Morning Fog and Name-dropping

 

Another very hot day will unfold - the last two days we had temperatures of 34° C, which make you feel as being clad into hot blankets. 

In the early morning mist rises from the meadows on the low ground near the little river. It is always a stunning sight.                                                   

So: No walk with the triplets' electro mobile - but I brought two watering cans, thus we spent a very vivid and wet afternoon in the garden - little hands slided into the cans, discovered how to splash fountains - and the sun dried the clothes at once. 

I wonder how I shall name the triplets here - to respect their privacy. They have very beautiful names (and each of them has three - fortunately we only use one, otherwise they would be up and away while we stand around and call them :-) 

Elizabeth von Arnim called hers fictional "April, May and June". Might bring confusion to the readers, especially in months with the same name? 

Maybe I call them by the name of the Three Graces: Euphrosyne, Thalia and Aglaia - but Euphrosyne is a bit long - and my son detests abbreviations...  

So: I will call the unidentical triplet "Igel", which she choose very early to name herself, meaning hedgehog - in the beginning her abundant hair stood away from the head in little spikes; so she heard it very often. Now the spikes changed into a sort of long curls.The uniovular call her "Igel" too. 

The first uniovular triplet calls herself "Ada" (which I adore!). 

The second uniovular, who is very determined and fearless, has the name of a strong Nordic goddess - the name is short so she can pronounce it almost correct. She is the third of the Three Graces, Aglaia- so I will call her Glaia.  

Igel, Ada and Glaia -time will show if that fits. 

Nature's Mysteries

 

Now that I have Internet in Bavaria, I can come into contact with the world again. 

I am here since almost three weeks - the Flying Dutchman left a few days ago, and I try to arrange the last (the last?? Hahaha) equipments for my second, very rural domicile. 

With the triplets we do very long walks - WE walk (most often my Daughter in Love and I), the triplets are riding in a fashionable electro mobile, motor necessary because here are steep hills, sometimes with a gradient over 9%. 

When I say long walks I am speaking of 10 - 13 km, and those very often in the sun - because around 14 o'clock the triplets shall sleep, which they do in that mobile. 

And I enjoy the beautiful nature here. See so many plants I know - but now I came upon something (with no time to make good photos - first time on May 30) that made me fall back for a second: WHAT IS THAT? on a lake? 

Second time we went by I also had no time (the electro mobile runs fast) - but I managed a snapshot, the flowers no longer in abundance - and which my Apps did not recognise - I use PlantNet, Andy Green and Flora Incognita. 

Do you know what that is? Thank you for your help! 

PS:  I've found it! (I think...): 

        It might be ALISMA - maybe lanceolatum, or Alisma gramineum.

A Sign of Life

 

Dear You,

just a sign of life: this is the view from my new domicile in Bavaria - isn't it ravishing? 

At the moment I am back in Berlin: I got the offer for my first Biontec shot two days ago, and thought that so important that I entered the ICE and will stay here for a few day. Hustle and bustle - but also 

                                                            Joie de vivre!

(Britta)'s On The Road Again

  

Dear You, 

I haven't use the photo above (which I took years ago at V&A) for a long time, and you know why. 

But now, despite the lockdown-lethargy, I am in the middle of an adventure. 

At the beginning of 2021 I decided that I do not like to feel remote-controlled. 

So, after having not seen the triplets since February 2020 (!) I acted: I had luck to rent an apartment in the village where Son, my Daughter-in-love and the triplets live. To be precise: it was my DiL who told me that the apartment was there to be rented, one street away from their house. 

I thought: "OK - at least it is far enough away that one has to put on a jacket to visit each other".  I don't want to intrude into a family - though welcomed and hopefully able to really help with three vivid little girls, no longer the babies I saw last year but little children who run around, start to speak - and love to lie on the ground and "read" a book. 

I rented without having seen the apartment except on photos - (though Son went and looked at it once). 

I keep my huge apartment in Berlin - by now I know myself: I am a city-girl. 

I could buy the whole kitchen including all machines; and a good-looking big wardrobe in the bedroom. Yet the van the caretaker and his son filled today with the sofa, the bicycle, ten moving boxes and a lot of other things is full - tomorrow I will manage to climb inside, and then we three drive to Bavaria. 

Hurray! 

The janitor and his son are part-time knights - living in medieval tents, being able to fight with real swords, and hunt with real bow and arrow, so I see it as a sort of crusade: 

Time to fight the dragon Corona, time to move again. 

Wish me luck - and forgive me if you do not get comments at the moment: for some time I will have no Internet, though after five days quarantine I will try to get a connection to you in the house of Son&DiL. 

On my smartphone I can see your comments (and will find out, how I can read your blogs too). 

So: Toodle pip! 

DELIGHT Two: SHOPPING in small towns and villages

 

photo by Britta Hügel 

No travels to little towns and villages at the (long) moment, AND the shops are closed everywhere in Germany. 

