Ode to Studio 54

As you all know, I have been having a rough past couple of days lately, mostly because I have been feeling so alienated, and like an outsider, and last night, I had an epiphany. Not just a thought, literally, an Epiphany. Capitalized. It went like this: Every time I want to curl up in a ball and then fling myself into a river-something always stops me, and reminds me, "hey people care." Last night, it was Izetta. I spoke to her on the phone and she said, "Annie you've been in front of my face all day and I've been praying for you." And I realized then, that whenever I need help, and say, "I quit," God calls in for backup. Every time. I have been so low and so dark that I couldn't pull myself out, but every time I've been there, God has sent someone to help me. In high school it was my family, in Dayton it was my friends, in D.C. it was Andre and co., but there is always someone. So I've decided that I am not going to waste my time feeling alienated any more. I got peeps. Much like a street gang. Except in my posse there are no bloods or crips, just really nice people, who wouldn't be much good in a knife fight (although, I don't know, Charisse could shank a bitch). So that was part one of my Epiphany. The second part was, "FUCK THIS, I'm awesome." When I hear stories about what people have done in Berlin they go like this, "we went to this club with these IES people, then this club with these IES people..." whereas mine involve things like, "I met this German lawyer and drank him under the table with whiskey, or I went to a gay bar with Kaegan, or I saw the museum at night and then had authentic beer and lachs and bagels from a Jewish bakery." Moral of the story. Mine are BETTER. Yeah go drink it up in the clubs with other tourists, I'll be chilling at the artists squat chatting with actual Germans while they teach me how to roll cigarettes. In the words of Cartman, "screw you guys, I'm going home!" Except I'm not going home. I'm going fuckin' balls out.

So I woke up this morning with a completely new attitude. And giggled my way through German class for no apparent reason except I was so happy to not be depressed. I even asked my German teacher if "bomsen" which I learned from Cabaret, is the word for "screwing". It actually translates to "banging" but same idea. One might think this was an inappropriate question, but Burkart is super chill and asked us to use the familiar form of "you" and his first name, much less stuffy than traditional German professors who would insist on the formal you, and addressing each of us as "Herr Wenning" or "Frau Schuerman". He is teaching us slang and rap songs and dirty words as well as traiditional verb conjugation and adjective ending. He also, very possibly, is a flaming homosexual. But again, as he is European, I have to say possibly instead of certainly, because there is always the possibilty those Italian leather shoes and ass hugging jeans he is wearing are just fashionable. But he's great. He kind of scares me, especially when he speaks in English because his voice lowers and it gets this weird condescening tone, like I asked what the verb "springen" was and he goes "to jump, naturlich" and its like, whoa there B., wasn't so "naturlich" to me. Also fun news from German class, Burkart is bringing in his daughter (further evidence he could be gay, no Frau is mentioned) in and its her geburtstag! Which means birthday. Which means we're bringing in little treatsies. Which means AWESOME.

So after class I had my women and gender's studies class. I don't know what I think of it, in sharp contrast to Mary Carlson of Dayton, who is a loud, strong, forceful, women, Lotte is very much like a pony. She has HUGE teeth like one, firstly. And secondly, she gets very nervous and skittish easily and sort of prances around collecting her thoughts. It's distracting for me. Like we talked about something involving transvestites (which were the subject of class) I forget the comment, and she goes, "Oh now that would be a scandal" but then she had to guffaw nervously for 10-15 minutes while we all wonder, "that funny? Really?". Or at least I do. Tomorrow we have a field trip to this museum that was opened by Berlin's most famous transvestite, who also happened to be an antiques collector. So that should be pretty sweet. Or awful, because it's at 9am.

Anyway, now to the crux of this blog. I went, during my break between next classes, to go get some coffee at Studio 54, arguably, the happiest place on earth. It's this bar/cafe right near this artists squat for all these alternative people, and Berlin's degenerates flock to this bar in a staggering number. For relatively cheap, (2 coffees and a tea for only 4 Euro total) I can sit, read my assignments, and people watch with some of the most interesting people I have ever seen. BETTER still, I am a REGULAR. So I see people I know. All the bartenders for example. Also, Steve, who may or may not be homeless, who sits at the bar round the clock, rolling cigarettes and drinking beer. Also, posses of Turkish people come in and stare at me, covetously, but the bartenders I think sort of think of me as like the baby, since I wear clean clothes and cardigans and don't smoke and am very polite, so they watch out for me. It's like cheers, if cheers were dirty and filled with burnouts and criminals. But not everyone is a criminal, it just has a distinct flavor, like an aged cheese. The floors are wooden, it's always smoky, the people are loud and dirty and varying in age/race/hygiene level/gender...but it is heaven. My home in Berlin away from home.