Wow, it’s been a while since my last post! I’m really sorry, but I couldn’t find much time for blogging lately. The world didn’t end either, for my last post I just used the opening song of Code Geass the nice video of which can be watched hereafter:

Generally speaking, my life is quite normal nowadays: the job is fine, the time with Christian is always exciting and I’m fully healthy. However, I feel sometimes a bit apathetic, maybe because I need a short break and just… sleep I also need some new music, new movies, new TV series…
In the meantime I’m organizing my 30th birthday party all my regular readers are invited to. In case you didn’t receive the invitation yet, just click here and confirm your presence.
So far so good…

Cheese

One year ago, when I moved to Amsterdam and I was a bit confused, I spent many afternoons watching one of the best anime ever: Code Geass. Last April the second season started and yesterday I’ve been watching the 18th episode on the way home: very exciting, finally Zero is that mix of rage and violence I loved him for in the first season.

Speaking about Amsterdam, I bought last Friday some rare tickets to travel there by train anytime between mid of August and end of October. It was a special offer by the German railways available only on eBay for a limited time. I wouldn’t have probably even know about this promotion if I wasn’t checking spiegel.de for news about that stupid war in Georgia… It was the right advertisement on the right page at the right time :mrgeen:

What else should I blog about? Nothing really happened lately, to be honest. Christian’s parents are visiting Berlin and I have a stressful program too… They love me so much I have to spend a lot of time with them. Luckily they are also quite independent and I can enjoy some evenings alone with Christian too.

Rathaus

For I’ve not been blogging regularly during the last two weeks, I have some topics which might be quite old but I still want to write about.

On July 26 I celebrated with Christian my 5th year in Berlin. Technically I’ve not been living here for 5 years, because I moved to Amsterdam a bit more than one year ago, but it felt right to celebrate that day anyway. We didn’t do anything special but Christian cooked a very delicious dinner for me I’m wondering whether I’m only attracted by people who can cook very well… The day after we went by train to Stralsund, a town of the hanseatic league 3 hours north of Berlin on the Baltic sea. It’s a very nice area: I felt like being in Gdańsk or Lübeck… Mmm, I’ve been probably visiting too many towns of the league for I’m starting having déjà vu Anyway, we had great time there and we met André, one of Christian’s best friends, who was visiting his parents.

One of the main reasons why I love Berlin is the thin sense of anarchy: no one seems to care about what other people do, as long as they are not annoying. I guess that my neighbors have seen every possible sin through the window of my flat of which I still didn’t fix the curtain but they never complained. They didn’t seem to be bothered either by my neighbor’s loud music at 2am few days ago, when I was forced to call the police to get some sleep before going to the office. I was impressed: Charlottenburg is not Kreuzberg or F’hain…
Apparently not all the German cities are like Berlin, which is why the band Die Ärzte (= the doctors) came up with the song Lasse Redn (= Let them talk) about bad-mouthing. The part of the song I prefer:

Lass die Leute reden und lächle einfach mild,
Die meisten Leute haben ihre Bildung aus der Bild.
Und die besteht nun mal, wer wüsste das nicht,
aus Angst, Hass, Titten und dem Wetterbericht!

Yes, unfortunately, here in Germany many people are educated by reading the newspaper Bild (and its clones), which is only featured by fear, hate, tits and weather forecast (per gli italiani: sì Bild e Libero sono molto simili) The video is also very funny…
Of course bad-mouthing has been always been a big problem everywhere in Italy, which is why my mother told me few days ago that she doesn’t feel comfortable with my piercings… Mmm, but my piercings are quite old: I got the first almost 5 years ago and when she saw the last 3 months ago didn’t complain too much. So why now? I guess for the same reason why she didn’t want me to go to Amsterdam anymore after I was visiting there quite regularly for a couple of months: somebody talked to her… And we had an argument I mean, I love my mother and I’m thankful for her unconditional support, but why are neighbors’ minds sometimes more important than mine? I guess that she will never be a proud mother of a homosexual guy

Leather

The bells of freedom is the title of the official song of the Stockholm EuroPride ‘08. This European gay gathering is the main reason why I’m spending my weekend in the Swedish capital. The other reason is obvious: I love this city Because of some organization problems Christian is not with me, but in Hamburg, for its CSD, host of some friends of his…
Although I didn’t want to fly again with Ryanair I ended up by booking their flights because they were extremely cheap (€30 return) and at almost perfect times: Friday night to Stockholm, Sunday night to Berlin. Unfortunately this also meant I didn’t make to the bear party on Friday because I was in town as late as 1.30am and I was too tired to go dancing.

