Turkey Day Redux

Last night, after a rather long and somewhat mentally taxing interview I watched the last half of the Turkey – Croatia game in Neukölln. Neukölln, for those unfamiliar with Berlin geopolitics is a highly Turkish neigborhood. Quite a thriller, this game, 0-0 until the last 2 minutes of overtime when Croatia first scored a goal and then Turkey another. Turkey won in the end. Cue shooting into the air, rampant fireworks and Turkish flags everywhere.

We went to Kottbusser Tor/ Oranien Platz to watch the celebrations. There was sort of a benign riot/ street festival atmosphere that carried on into the early hours of the morning. Next week Turkey plays Germany, I’m a bit bummed I won’t be in Kreuzberg to witness the atmosphere.

After loitering for a good hour and a half we did some bar-hopping. Last stop Roses and cocktails that tasted like strawberry jam diluted in vodka. I think Roses may be my new favorite bar.

Again I left my camera at home.

Tonight, onward to Tel Aviv!

Türk-i-ye! Türk-i-ye!

Last night David and Laura took me to watch the Turkey – Czech game at a Turkish beer garden in Kreuzberg. Borg am See, I believe it was called. At first I was only so-so in to it. I have never been a big sports fan. But mass psychosis soon had me standing on the bench screaming Türk-i-ye! Türk-i-ye! with the rest of them. That and the fact that Turkey got back from almost losing 0-2, then made 3 goals in rapid succession toward the end. As soon as the game was over people streamed to their cars and commenced speeding and flag-waving through the streets until the riot police came out in full force.

First I was tempted to find a Turkish flag of my own. Then, after an hour or so I’d had it up to here with the nationalism and the giant posters of Kemal Atatürk. I was tempted to start shouting “PKK! Ödzalan!” and “Free Kurdistan” or something along those lines. Probably good that I didn’t.

Unfortunately I left my camera at home. This slide show in the Berliner Zeitung pretty much captures what the streets looked like.

Berlin Baby

So, I spent a few days in Lund and did the interviews I hoped to do there. I also spent some quality time with the mom and the sister. Very nice.

Today, I’ve reached the third leg of my journey, Berlin. I’m writing this from my friend David’s living room on Gneisenau Straße in Kreuzberg. This is the view from here:

(Click the photo for more pics on my Flickr set.)

I took the night train from Malmö to Berlin last night. “Liegevagen” that is six bunks in a small cabin. Not bad actually, but not great either.

This is what Malmö Central Station looked like while I was waiting for the train — not unlike the header, no?

My cabin mates turned out to be a single guy, plus a family with two kids about 10 years old. Exactly the company I had hoped for. They were pretty quiet and didn’t talk much.

When I got on the train in Malmö everyone seemed to be wearing football jerseys (that’s “soccer” to you Americans) and have Swedish flags painted on their faces, including the family in my cabin. I asked them if they were on their way to a game. Turns out they were just going to visit an aunt in the Czech Republic. Also, today I found out Sweden lost their last game so not sure what all the face paint was about.

Guy from neighboring cabin in a football jersey (surreptitious shot from the hip.)

About 4 hours of the journey was spent in the train aboard a boat from Trelleborg (Sweden) to Sassnitz (Germany).

This was a bit of a low point. You can imagine what the non-air-conditioned cabin smelled and felt like after a few hours of six people sleeping it in it. I had the top bunk. At one point I went up on deck for a breather.

A view of Sweden from the boat:

I arrived at the Central Station in Berlin just before 6 a.m. which was a little rough. I managed to stay awake long enough to make it to Kreuzberg where I woke David’s sister up at the crack of dawn to let me in. Once there I slept for a few hours. It was divine.

Berlin too is awash in flags, Deutsch and Turkish, which I assume is because of the European Football Championships.