The only living person a lot of people nowadays see at all is the Amazon delivery man. Or the postman - which makes me think of the time when little shops in villages were also the post office... 

But I agree with Mr. J.B.Priestly: shopping in small towns and villages is fun and a delight. 

"We begin (to shop) as small children clutching our pennies and staring over the counter in a sweet agony of indecision." 

Oh yes: I remember Mr. Meissner, the chemist's, just over the street - you could go there with 1 Pfennig (!) in your little hand and he would take down an enormous tin can, open it (ahh - that heavenly smell!) - and took out one heaped teaspoon of black sharp salty rhombic salmis - mmmmhhhh! 

"We who begin to buy only when we are at the mercy of our instinctive drives do not want a whole floor of neckties or saucepans, with lifts to take us to cushions or tobacco. It is when shaving brushes and cheese, toffee and potato peelers, liver pills and socks, are heaped together that we go berserk, shopping like mad." 

Every time I see the scene in the village shop when watching "Saving Grace" with Brenda Blethyn, where the two elderly ladies, having drunk a very special tea, hide behind the counter, pop up with big goggle eyes that pop out of the spectacles from the joke items - I have to laugh out loud, every time! (Well, you could put me beside an old-fashioned laughing bag and I would roll around with laughter 😂) 

What do you think about shopping in little villages - or do those kinds of old-fashioned shops still exist in your area?

PS: As Tasker and Joanne asked ... here I will try to explain what "Salmis" are. One picture says more than hundred words - though in this case I doubt it. 

See why: 

"Ah, liquorice!" you might say. 

Yes and no. They add something that sounds horrible: sal ammoniac - which gives a sharp tang and taste (liquorice is more sweet, salmis are WHOW! Salty-sharp). 

People in northern countries love them and have many varieties: the Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden - and the region where I come from, Bremen in Northern Germany - countries that are more cold. 

It drives up your blood pressure - maybe this is why we Northerners love it (though I searched for it in Edinburgh in vain.) 

I cannot say more to it - you have to taste it. For a lot of people ONCE is enough forever - the others I would call dangerously addicted  :-)    (you can buy it in every chemist's shop...) 

DELIGHT One: Fountains

 

The last days I was a bit "under the weather", although the sun came out and I got some (personal) very good news. (I will tell you another time). 

So I did what I always do when I feel sort of blue: I looked into my bookcases and took out "Delight" by J.B.Priestly. It was first published in 1949. 

" FOUNTAINS. I doubt if I ever saw one, even the smallest, without some tingling of delight. (...) The richest memory I have of the Bradford Exhibition of my boyhood, (...) is of the Fairy Fountain, which changed colour to the waltzes of the Blue Hungarian Band, and was straight out of the Arabian Night." 

Priestly complains that there are only few fountains in Great Britain: 

"We hunger for them and are not fed." He asks for letters to The Times and even for demonstrations to get them. 

"Their cost is trifling compared to so many idiotic things we are given and do not want. Our towns are crammed with all manner of rubbish that no people in their senses ever asked for, yet where are the fountains?" 

The fountain on the photograph I took at the Victoria Luise Platz, a few steps from my home. The man who designed in 1902 the whole quarter, Mr. Haberland, insisted on many "Schmuckplätze" - Ornamental Places? - where you will find every time a fountain - in always diverging design. 

When they start to sparkle after winter, you know: now it is really spring.   

Query: What do you think about the delight of fountains? Are there fountains where you live, or nearby - and/or do you remember a very special one? 

Haircutters and Political Mutants

 

Hahaha: the BZ (= Berlin Newspaper) is sort of equivalent of The Sun. Gossip and "sensations" - like our infamous BILD Zeitung, horror, but often amusing headers. 

Here they title: 

                   "Berlin Hairdresser continues cutting during Lockdown. 

                     Policemen among his customers! 

                    Appointments via Dating-App!"

In Germany the haircutters are not allowed to work during lockdown - so you see many lopsided self-cut fringes, striking white streaks amid the parting of deep black hair etc. 

The Germans are very angry to see many of our politicians mysteriously immaculately coiffed - although they should look like this by now: 

1: "Open the hair salons! 

2: More and more mutations in Germany!"

(If you know some of these politicians, but not the mutants, here they are: first our Minister of Health, Jens Spahn, third chancellor Merkel, last Bavarian governor Söder) 

Creativity in January

 

photo Britta Hügel 

Snow can be fun! 

Photo Britta Hügel 

                         Then I didn't trust my eyes: such a beauty! With a veritable camellia! 

photo Britta Hügel 

photo Britta Hügel 

...he even put another real camellia on the box border:

photo Britta Hügel

... but I enjoy the simplicity of the "Bauhaus"-version too

 

photo Britta Hügel 

PS: It is a bit unnerving to put "photo Britta Hügel" every time by the side of a photo (and I do not even know if it protects against photo-thieving). I have forgotten what I formerly knew: how to put a copyright-sign into the photo. 

