The weekend was a good one. I very much enjoyed it, especially because I got to spend time with Volker and Chris together last night. We went out, first Chris and I met up and had Pizza at the cool place right by the canal. It took a while until the food came and we were both a little tired but eventually we ate, drank and enjoyed the time together, talking, rambling. Then at some point Volker called, he’s currently alone at home because his baby momma and his son are in Italy on vacation, and about an hour later, he joined Chris and I. During that time, Johannes, a mutual friend of Volker and I also came by and we sat down on the bridge among many young and old people who were already sitting there, and we talked and laughed and the sun set and it got dark and we drank beer in the warm summer night. Then, we learned that there was a birthday party just a few minutes away and we got everyone together, walked there, spent some time and played bocci-ball. I wasn’t the most happening scene, although people were nice and all, and then Volker said he had heard of yet another birthday party and we took off to go to that one. Now, it was around 11pm if I remember correctly. We walked over into Neu-Koelln and tried to find the place that Google maps had located but it turned out that there were two streets in Berlin with the same name “Weserstrasse” – The one we were supposed to be at, where the two girls had their birthday party, was actually in Friedrichshain! So, not much time to think, we decided to make the hike from where we were and head over to F’Hain. Since Chris and I both had our bikes and Volker was there by foot, Volker jumped on the back-seat with Chris and we rode quickly towards the Baumgarten-Bridge. Chris’ bike made a bunch of funny sounds because it is an old bike and not used to carrying two people’s weight. When we got to the bridge we saw hundreds of people partying in the street, it got so crowded. We crossed the bridge meandering between lots of people and at the foot of the bridge decided we would better take a right-turn to go into F’Hain via the Gaertnerstrassen-Bridge to the East instead of trying to go via Warschauer Strasse where more people were one the street than I had ever seen. So, at this point, Volker jumped on my back-seat and he sat side-ways which I wasn’t sure if it would work but it turned out that it’s a very efficient way to drive and I rode the bike and it felt almost as if I was alone because he didn’t add much weight. So we drove to the East and then, right on the crossing of where I work during the week, we took a left and headed up the street, over the bridge, past Boxhagener Platz and towards the bar we were supposed to be at. The name of the bar was something with “Teddy” and we soon found it, locked our bikes and walked in. Volker introduced us to two very cute young ladies, one whose birthday it was and one of her friends and it was obvious how stoked they were that Volker (and his friends) took the long ride to come and see them. There were other people in the bar and I think some of them were friends of the girls but we weren’t introduced. Then we got ourselves beers, and Chris and I stood outside for a moment to just chill and talk about writing and the world. It felt good, the air was still completely warm, it was a great night to be out in the streets of Berlin. Eventually, Volker also came out and we sat ourselves on one of the tables right in front of the bar and chatted. At some point I had the idea to play with an iPhone game called “Heads Up” where you place the phone on your forehead, it shows, for example the name of a movie, and the others have to explain to me what that movie is without mentioning the title. We had great fun, first we did movie titles and then we did accents and because we had had a second round of beers at that point, we were jovially laughing and genuinely having a good time. Especially with the accents since they’re a lot of fun and hard to get right. The game recouperated our spirits and we felt awake and alive from all the laughing and gesturing and shouting. That was a lot of fun. Then, the second birthday girl, Eloise I believe was her name, came and sat with us and we spoke about how she knows Philip Glass and that made me listen carefully because I love his music and also I think I would very much like him as a person if I met him. Our group grew and 2 more people joined us and it was a quiet night now, the conversations deeper and we all enjoyed it tremendously.