Adam Fletchers – The Zig

Pass me the ideology

// May 24th, 2010 // Comments // cultural differences

I’m not a principled man, its a topic that’s come up repeatedly between Annett and I as in contrast she’s a principal for every occasion, usually one that stops us doing what I want to do like buying a McFlurry or shopping in any store that contains the word discount in its name. Generally its one of the things I like most about her, she cares deeply about, well, everything and that encourages me to do the same and focus less on myself. It can also be annoying though and somewhat of a blocker to normal everyday living:

Adam: “we need toothpaste”
Annett: “well don’t buy one from x, they’re a minority shareholder in y who are raping the third world and oppressing women in uganda and such places, I will not have their products in our bathroom”
“can I buy this one then?”
“is it fair trade? From a co-op farm run by of female tibetan refugees?”
“jesus its just toothpaste”
“yeah well its easy for you don’t have any principals, you’re a capitalist pig”
“I do have principals, its just that they can be bought very cheaply, like toothpaste if you’ll just let me.”

On May 1st we attended the anti-capitalism rally here in Berlin. For readers in the UK I might need to stop here to point out that there are (allegedly) some alternatives to capitalism. I know, baffling. No-one ever thought to inform us! Growing up in the UK I don’t remember there ever even being a discussion about it, I don’t even remember using the word capitalism, there was no need for the word since there was nothing to contrast it to, without night, day is not really day anymore its just default right? I guess now the fact that the country is almost completely bankrupt and people don’t want to play with it anymore, some healthy debate would have done us some good but I digress and we had a good run while it lasted and we’ve all those pretty shoes and George Foreman grills and stuff so it was probably worth it in the end right?

Anyway, we attended the rally. Annett would join a rally for anyone, if red squirrels organized a rally to highlight their plight at the hands (do what squirrels have count as hands?) of the more aggressive grey squirrel, she’d be there with her whistle, nuts and Che Guevara t-shirt doing her bit. Okay so I’m exaggerating there, she doesn’t own a Che Guevara t-shirt.

So we joined, I was interested to here their proposals, unfortunately they didn’t end up really having any other than this is bad, that is bad etc etc. Afterwards we got caught in a mini riot between protesters and the police which was very entertaining and exciting and could be a topic of a whole other post.

I mention these anecdotes because while before I thought I was pretty principal-less, not really critical of anything, just a happy citizen of my own bubble world, it turns out I was wrong. I had some Hipstery related speaking gigs this month. It’s always fun to get out on the road and talk about the Hipstery, firstly because I’m really passionate about it and secondly because the reactions to it are so entertaining. It’s a really polarizing services, for some the click is instant and they’ll rush straight off to the corner and try it out, for others you’ll get a response the same as if you walked over to inform them you believe the world is flat or that jesus is a chocolate leprechaun.  That’s stupid, just stupid either they, or just their body language will say.

One of the conferences was in London and one here in Berlin at the Next Conference. In the audience was a guy from Spiegel Online whom it did seem to click with (the rest of the audience we’re more of the chocolate leprechaun disposition). We did an interview and it turns out Spiegel is one of the biggest sites here in Germany I was later informed. The informing didn’t stop there, for in the interview they listed me as not only an Internet Provocateur, but also a Consumption Critic! Well I never, who’d have known! Maybe I’m not just a capitalist pig after all…

I think Matthaus summarised it best when he said “You’re not really accepted here in East Germany until you’re a recognized critic of something. Congratulations,  you made it.”

Watch out grey squirrels, I’m coming for you next!

With me its not good cherry eating

// May 10th, 2010 // Comments // Theories

I’ve been a Berliner for a mere four weeks and already I’m noticing several slight behavioural kinks not found in my native Leipzigers. If I can borrow just a small moment of your time I’d like to tell you about them, lets begin…..

1. The inner voice need not stay inner
We all have an inner voice, its what keeps us company in the lonely hours. Mine likes to distract me by shouting things like “kill the donkey”, “or with me its not good cherry eating” or the more seductive “hello pretty boy come sit on my knee” when I’m trying to concentrate on important tasks like eating chocolate.

The inner voice is where are thoughts first manifest themselves, from there they run through the feedback loop that is our sanity and if deemed worthy, become the things we speak, or write or do. Think of it like a big production line, down which our earliest ideas travel. At the end is a filtering mechanism I imagine to be a big giant crusher ball, known as ‘sanity’. This swings back and forth crushing to a pulp all of our stupid ideas and thoughts before they can go anywhere dangerous. The best ideas dodge the crusher and come flying out through our mouths, or hands in the case of this here blog post. Usually. Usually…… For if you walk the fine graffiti filled streets of Berlin you’ll see that there are a very high population of people with no internal crusher. Anything can come out at any time, no need to hold back. You’ll spot them easily, on most streets at most times, they’ll be someone just wandering around muttering to himself incoherently. Sometimes a whisper can be directly followed by a SHOUT of nonsense, there are no rules when there is no crusher.

In short, Berlin is base hq of the mental.

2. Customer service is the responsibility of the customer

Germans don’t have a reputation for being the cuddliest of soft bunnies. However retrospectively I see that I was spoilt in Leipzig by the mild indifference I received by the service professionals I encountered. Berlin?! Customer service is an abstract concept still resting in a lost suggestion box somewhere in the town hall. It’s not that people are unfriendly as such, to me that implies that they make the effort to be hostile. Here its more a complete disinterest. Like when a bill you’ve been expecting arrives in the post and you hide it under a pizza box in the hope that if you don’t acknowledge it exists it might go away.

3. Everywhere in Berlin is the new hottest place in Berlin.

Berliners seem to have an overly healthy interested in indentifying where is the current “hottest place in Berlin” at any one particular moment in time. So far I’d say they are doing this without much consensus since everyone keeps telling me a different place is the hottest place. If I were to take the large blue suitcase under my bed, put an ikea lamp in it, spray it in graffiti, break the zip so it didn’t close properly, throw it up a tree in the Treptow park and then put it on immobilien scout as provision frei, casually mentioning that its located in “the new hottest place in berlin”, it’d be rented for 600eur by the end of that very day by a skinny green jeans wearing hipstery in big red plastic sunglasses (assuming the tree was in 1km of a good bio cafe).