So, this is my post about Berlin, written as the week went on… well kinda, it was written in sections over a few days.
Lets see, we can skip the train journey down on the Sunday evening mainly as it was dull, long, and unexciting. I arrived in London and eventually made via tube and taxi to where I was to meet James. I arrived about 1am, after a short conversation with James we tried to get a couple of hours kip for at 4am or so we left for Gatwick. James, Ashley, Nathaniel and myself were driven at this forsaken hour to Gatwick so we got there in plenty of time before the 0625 boarding, so we checked in and headed through security. Annoyingly my good palette knife got taken off as it was not allowed in my hand luggage… that sucked, oh and I had to bin my unopened bottle of bru, while my five ink pots weren’t a problem :(.
The wait for the flight was unexciting but a good chance to start to get to know these three guys who I had never met before that morning. Anyway, skipping past the wait, the boarding, the really small seats, the fact I ended up with a row to myself, and an uneventful flight, we arrived at last in Berlin and got through customs and picked up our weekly travel tickets, which I stupidly paid for in cash rather than with my card so my cash resources took a big hit The ticket however is very cool as it allows travels on all Berlin public transports, be it train, tram, bus, or underground (although I’ve never seen it underground) and you don’t swipe it, show it to anyone, you just get on and travel as long as you carry it.
So Berlin, what little I have seen so far, is a nice city but is covered in graffiti tags, and I mean covered, most of it is the usual low quality rubbish, but there is some amazing stuff as well. This became increasingly apparent as we ventured to where we would stay, a Sunday school room in a block of flats. The American family who we would be working with were there to meet us, the lived five flights above, its one heck of a climb. Anyway, we settled in, took a trip to the gallery to get the keys, waited for the two other team members to arrive, this time from the Netherlands They were a bit late (two hours or so) so the first day was a bit of a bust but we did plan stuff so it wasn’t wasted.
So the team, at the moment stands as follows, this is a REALLY short version of who they are:
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James – organiser, artist, from London
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Ashley – from same church as James, on the street team
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Nathaniel – again same church, also on street team
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Joax - graffiti artist from Netherlands
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Erik - also from Netherlands, does some graffiti work but has been mainly involved in street team
The pattern for the next couple of the days would be, wake up, prayers, breakfast/lunch, head to gallery and paint, have tea, chill, then sleep. During REALLYthis of course we would chat, share, discuss and get to know each other better. While it was obvious none of us were really from the same background or shared identical views on a lot of things we all acknowledged the more important common ground. Which put me at ease quickly as it meant I could discuss with them and not worry too much about a massively negative outcome, at least on what we talked about :). Speaking of food, I have to admit that its been relatively interesting to eat out, the prices were ok, averaging 6 euros for a main, about 1.50 euros for a drink, lunch works out at around 2 to 3 euros, which is nothing amazing but you do get decent portions.
So currently its Wednesday night, the artwork is coming along slowly but surely and in general we are getting along well and having a laugh. Personally I’m tired as not only is painting for hours quite draining but I’m sleeping well on my tiny air bed, I think tonight I will try and just sleep on the floor to see it that helps.
Well it did, I slept a lot better, just writing this having got back from an evening in one of Berlin’s parks having a BBQ and a three of spraying onto a legal graffiti wall. That was rather fun, I got to put up my first piece of graffiti, and not only was it legal, but it was on a wall in a different country :). The gallery opening is in two days (Saturday at 7pm) and the pieces for “Who do you say I am?” are coming along slowly but surely, its going to interesting to see how many we get done in under 5 days, in fact probably less than 24hours of work. We also at long last got the flyers today after a serious of small problems, they look fantastic and the street team has been busy putting them up and handing them out.
Friday was a busy day with James, Joax, and myself making sure we headed off early to get a good start so we could be finished, or at least as close as we could, today. We eventually called it a day after about 7 hours of work and the three of us headed to a Vietnamese restaurant for a more expensive but very much worth while meal. Before heading home and chilling out before tomorrow, which would end with the opening of the exhibition.
So on Saturday we finished off the last of the work as the street team put up the work for us. Rhyse, another graffiti artist from Holland, who was joining the team for the next week, After a mad rush and a very rushed price list we opened the exhibition. All in all the opening went well, we had a good number of people throughout the evening. Hopefully the interest will continue next week. I was rather tired so I moved to the next door room to get a better night sleep and give Rhyse more room in the main room we were sleeping in.
On Sunday we met up with the two Americans who lived above us for brunch at an all you can eat brunch place which was rather fantastic.. they had potato croquettes, which made me happy :). I then went my separate way for a few hours as I wanted to do some sightseeing. I managed to see the “TV Tower”, and the holocaust memorial and a bit around it. While taking a seat a wondering if I should go and meet the rest at the park they had went to they arrived, so we went back to the flat for a while to chill before grabbing food. It transpired that the wall we thought was legal, wasn’t, which was a shame.
After some food, the indian for the third time this week, we had some worship, I was asked to share my testimony (probably went on a bit I think) then some of us watched 12 monkeys… great film. Its now 0230 and I leave the “flat” here about 0315 to give myself plenty of time to get to the airport and catch my flight back across to Gatwick. The reason for lots of time is that I am still not 100% sure of the times and how frequent the connections are so, better safe than sorry and it means I can take my time. I arrive in London about 0845 and then aat around midday I catch my train to Edinburgh. The idea of that journey is not a pleasant one, ass I will have been up for around 32 hour when I get to Edinburgh, and I want to stay up until normal bed time… so hopefully this time i’ll get some sleep on the train but I doubt it.
So, in conclusion its been a good week, the art I created was ok, some if good, some bad, but still overall I was happy with it. The team were fun, and I think they got on well with me as I did with them.
Now my mind however focuses on the youth rally this Saturday.
I will try and update this post with images when I get home and get things sorted :).