And it isn't vanity: I wouldn't be so prim if I hadn't found one photo of mine (a really beautiful peacock-photo) on a Russian website - and it WAS mine, I can prove that. It just annoyed me. 

What do you do to protect your copyright? 

(The copyright for the term "Bauhaus-version" for these snowmen belongs to Klaus W., a friend of mine)

The Beatles - Help!

I am happy to welcome my 60th follower: TheMerryNeedle! 

And I do have a question: 

is there an easy way to find out whether a follower writes a blog too, or is (hopefully) just enjoying to read mine? I cannot find out how to do that in the new version of Blogger. 

Joanne Noragon helped me to insert a follower's blog - as for instance follower number 59, Tasker Dunham - into my blogroll here on the right. Thank you again, Joanne! 

So I hope: We can work it Out! 

I wish you a beautiful Sunday! 

Tea, Coffee or ...?

 

The "old" pretender, my "retro" coffee machine went kaputt. 

I mightn't have noticed for weeks - I am not a heavy coffee drinker (till I was 50 I didn't drink any coffee at all - it was too bitter for my child-like taste). I still prefer strong tea. 

Now I drink at the most 2 cups per day. (My neighbour told me about her awful headache- she was, her words, on "coffee-withdrawal" -- later I found out that she drinks two strong cups per day - tja).  

Often I prepare my cup with the Nespresso machine - not good for the environment, I know, and I suspect not good for the body either, with those aluminium capsules... But a coffe machine is not good at preparing one cup - and I tried it with a porcelain filter: not very convincing either. 

The Flying Dutchman drinks coffee like a fish. That's why I used the machine. He is highly amused that I call her my "Russell & Hobbs" - well-knowing that I must say "Russell Hobbs" - but I don't care, I do it my way 😋. And Amazon came very handy in these days of closed shops: next day I had a new "Russell & Hobbs" - though a different design - fake "retro" is out - and that is not a big loss, I think.

And that coffee smells delicious - on Sundays I add a little oriental trick: I add a slightly crushed pod of cardamom - the Arabs put one into the nozzle of the coffeepot. 

Smells like heaven... Add a lump of sugar and a little bit of cream and there you are - in heaven. 

Fondness Might Change over Time

When I worked on the manuscript for the book that should give German Detective-story lovers an overview about how many, many British gems on DVD  exist, of course I saw the screen adaptions of Dorothy Sayers marvellous detective Lord Peter Wimsey again.  

Sadly, most Germans know only a few films such as Caroline Graham's 'Midsummer Murder' or Agatha Christie's 'Miss Marple' (and then the version with Margaret Rutherford, not the outstanding Joan Hickson or the version with the late Geraldine McEwan). 

TV in Germany tries its best to enlighten them, but what I had in mind is a sort of "opera guide" for British detective TV series from the beginning till now - available on DVD. 

I admire Dorothy Sayers so much - a witty intellectual, so much fun to read - and I have to confess that each year since the 1970s I read at least two or three of her novels per annum. 

And I can recall vividly my disappointment, when I purchased the first DVDs starring Ian Carmichael, OBE. "Clouds of Witness" was filmed in 1972 - at that time I was a very young student - and THAT was NOT MY Lord Peter! For me Ian Carmichael was an old man, sorry to say. When in 2003 the DVDs with Edward Petherbridge appeared, I was a bit appeased. 

Now I saw the series with Ian Carmichael again. And think them very well done. 

Yes - he still is a bit old for Lord Peter - but not THAT much as I saw it in 1972.   

He didn't change - I did. 

Which is - all in all - a good thing.    😀

  
 

Better late than never...

 

Times flies by, and I know it is a little late to wish all of you a Happy New Year - but I do, with all my heart. 

It is very cold now in Berlin. And empty - the lockdown is rigid (but that is ok) - now we are allowed to meet only one other person who is not living in our household. (Though that is strange too: nowhere you can find out if you are allowed to meet fifty people in your house in succession - one after the other - or only one a day, or a week?)

And those towns and cities with high 7-day incidences can order that people are not allowed to move further than in a 15km radius. 

Sounds sensible - but isn't: it means that people here in Berlin are allowed 15 km from the border of Berlin! Meanwhile you can flip through the city (if you are with no consideration for others) on 892 square kilometres as long and often as you want...  

I think what really tires us in Germany are the contradictory rules that change daily: do the children have to go to school - or not? (If they have to, they sit in cramped buses!) Do we have ordered enough vaccine or not - or, when I follow the latest news: do we Germans have to be ashamed to want more than is our due? And on and on and on - and each federal state in Germany also can do as it pleases... and does it... 

No control anywhere: people who do not wear the mandatory mask on the Ku'damm don't have to pay a fine, because they smoke grinning a cigarette or hold a coffee mug in their hands - and then they are allowed to wear the mask around their neck instead covering mouth and nose.. Honestly: I think that they must have to choose: stay away from those streets if they have to smoke  - or wear a mask. Period. 