Saturday morning I texted to Kristian (please note: Kristian, with K not Christian, with Ch), a Swedish guy I was chatting with since more than one year, and we met somewhere close to Slussen (in English, sluice) as early as 11.30am to watch the parade. Now you should know that the parade was supposed to arrive there at 2pm, but people were already taking place in the most beautiful spots and when I arrived there it was very crowded Anyway, I was introduced to some friends, another acquaintance of mine joined us and eventually… we were soaking wet under the rain shower It was sooo bad! Obviously when Peter (Kristian’s bf) and I decided to go to H&M (where else?) to buy some umbrellas, the rain stopped…
The parade was great! Lot of people and as much as 152 floats: almost never ending I made a lot of pictures, which I’m going to post as soon as I’m back home. The English language Swedish newspaper thelocal.se writes:

The parade set off at 1pm from Humlegården in central Stockholm. As always, representatives from Sweden’s different political parties joined the parade, including Cecilia Malmström, Sweden’s Minister of Europe. Other parties represented include the Feminist Initiative and the Pirate Party.

Actually this parade was the most political I’ve ever seen in my life: impressive. Kristian and his friends could even boo to the conservative party while I was dreaming of an Italian gaypride with at least an official recognition… Swedes are spoiled! Of course in Berlin is not much different: groups and associations are also more free to participate to a gay pride, but I never saw church representatives (the Swedish church, in this case) or the group of homosexuals in the army The most touchy part was anyway when the Stolta Föräldrar till Homosexuella Barn passed by: the proud parents of homosexual children. My god they have been cheered by the crowd! I had goosebumps! It was so emotional…

After the parade we went to a diner and then to some friends’ place before joining a bear party on a boat… We soon found out it was much more of a post-orgasmic-chill-out-meet-up than a real party. I don’t want to say that it was boring, but, yeah, ok, it was kinda boring At least I could socialize very easily. Of course some Italians were there too , acquaintances from Denmark and Norway and, surprise surprise, even a Greek guy who uses to live in Amsterdam (dunno if it’s still the case, he kinda hates me, so we don’t speak much with each other).

Now I’m going to meet Thomas, a guy I met yesterday on the boat who regularly visits Berlin. He’s not a bear, but he is Swedish and has blue eyes

People of Berlin

I was not supposed to neglect my blog for almost a week but I’ve been just busy busy busy, especially at work, until yesterday and now I’m trying to fill out the gap since my last post.
Most of you have seen on flickr my picture taken during Obama’s speech at the Siegessäule in Berlin. Unfortunately I didn’t have my camera with me and the digital zoom of my mobile phone, well, sucks But it was nice to take the picture, have it automatically geo-tagged with the integrated GPS and immediately uploaded on flickr. I got a very strong feeling of what the mobile2.0 exactly is.

Anyway… It was a huge event! A lot of people (I still don’t know precisely how many) met at the Siegessäule to listen what Mr. Obama had to say to Berlin. Unfortunately the audio quality was really bad and the audience too noisy and I couldn’t understand everything before I watched the speech again on youtube When I struggled a bit to get closer to the stage I could listen a much better. He mentioned many times the Berlin airlift (Luftbrücke) and indirectly Kennedy and Reagan who made historical speech in the German capital. The Berlin blockade and the simple sentence

Ich bin ein Berliner

are actually terribly dramatic!
Being there was definitively very symbolic: it was something people usually see only on tv. I loved to see people moved by the words of this man, of this rockstar. The Bono Vox of the American politics. It was great.

Museuminsel

This post was supposed to be named after the song Oh My God by Kaiser Chiefs, but I don’t remember why I would say oh, my god in a first place Well, I just watched the new trailer for the next season of Heroes, and… wow! I can’t wait for September 22nd! In the meantime I enjoy my save the cheerleader, save the world-t-shirt

Yesterday I celebrated a party with my colleagues. We first went paddling on dragon boats along the river Spree: it was a fantastic experience especially because of the stunning perspective of (east-)Berlin. Later we went to a very exclusive French place, apparently Brad Pitt’s favorite in town, for a dinner. The menu was quite fancy, with snails, quail’s eggs and some other things I didn’t recognize. It was delicious, without any doubts, but I think that pork didn’t match snails at all and I was horrified to see swordfish with ham sausage! No way! I mean… that’s wrong! La tarte au citron was anyway the best I ever had. My evening was definitively over after two glasses of Finnish vodka…

Le penseur

I was terribly busy last week, mainly because of a series of meetings at Nokia: company’s introduction, legal aspects, employee’s benefits explanations and all this stuff. A lot of Finnish employees were attending too and it was funny to listen to their accent We also had a sort of short cultural introduction, although I didn’t really need it since I already have a couple of Finnish friends.

