January down, February and March to go

Finally the vengeful arctic god seems to have loosened his grip on Berlin, the thick layer of ice encasing the city has started to go soggy at the edges, and it's possible to be outside without gloves for up to 10 minutes before the onset of frostbite. Last weekend I walked on the frozen canal, though not without some trepidation and mental images of hands clasping at jagged broken ice before sinking forever into black murky depths. In fact it was very Bruegelesque with its parading families complete with bicycles, dogs, prams and sledges, and a few show offs doing pirouettes.

I've been going out more in Prenzlauerberg. It's officially hipper than Kreuzberg, but it seems to me that there's a lot more pretence to it. For example one co-operative type place offers you refills of wine and home-cooked food, and tells you that you should pay what you think it's worth. But then the staff stand in a line to badger you if they don't think that you've paid enough. There's also of course the risk of falling asleep on the U-Bahn back and having to be woken by some nice concerned Berliner at the end of the line.

What's more, I have noticed that everybody looks at you oddly here when you play air guitar.

My favourite Berlin street names to date are, in reverse order:
Schlangengraben
Arnold-Knoblauch-Ring
Christburger Str.
Dickhardt Str.