We others then sometimes feel like obeying idiots. Or, worse, are attacked for being obedient: Yesterday a man from Africa boxed very hard into my little leather rucksack when I friendly (!)) asked him to keep the distance from 1,5m.  (There was lots of space to do that, no need to rub against my coat). 

Come to think of it I (being alone - in bright daylight) was lucky that nothing worse happened - luckily I am tall (1,78m), can look like an attacking tiger over my mask, and have a body language that signals: though I am a woman I will hit back. That makes them overlook that I am old and slender - the mask shows only furious tiger-eyes...    

(This photo is a year old, when I walked the catwalk as a silver-model). 

Well: I hope that the year 2021 continues in a more friendly way... for all of us. 

Today is my Birthday

 

drawing by Quentin Blake

... and I am happy to be here! 

It was a very strange year for all of us - but as a wayward taoist I accept change, though I always try to find a few balloons which make wafting through life a little easier. Of course "wafting" has, as most things and situations, two faces. Some will call it "living in a bubble", I call it "looking for happiness even in tiny things". I believe that many days consists mainly of tiny things. 

This early morning I looked at the water-grey sky of Berlin (in my dressing gown, on the balcony, clutching a warm mug with strong tea in my hands) and I had to stare very hard, but then I saw them - sparkling in a hazy misty way: five stars! 

As long as I am able to enjoy that, life is beautiful and my greatest gift.  

Christmas decoration

This little crib my son made in kindergarten when he was four years old. 

Here it stands on the long table, but then it is put under the Christmas tree. 

It is very handy:  you can put the parts together in a flat box (decorated with potato print :-) when you want to store them for the next year. The star is hung up on a tiny nail. I love it very much. 

Christmas was fine, very tranquil. I hope you had a good time too! 

Merry Christmas!

 

photo: Britta Hügel 

                                        I wish You a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! 

                                                               

Don't lose courage - though this year we learned the hard way what beloved John Donne wrote in 1624: 

'No Man is an Island'

No man is an island entire of itself; every man 

is a piece of the continent, a part of the main; 

if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe 

is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as 

well as any manner of thy friends or of thine 

own were; any man's death diminishes me, 

because I am involved in mankind. 

And therefore never send to know for whom 

the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. 

I do hope with all my heart that there is still a lot of time till that happens - 

and that we enjoy our lives, feeling grateful among all our sorrows, grateful for being alive.  

photo: Britta Hügel 

So:                                    I wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. 

                                                                                Britta XXX 

Gratitude

 

 photo Britta Hügel 

I wish all of you a Happy 4th Advent! 

This year was very, very different - for all of us -  from what we had expected. 

And I feel for all people who have lost a loved one, or lost their job or have fear to lose it. 

But I get a bit bugged by those ones around me who bath in lamentation, wallow in bad news while sitting on a sofa, whining about to have to wear a face mask or not to be able to visit a cinema. 

"As we get older, we (...) learn to focus on what's not right, what is lacking, missing, inadequate, and painful." writes M.J.Ryan 

This year maybe we had to learn to be less critical, to appreciate unexpected kindness, smiles under a mask and friends who thought of us. Not to rush around like mad - we had no chance to jet just for a weekend to Venice - for 14 Euro! - and jam the streets and canals there, and disturb the inhabitants with the rattatatatt of trolley bags. 

Don't get me wrong: I love to travel. I love to walk through my city, 

But if it is necessary - and in Berlin we have a strict lockdown, though not as heavy as now in London - I nevertheless can find something beautiful in my day - and be thankful for it. (Look: the geraniums on my balcony are still flowering - in the midst of December! A red squirrel runs over my balcony lattice, here, on the second floor!) 

As a topping I douse this with a little sweet sauce of Ralph Waldo Emerson: 

"The invariable mark of wisdom is to see the miraculous in the common." 

Advent calender

This is my Advent calendar for this year. I bought it in November - because I found out that Father Christmas is on this calendar not only utterly mobile, using trains, sledges, ships - but also carries the national flag. 

And The Father Christmas who comes to the Netherlands is there in two versions - two times!  

 

Birds and blossoms

 

photo: Britta Hügel

December 2nd --- Since three days (and nights) it is very cold in Berlin. My rose geraniums (Pelargonium odoratissimum) still bravely defy the cold - but I have to think about my oleander:  I have enough space, but all rooms are heated, and in winter the plants want it cold. The cellar is no alternative - in Berlin we have long-distance heating - and the pipes run through the cellars - good for furniture that you want to store there - but, as it is warm, it's No country for Old Geraniums. 

And I have to think about the birds too. They are regulars for water - the sparrows, blackbirds, a pair of jays, (the magpies do not come). The doves and hoodiecrows I shoo away- especially since I know the Latin name of the hoodies: Corvus corone cornix (Apples autocorrection turns that foresightful into "corona"..)

I love the tits (birds) - and for all of the above mentioned (and sometimes a squirrel) I put out grains etc to feed them. 

