What do you keep in your shoes? Ok, your feet. That’s generally the case. But what about when you pack for a trip? Do you ‘fill’ your shoes, as I do? Or do you leave them empty just in case a group of uniformed security border controllers mistake a bottle of baby powder (yeah! Why not?? You got a problem with that???), a 3 socket USB plug, two charge leads and a pair of electric toothbrushes as a BOMB!!!! Well it may be time to reconsider the latter option, as I sit here at Berlin Tegel airport relieved to be a free man. Because they stopped my bag in the scanner and it stayed stopped. And they called a few other bods. Then a big bod (every sense of the word) and everything else in the airport stopped. They all stood back from my case. Called over another dude wearing rubber gloves, at which point I thought ‘NOOOOOOOO’ but he just swabbed the outside of the case. I’m not a generally anxious or nervous person, but a group of armed, uniformed men shouting in German just… just… just.

They opened the case, very carefully, very gingerly, and found that the heap of electronic shit in my shoes was less about explosives, more about ergonomics. More stuff into less space. Well, said ‘the nice one’, perhaps its best not to load things into shoes when you pack your carry-on. But… but… but…

Berlin. It is just the coolest city in the world. My home is always London but my heart is in Kreuzberg. And my daughter too, so that’s nice. It is just a city of such startling contrasts, as exemplified by this photo taken in the affluent, almost opulent area of Rosenthalerplatz. The ultra-modern, super high-tech and the derelict remnant of an old house which survived the war and the Russians, but only just. And that photo is pretty much the perfect metaphor for the city. Yet everywhere you go there are little surprises. Areas along the river with a bar, coffee shop and just generally ‘heaps of cool’, in what was ready for demolition last year. The parks are fab, the restaurants, cafes and bars abundant and pretty uniformly great value if not exactly cheap.

Yesterday, according to records, we walked a total of 16.2kms. We started at the Reichstag for a 9am tour and went on from there. The tour was incredible, comprehensive and educational. In that when Germans of today talk of Hitler and the Hitler years, they are talking about ‘them’ and never ‘us’. They treat him, and that whole era, as the most important, catastrophic and horrendous lessen ever to be learned.

Then we walked, we ate, we had ice creams, we ate more and we just managed to squeeze in the two longest sporting events in sporting event history. The tennis? Holy shit! And the cricket??? OMGeeeeee…

We (that’s the English, not British, not pre-Hitlerite, not post-Hitlerite, not Berliners, not anyone else but our ‘royal’ we) are the World Champions. Amazing all round.

On the way home now. Shame. Love it here.

Happy Monday

A xxxx