I spent the whole weekend with Christian. It was really nice: he cooked for me (I’m totally spoiled, I guess I will never learn how to prepare a decent meal), I spent all my money at the boutiques on Ku’damm, I let my nipple piercing being stretched… and the fun suddenly ended I was not expecting that the operation would have been even more painful than getting a new piercing Unfortunately for Christian, I was a bit, let’s say, grumpy for a couple of hours… But the evening was really relaxing, with some good food and a couple of movies.
On Sunday we strolled around Berlin, mainly Gendarmenmarkt, Scheunenviertel, Unter den Linden and Potsdamer Platz. Because of some military parade, Straße des 17. Juni were totally closed and the city felt incredibly empty, it was an awkward feeling. At least I saw the recently (obviously on July 4th) opened American embassy which finally completes the Pariser Platz complex around the Brandenburger Tor, landmark which has been gently forbidden for Mr. Obama’s speech planned for Thursday. They said that only official state representatives are allowed to use the famous spot… He will eventually use the Siegessäule and one million visitors are expected to fill the Tiergarten around it.

Heidelberg

During the weekend I went with Christian, Frank, Manni and his friend Gabina (or Gabi or Gabine, I still don’t understand the best way to name her) to Christian’s hometown, Heidelberg, in southern Germany. I have never been there before, although it’s definitively one of the sweetest German cities.

On Friday afternoon we picked up the car we booked some weeks ago but we immediately had a lot of problems. We were both supposed to be registered as official drivers but eventually my Italian driver license was rejected! They said I could have faked it because the release and expiry date were handwritten. I was furious! No, furious it’s an euphemism… I wanted to go to the police but eventually Christian didn’t mind to drive 1500 km in 3 days

On Saturday we visited Heidelberg which is a really nice town as well as the set of a cruel murder in the anime series Monster… Anyway, we strolled around the center which is of course very touristic and full of Americans who are based there since after WWII. We also climbed 315 steps to the magnificent castle and eventually I could meet Ronin, ilGrisa’s Taiwanese friend I was introduced to while I was visiting New York City.
Late in the afternoon, back at Christian’s parents’ place, we had some coffee and a delicious homemade cheesecake I still didn’t manage to digest After that a huge BBQ. Yes, I definitively put on weight! I don’t even wanna know how much.
At night we went to Connexion, a disco club in Mannheim. It was incredibly fun! The music was really nice (distributed on 5 different dancing floors) and the location terrific: I definitively need to go there again

I like dancing
At the disco
I want blisters
You’re my leader
I wanna ride on a white horse
I want to ride on a white horse

We were back at 6, which meant we could sleep only 5 hours before having breakfast with the family again and leave then already for Berlin Christian and I were exhausted, while Manni and Gabina managed to sleep a bit in the car.
Apparently, Christian’s mother really appreciated me and told him more or less

What are you waiting for? Grab him, you’re not getting younger and I want to see you happy with your man

Wow! I guess I now hold Christian in my grasp

This is my favorite songs from the album Language. Sex. Violence. Other? by Stereophonics and I finally found the right moment to use it I should have written this post yesterday or even the day before, when I was reading about the No Cav Day in Rome and the speech given by Sabina Guzzanti, but I didn’t have much time for my sister was visiting. Non Italian readers probably need a short introduction about the subject. Long story short:

• Berlusconi is for the third time prime minister of Italy
• Biggest part of Italian media are more or less under his control
• Last time he was prime minister he managed to ban at least 2 very popular journalists and 1 comedian from the Italian tv
• Comedians were forced not to talk about politics
• Sabina Guzzanti didn’t follow this rule and was banned too
• Apparently (since the last elections I’m almost alien to Italian politics) some Berlusconi’s phone conversations about this subject were lately intercepted
• Apparently some new ministers’ phone conversations about how to give Berlusconi a satisfying blow job were intercepted too
• Funnily, one of them, Mara Carfagna, once known as showgirl and naked model for some men magazines and calendars, is now minister for equal opportunities (her opinions about women and gays, for instance, probably deserve a separate post )
• Yesterday the lower chamber of the Italian parliament approved a law to let important politicians, such as the prime minister, immune against any lawsuit

Tuesday some people protested against this law which will protect especially Berlusconi and the speech given by Sabina Guzzanti shocked Italy. Readers who can understand Italian may listen to the whole speech in three parts on youtube: 1st part, 2nd part, 3rd part. For the others, I’m going to quote and translate the parts I appreciated the most
Sabina is always at her best not when she attacks Berlusconi, which is quite trivial, but when she attacks the left-wing parties, responsible of almost the same bad management and politics.