Sparrows are the typical birds for Berlin: cheeky, bragging and in loud huge groups. They go to MacDonals and eat French fries, they sit on coffeetables and pick at your cake, if you don't watch out - and when I read in a photo-book that is impossible to take a picture of a sparrow I went out and proved the opposite. 

"Rest You Merry" by Charlotte MacLeod

 

photo by Britta Hügel 

Chapter 1

"PETER SHANDY, YOU'RE IMPOSSIBLE!", sputtered his best friend's wife. "How do you expect me to run the Illumination if everybody doesn't cooperate?" 

     "I'm sure you'll do a masterful job as always, Jemima. Isn't that Hannah Cadwall across the way ringing your doorbell?" 

     With a finesse born of much practice, Professor Shandy backed Mrs. Ames off his front step and shut the door. This was the seventy-third time in eighteen years she'd nagged him about decorating his house. He'd kept count. Shandy had a passion for counting. He would have counted the spots on an attacking leopard, and he was beginning to think a leopard might be a welcome change. 

     Every yuletide season since he'd come to teach at Balaclava Agricultural College, he'd been besieged by Jemima and her cohorts. Their plaint was ever the same: 

     "We have a tradition to maintain." 

(.....................................................................................)  ....something snapped.  (...) 

On the morning of December 22 two men drove up to the brick house in a large truck. The professor met them at the door.

     "Did you bring everything, gentlemen?" 

     "The whole works. Boy, you folks up here sure take Christmas to heart!" 

     "We have a tradition to maintain", said Shandy. 

"You may as well start on the spruce trees." 

     All morning the workmen toiled. Expressions of amazed delight appeared on the faces of neighbors and students. As the day wore on and the men kept at it, the amazement remained but the delight faded. 

     It was dark before the men got through. Peter Shandy walked them out to the truck. He was wearing his overcoat, hat, and galoshes, and carrying a valise. 

     "Everything in good order, gentlemen? Lights timed to flash on and off at six-second intervals?" Amplifiers turned up to full volume? Steel-cased switch boxes provided with sturdy locks? Very well, then, lets's flip the power and be off. I'm going to impose on you for a lift to Boston, if I may. I have an urgent appointment there." 

Every year I read this very funny Christmas-detective novel (it appeared in 1978 - if I'd count the way  Professor Shandy does that would be....?...times...) 

The photo above I took yesterday evening - in Berlin they start their Illumination tradition too! 

(I have typed the whole text by hand - hope there are no typos) 

Contact Restrictions of a Special Sort

 

30th November --- The supermarkets silently have raised the sum you can spend with a credit card without using your PIN - (45 Euro now). Till The Plague Germany was the country of cash - the Flying Dutchman always aghast, because in the Netherlands you even pay for five bonbons with your card (Memo to myself: should avoid self-censorship by turning harmless use of "five acid drops" to even more harmless "bonbons" - fearing unwelcome associations .. the Netherlands with their free grass politic...) If you pay cash in NL and the sum is "0.36 Euro" they round up to 40 cents (the Dutch always were great merchants!)

In Germany you had to spend hours in the queue before the till because a person tried to hand over the exact sum of money - "Wait!", fumble, fumble, "I think I have it exactly fitting..." fumble, fumble, then, after felt ten minutes: "Oh no, sorry...it doesn't match!" and uttering a little (lonely) pearl of laughter hands over a 10-Euro note. Now Grim Covid educates the Germans moneywise... 

See that little wallet-safe above? I bought it for my credit cards, but didn't use it - until some weeks ago Francine and I sat at Ishin, the Japanese restaurant. The waitress took my credit card - and stopped midway: "What? I did not even put it on the cash-reader - and yet it has already deducted the sum!" 

Oh! - I became quiet...thought... I mean: I live in Berlin... to avoid a shit-storm I want to phrase it politically correct: we have a very mixed public... thimblerigger playing their criminal games on the Ku'damm, though it is legally forbidden ("C'mon", laughs permissive Berlin - "that is piffle, look at our clans which work in other dimensions, think of the recent Great Treasure-Robbery in Dresden...) 

But "Many a little makes a mickle" (or as we Germans say: "Small livestock also make dung-shit"). 

The thimbleriggers do not care about contact restriction, they search contact -"Oh, sorry!" - having this little cash reader in their pocket which can work without the contact of a card - hoho. 

From that day of satori, Enlightenment, I use my beautiful Wedgwood-blue security cardholder - you bet!

 

 

How to Stay Supple Through Pre-Christmas Season

 

29th November --- Got this funny drawing per WhatsApp. (Query: Why? Is it tongue in cheek - or just funny? Muse on humour as a funny thing...)

Translation (utterly superfluous for Yoga-afficionados): Die Tanne = the fir; Der Braten = the roast; Die Waage = the scales; Die Kerze = the candle. 

Take out my appointment book and write: "Cancel Fitness-Studio", though I would love to be there, being unsporting since February. Before work-out with weight 3 times a week. Now my muscles try to impersonate a jellyfish (Memo to myself: Try not to overdramatise - at least I do around 10.000 steps a day. With FFP2 as an extra-weight). 

