Funny where the path of internet surfing sometimes leads you. I was thinking about transferring my blog to my own domain www.cosimaunderwater.com, which I own but only use to host images and audio at the moment. I did a little research on which application to use, should I ever find the time for a move. Blogger, WordPress, Joomla, Serendipity… the choices seem to be endless.
Anyway, one of the featured blogs using Serendipity was www.gorillamen.com , and it had a post on a song called:
(click on the link to go to the myspace page where you can listen and even download it). It instantly lifted my mood, and I did a little chair-dancing to it.
I must have been ten or eleven years old. I was lying on my towel next to two girl-friends at the public swimming pool, when one of them pulled packages of fizz powder from her bag. We loved them. One flat package of Ahoj-Brause was enough for one glass of lemonade, but we never mixed them with water. We either stuck our wet index fingers into the package and licked them clean, or poured all of it into the palm of our hands and dunked our tongues in it.
Suddenly my friend said “It’s even better if you pour all of it into your mouth and then kiss a boy”. My other friend and I stared at her open mouthed. How did she know such things? Had she tried? “My sister told me.” Aah. Of course her older sister would know.
Even before, licking fizz powder always felt curiously illicit. Licking it slowly from your index finger, and the wonderful, tingly feeling on your tongue afterwards. If you ate too much of it, against the warnings by grown-ups, your stomach felt bubbly and the occasional citrusy burp – lemon, orange, raspberry, or woodruff – escaped.
And then I saw The Tin Drum on TV. I was still fairly young, and didn’t understand half of it, but the images were so powerful. A lady sitting on a wintry field and cooking potatoes in an open fire, when a young man runs by, pursued by policemen. She hides him under her long, wide skirt, and after a while makes curious grimaces. The angler at the shore of the Baltic Sea, using the head of a dead horse to fish for eel. Oskar, the drummer that refuses to grow, pouring fizz powder on the belly button of his nanny and licking it clean (there is a whole chapter in the novel titled “Fizz Powder”).
I have seen it in other films as well. Everyone in Germany knows Ahoj-Brause. It’s an easy symbol to use. The time of childhood innocence usually ends, right after the protagonists lick Ahoj-Brause out of each others slightly dirty palms.
Yesterday, I bought it at the supermarket. Ten packages for 55 cents, it’s still a cheap enjoyment, and the packages haven’t changed much since they came to market 80 years ago. They still feature the same logo with a blue sailor.
I hear that it has become fashionable to pour it into alcoholic beverages. That’s not for me. Sticking my wet index finger into the small paper bag and licking it clean – slowly – is quite enough. Woodruff still tastes best… burp :).
Mannekin Pis at the BerlinZoo …gives me a chuckle whenever I see him… aah… the small joys in life. He is peeing on a big toad, which is just mean, because the toad says “kiss me, kiss me!”
Feeding the lion with fresh meat
This one is for CeeCi’sbear collection. There are bears like this all over the city in different sizes, and they are painted on by different artists. This one was created by an American painter. The bear is the heraldic animal of Berlin, and is a symbol for the people. A bear holding the flame of liberty makes for some nice symbolism.
During the last weeks, I have spent a handful of days in the office of a business partner, to get the most pressing things done for Cosima Inc. When little man is around, it’s impossible to get anything done, and it is also nice to talk strategy while I am in his office. He concentrates on sales, while I do the buying side of the business.
His office is in a converted shop, which he shares with another company, and it’s not exactly located in the best part of town. But I am enjoying it more than sitting in a glitzy office tower. It’s a colorful area with lots of people on the sidewalks, and restaurants with cuisine from all over the world. My favorite is a little Vietnamese restaurant, where I can get an excellent authentic meal with main course, drink, and coffee for 8 Euros (US$5.80).
Yesterday, not one but two gypsy bands came by to serenade us from the side walk, which let the rest of my office companions sigh in exasperation. Apparently, it’s a too frequent occurrence. I enjoyed it though, they were good.
Our neighbors are an organic produce shop and a hairdresser specializing in African hairdos. Opposite are an animal clinic and an old-style pub, a “Kneipe”. While I wouldn’t want to spend time inside – think smoky dark room with a few men sitting at the bar drinking beer at 11 in the morning – they also have a few tables on the sidewalk, an excellent spot to drink coffee and do a little people watching.
Best of all, the office is near enough to get there with my bike. So my working days are also my work-out days, which brings a sense of double accomplishment.
PS: The post title “Kiez” is the equivalent of hood or neighborhood in Berlin dialect. It’s mostly used for inner-city areas, not the wealthiest but with lots of character.
Woohoo! Little man has learnt how to ride his bicycle without training wheels. Taking off the pedals together with the training wheels for a short while did the trick. Without the pedals it was much easier for him to learn how to balance. Opa also promised him an ice cream if he tried…
We are off for a bike ride. I hope I can keep up…lol
I am slowly learning how to shoot pictures with a macro lens, I bought recently for Cosima Inc. The lens is for a Nikon D100 camera, that we had for a long time, but which I have not used much. It takes much better pictures than my small point-and-shoot camera, but is so heavy, that I seldom take it with me.
The goal is to become proficient enough to shoot product pictures for Cosima Inc that look professional, but I am discovering that it’s also a lot of fun to just take the camera outside and capture the little things that often go unnoticed. Like snails and daisies in little boys’ fingers, and beautiful feathers, barely an inch long. Also, tiny ants and petals, all found in my parents’ wonderful garden.
I am milking the zoo visit for all it’s worth. This is the last zoo post. I promise. At least for this week.
After trying to take pictures of animals and not having much luck, because a) they move a lot, and b) I don’t own a phallic camera lens, I concentrated on homo sapiens in front of the cages. After all, we were in the zoo, where it’s all about humans staring at animals …and animals staring back?
I wonder whether they were thinking about lunch, because…
This was the crowd in front of Knut’s enclosure. Knut has become a rowdy teenager, and was surprisingly active on this very unpolar summer day. His grown-up relations were taking cooling baths and naps in the shade.
