know Germany, you've been anticipating the onslaught of...
View ArticleFifteen Years
On the morning of August 12, 1993, an American Airlines jet landed at Tegel Airport in Berlin and I got out. I was excited, or as excited as someone that tired could be. Something like three years of...
View ArticleThe Missing Link
When I stuck a teaser in my post of a couple of days ago for yesterday's anniversary post, I promised an amusing link to go with it. And no, the picture of Öoby Döbi with hair was not it. What it was...
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The Crumbs Of Late Summer
It's always a bit astonishing for someone who moves to Berlin from more salubrious climates to notice that it's getting distinctly chilly by the third week of August -- the week in which I usually took...
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Another Restaurant We (Probably) Won't Be Eating At
Jay Rayner, a food critic at the Guardian, had an unusual experience at a Chinese restaurant which he felt worthy of a blog-post the other day. To summarize, he ate at a place, liked it very much,...
View ArticleTacheles Closing: Who Cares?
Back in 1998, I was the head of a group of people trying to put an English-language magazine together in the wake of Zitty having killed the one I'd been editing, Metropolis. At one point, we decided...
View ArticleNew Old Blog
In September, 2001, I took a three-week vacation in Japan and kept a journal. I also took a bunch of photos, and when I got back, I sent the results to my friend, the late Bob Watts, who was art...
View ArticlePostKomm '08
Sorry about the protracted absence; things have been just a bit nuts around here. Some of it, which involved getting a ghost-writing deal for a book finalized, isn't of much interest. And, when I...
View ArticleLong-Awaited Announcement
This morning at 11:30 I signed a lease agreement with a landlord for a 55-square-meter apartment in Montpellier. The agreement goes into effect on November 1, although since my 60th birthday is Nov. 2...
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