So:                        Happy Supple First Sunday in Advent! 

Let There be Light - but not too much, please.

 

photo by Britta, chandelier 10 times brighter 

November 28th ---All morning busy. My "Good-man-for-the-house" (have to remind me to become more careful with language: first I wrote "I was busy with" - which might be a quite harmless half-sentence, but as today I made a big blunder (in German language!) my confidence is shaken. 

I said to him: "First we'll have to have a test-run in the bedroom" - thinking  of my beautiful net curtain and KNOWING that I spoke of them before - but of course he grasped the chance for a wicked manly laugh.

So: he is an all-round talent and helps me with those things I myself do not dare to tackle - which are not many, but I my rooms are about 4m high and there is no one around to pick me up IF... I learned - late in life, but better now than never - to require help if I need it. (Memory to myself: The art is to have the insight that I need it - I am still a bit megalomanic). 

But a very high ladder intimidates me. 

It was the third time he moved up to change the chandelier bulbs - they were still too glaring, they bit into the eyes - 18 bulbs gave me the brightness I missed before - but their intensity was too much... 

Now it is better, but still not good - so a moment ago I ordered via Amazon chandelier bulbs that I can dim. I did not know that they exist - I mean those you can work with a remote control - because before I had looked at the fine stucco on the ceiling and thought: I do not want a cable above! 

Ha - now I am wiser - and he likes to come - even if it means to climb the ladder the forth time. 

Finger exercises 2: Eating at Home

 

photo Britta Hügel

26th November --- Wonderful lunch with my friend Francine. Wednesday "in normal times" is the day we meet at a restaurant - often at the excellent and very reasonable priced Japanese restaurant "Ishin" (sporting the secret charme of a disinfected third class waiting room), and on special occasions we book a table ("YES - for only two persons...Yes.. and please in the rear of the restaurant, we don't want to sit in that draught of the entrance door") "Colette" of Tim Raue: a celebrity cook who makes it possible for ordinary mortals to pay his bill by offering "business-lunch". (Business-lunch exists on an exceptional broad scale in Berlin). 

Cannot suppress the feeling of sadness that so many restaurants will be forced to close forever now - so very, very unfair, because they did so much to keep us safe - bought expensive air cleaners, put distance between the tables thus reducing the number of (paying) guests to half, the waiters, almost fainting, had to wear masks all day long, collected lists with names and address of the guests (among them an astonishingly plenty of Smiths and Joneses), and, and, and - yet nothing helped. 

Yes, government will support them - they talk about an 'anticipated payment' of 10.000 Euro - but that is the crux: politicians talk and promise, while administration is busy to create application forms in an even more cryptic language. 

Well, we mustn't forget: the legal profession has to live too. 

And, as the proprietor of more than one posh restaurant in Berlin yesterday on TV said: 10.000 Euro will be just  enough to pay his 80 employees for one (!) day.

Yesterday, when Angela Merkel gave us new orders how to live till Christmas and New Year,  I saw on TV Tim Mälzer (another famous German cook, the forename Tim must be a guarantee for gourmet success ) - he resembles a bear, and that fine figure of a man, always an optimist and a doer - struggled to gain his composure, chin quavering, eyes filling with tears - he left the discussion forum for a break - men still don't cry -- though we all did cry with him.  

Well, Francine and I, accepting the inevitable of restaurants closed, rushed instead to Butter-Lindner at the Wittenberg Platz - an exquisite delicatessen - because we wanted to celebrate the now so rare occasion when we can meet each other. 

Then back to my apartment - I give it three stars: very good ambience, lovely food. No draught.  

We dined and then chatted till 7 o'clock pm (meeting at 13:15). 

Not to be able to hug each other when we parted is absolutely sad. 

Finger Exercises 1: Sleep

November  25th. --- Wake up very early this morning - a quarter past 5. Why? I think, staring into the dark sky of Berlin, no star to be be seen today - Why?  

I might sleep as long as I want to, because a week ago I took my heart into both hands, or better: one, because in the other hand I carried the dustbin on my way down to the cellar where the 6 big dustbins for the whole house stand (the two for plastic constantly overflowing). 

In the courtyard a week ago I had heard steps behind me - AND THOSE STEPS I KNOW! 

The Flying Dutchman calls the owner of these steps "Pantoffeli". The Dutch have the tendency to make everything small and harmless by adding the syllable "-je" to it (a diminutive as "- let" in English) - and the Dutch use it in abundance, living in a small-sized country. 

Pantoffel might be translated to "clogs" in English (though I remember the old English word "pantofle") 

I say Hi and try to put some warmth into my eyes. In daytime neighbour is unremarkable, but at night he turns into a monster - murders my sleep with wooden clogs in the apartment over my head.  

Stomp! Stomp! Stomp! I sit bolt-upright in my bed. Every night, at least two times, at least since a year - yet I cannot get used to it.  At three o'clock it's prostate-time: Stomp! Stomp! Stomp! For me the perfect moment to send out Red-golden Love to all Beings in the World - yet that often fails because I am at the same time busy with incarnating a pressure cooker before explosion. 

To cut a long story short: I spoke to him. 

Very very friendly (as no-one loves to be rebuked). Not his fault, oh no, I say - of course he is a free man who can do as he wants - and nothing to complain about clogs in broad daylight (which is almost the truth), but at night... could he be so kind and spare a HSP like me, a fragile little woman (here I try to hunch my 1.78m  a bit) that stomping at night? Entirely my fault, I repeat, and the fault of a typical Berlin pre-WWII-residential building with beautiful parquet (Query: do I overdo it and sound like Hyacinth Bucket?), and  could he kindly change his clomps to bedroom slippers at night? 

He smiles benignantly at me. Had I but spoken up earlier! he says. I button my lips, because three years ago I had - which gave me more than one year of undisturbed sleep, then he must have discovered his favourite Pantoffel again ... 

And away he walks, rattling with his knight's armour ... can I trust my eyes: is he emanating a weak aureole of Red-golden light?   

Whatever: it worked!!! I can sleep through till 5 or 6 o'clock, undisturbed at eleven, midnight and three o'clock in the morning! Bliss!!!

Starting a Kind of Berlin Diary

I adore Tom Stephenson's blog, and Rachel's and Joanne's and Cro's, and one of many reasons is that they all write a sort of diary. 

I write diaries since I can write. 

The first one (I still own it) is a little vocabulary book sewed (by me) with big stitches in a green & white striped paper cover. I wrote with pencil, and was furious when I discovered that my little sister had crossed out some sentences - she thought a correction of the "quarrel" between us was necessary. 

Since that day I made sure that nobody could get at my diaries - and what I try here on the blog will, of course, differ very much from the private ones I write for myself, though I will give you my personal view of my living in Berlin. 

I am curious how it will work out. One thing is sure, little sister: 

                                                                  I'll do it my way. 

The Knack of Books... And How to Get It (Them)

photo by Britta Hügel

 

In Covid-time I have to pull myself away from Amazon & Co... because as I do not want to shop much, I look into Amazon's offers. 

Yet often The Good in me gains the upper hand:  I call my bookshop - and next day I take a walk and have a nice talk with the bookseller, and she often presents new books, so I get ideas and skim and buy - thus hopefully supporting Berlin's economy. 

But I have to confess that the man I see on an even more regular basis is the Amazon delivery man - he really is a marvel, always laughing and so beaming that one feels the sun goes up - he is from Africa, black, shiny, and full of joy. 

We talk and laugh a lot, and I have the feeling that the world is a good place to be in.  

Which it is: I am so thankful that I can breathe in deeply the crisp fresh air when I finally pull down the mask. That I can smell the special odour of autumn leaves, savour a cookie, see and smell the fine spray when I peel an orange and read a book - so: it is so lovely to be ALIVE.  

PS: Some of you might have noticed that I twisted and maltreated my headline to make it resemble one of the very first films I saw in the cinema (as I am 1.78m tall I could smuggle in very young, a little lipstick and kitten-heels from my world-wise girl-cousin Ragnhild helped ...): The Knack ... and How to Get It, by Richard Lester.. I have it on DVD and still adore it! 

Quarantine through Art

 

Dear You, 

maybe you know this video already. I was so glad when my friend Anne sent it to me! It made my day. 

Hope yours too! 

Yours Truly, 

Britta 

Enthusiasm, Rapture, Excitement...

photo by Britta Hügel

Dear You, 

Recently I read that we need "enthusiasm" to feel alive - and I thought: Yeah, that's IT! 

I have always been a person who easily falls in rapture about something. 

Friends who influenced me were always people with a lot of energy. 

The prototype was Roswitha, as I four years old, calling: "Tom, Didda, tom!" (she was not able to say "Come, Gitta, come!" - - but while I talked like a waterfall, she acted - she lured more timid Me into adventures (come to think of it: I lured, but she acted that out, pulling me behind her :-) . 

And Atie - my best girl friend at school: glowing dark eyes, full of verve (my parents called that "exaltation" - and they might have had a point - some time after we had lost contact because in her eyes I was too "bourgeois" and I really grieved over that deeply - her parents, standing very high on the social ladder, had to start a search for her by Interpol, because she was trafficking cars to Libanon). 

End of October they deactivate the fountain here on the Victoria-Luise-Platz - summer is over - but for me a fountain like that is rapture pure...

  

photo by Brigitta Hügel 

What about you, dear friend: what makes you enthusiastic, full of life, bursting with joy? 

Waiting for your answer, 

Yours Truly, 

Britta 

 PS: The glowing evening sun above is taken through the window of my room with a bay window. 

Setting NO example

Dear You, 

these two guys are from the Ordnungsamt (public order office - with glee they give you a fine when your car parks 2 minutes too long - sometimes I really watched them waiting!). 

The day when the stronger lock-down measures were imposed by chancellor Merkel on Berlin, ordering among others compulsary masks on certain streets - as for example Ku'damm - Tauentzien and Wittenberg Platz - those two went directly in front of me - without a mask. 

Polite but bluntly I asked them: "Why do you not wear a mask?" They waved at the street sign and said: "Still 10 centimetres to Tauentzien, haha!" 

Well - that is Berlin (impossible in Munich!). 

Still a bit angry (but of course not officially complaining - I am no deputy sheriff), I wondered what you would have done? 

Yours Truly

Britta 

PS: Of course I never say something to civilians who do not wear a mask (though I give them THE LOOK) - only when someone comes too near I say politely: "Please - would you mind to keep a little more distance?" and smile (which you can see around the eyes over the mask). I know that not much air especially under FFP2 masks make people really aggressive... and when you live in Berlin... 

PPS: The Look: 

 

How I outwit myself in Lockdown-times (my resolution no.3)

 
Dear You, 

you wrote that you fear to become a couch potato in these lockdown times, and I can understand that very well. But...

photo by Britta Hügel 

To stay fit you have to eat well. 

I eat each day what Gaylord Hauser called so appropriately "Sunshine Salad". 

I am a big fan of late Mr. Hauser (though "big" might not be the right word 😀) - but also a bit lazy: To cut all these carrots, peppers, courgettes, cucumbers, radishes and "all you can eat"! is Zen, meditative - but also a bit of a nuisance, sometimes. 

"Sometimes" begins around lunchtime. 

So here my lockdown rule number 3: 

I do that in the morning, right after breakfast - because I know myself pretty well:  around lunchtime a mysterious lethargy sets in - I just don't do it! 

So I have to outwit myself. 

I take the marvellous glas bowl (you see: it has a lid!), cut all the vegetables into pieces, put the lid on, back to the fridge (I know that I will lose some vitamins on that short run - but honestly: who wants to be perfect? And better 2/3 of all those vitamins than none at all!) 

So at lunchtime I only have to pick the salad to pieces, add pumpkin seed and feta cheese, and my homemade salad dressing 

(If you want to try it: 1 Tbsp Balsamico vinegar, 1 Tbsp Maple sirup, 2 Tbsp Olive Oil, a little dollop of Dijon mustard, salt and freshly ground black pepper, and, if you have, some herbs - lovely - it is the maple sirup that does it...)  And always remember: 

"Vinegar like a scrooge, oil like a squanderer"

Add it 

 - 

"et voilà!" 

Stay healthy, dear friend - and look after yourself! 

Yours Truly, 

Britta   XXX 

"If the Weather Permits..." (My Resolution no. 2 in Lockdown-Time)

photo by Britta Hügel 

Dear You, 

thank you for telling me how you overcome Lockdown-blues by cherishing memories of past journeys!  

My second resolution in Lockdown-time is to stay curious. It is so easy to become bored and, as the radius for walks diminishes, think: "Oh, I know it all... blah...."

No, one doesn't know it all. In Zen they recommend: Look at everything with beginner's eyes. Which of course I cannot. But when I take my camera with me, or try to draw something, I look more attentive. 

And if it rains, I just take a beautiful umbrella, and the world looks friendly again. 

And when I'm not sure IF it might rain - I take this tiny one, not heavier than a bar of chocolate, mere 100 gram.  

So: The weather (almost) ever permits. Give yourself a little push - and go out and walk, even if it  is everyday the same route - try to see what changes. 

Hope to meet you outside! 

Yours Truly 

Britta 

 

 

Imaginary travels in lock-down times:

 

Dear You, 

you might remember this curious "map" which hangs on my kitchen-wall. 

I bought it at "Dussmann", the greatest bookshop in Berlin, Friedrichstraße - a boulevard that seems as far away as London in times of an almost complete lockdown in Berlin... 

That map was "only" a gift wrapping paper which I framed - but I love to sit at the table in front of it, studying the drawings which of course are not true to the scale :-)  

and know that I walked through all (yes: all!) those streets on my month-long stays in London. 

I miss it. 

I miss London, I miss England (and Scotland too). 

Green is the colour of hope, we say in Germany - 

so: it has the right colour. 

You asked me how I cope with being so much alone (as most people are these days). 

In the following days I will write what I do to avoid to not become depressed. The order is of no importance - I just like to start somewhere, so here it is: 

1. safe-bet (for me): 

1. Make a bucket list of places you want to see again. 

Look at your photographs, or your diary, or call to mind what you especially loved. Write about your imaginary trip, draw, dream. 

Be thankful that you had the chance to see it at least once. 

And: - I try to learn taking nothing for granted and  

 be grateful! 

What are you dreaming of, dear friend? Which Fata Morgana runs through your head? And what are your best hints?  

Waiting for your answer 

Yours Truly

Britta 

 

In