When we heard that they were forminng a government supported by only 2 more senators than the right-wing parties we thought “mmm, they probably have a plan” but they didn’t, as usual, the only struggled along

Then she spoke about Ratzinger and how unsustainable are his daily attacks against gays. She was great!

In 20 years Ratzinger will be dead, he will be burning in hell and he will be tortured by top gay demons!

I immediately thought about the tv series Reaper…
But she also had something to say about Italian gays too, who can be, for my experience and personal opinion, the most homophobic:

They accepted, without complaining, to move the gaypride from Rome to Bologna just because in Piazza San Giovanni a group of priests were supposed to have a small concert. Fuck off! would have been the answer in democratic countries.

Actually I can’t really imagine the CSD, even in the catholic Cologne, being canceled or moved for whatever reason.
At some point she finally attacked Berlusconi and Carfagna:

I’m not moralistic, I don’t give a fuck about Berlusconi’s sexual life, but he may not design someone as minister for equal opportunities just because she gave him a blow job! Carfagna, go home!

But the best part came later:

To prepare my shows I ask some of my journalist friends for information about actual problems and I understand them. But if I read newspapers I don’t and f I watch tv I don’t even see where the problems are.

This October I will officially feel old and I won’t be able to die young anymore However, there is one more thing I want to do before I die and maybe before getting too old: visit Bruges, Belgium.
Ok, this is only bullshit, but I needed a way to connect the song by Robbie Williams with the movie I’ve been watching last Saturday: In Bruges (aka Brügge Sehen und Sterben, aka In Bruges - La Coscienza dell’Assassino).
I don’t know how to describe or to rate this movie: for me is simply great, it’s more or less like a British version of Pulp Fiction and the actors, especially Colin Farrell, are superb. Of course this is only my personal opinion, but I’ve been reading some good reviews almost everywhere. The dialogues are excellent: I could quote the entire movie Since I want you go to watch the movie instead of losing time by reading its quotes, I just mention the best one (it was hard to choose, tho):

Ken wants to climb the Bell Tower in Bruges
Ken: Coming up?
Ray: What’s up there?
Ken: The view.
Ray: The view of what? The view of down here? I can see that down here.
Ken: Ray, you are about the worst tourist in the whole world.
Ray: Ken, I grew up in Dublin. I love Dublin. If I grew up on a farm, and was retarded, Bruges might impress me but I didn’t, so it doesn’t.

Ooh, without Colin Farrell’s acting, this line is half as funny (but I embedded the trailer in the post) Actually, Dublin is a shithole. I’m living in Berlin. I love Berlin. If I were still living in Caprino Bergamasco and was retarded, Dublin might impress me but I don’t, so it doesn’t
If you already watched the movie you might enjoy the quotes on imdb… I’m wondering how the movie is when dubbed in German or Italian… mmm, I reject the idea!!! But I must admit I needed some subtitles to understand the British and Irish accents of the main characters… And even with them, I needed sometimes a dictionary or wikipidia to understand better some lines. Like the one about Tottenham. Luckily even Ray says:

Learn another language? I can barely speak English!

During last weekend, as I anticipated in the last post, I’ve been participating to the parade and the party of the 30th Christopher Street Day in Berlin. I had a really great weekend: parties, alcohol (yes, I had some glasses of vodka&orange juice), bears, friends (Krijn was visiting from Amsterdam). It was fun. A bit wet and rainy sometimes, but definitively one of the best CSD so far.

The weekend didn’t start the best way, though, because Christian dumped me. Already. My shortest relationship Even shorter than the one with Jean-Francois, which ended 2 years ago more or less for the same reasons and in the same way. Luckily, after my Amsterdam-cure, I’m now a bit less dramatic (still queen, tho), which is why I just feel fine, although my pride has been definitively hurt (as if it needed to).
Actually I should understand that being a control freak doesn’t allow me to let someone else take too much part of my life. I couldn’t tolerate any perturbation of the universal order I created in my mind
If I read my friend Jörg’s blog, I can understand he’s feeling butterflies in his stomach for James, but I recognize how distant for me those emotions are. I’m a loner.
In fact, I’ve recently done the test Which Film Hero Are You Really? and these are the results:

Hannibal Lecter: 79% Indiana Jones: 75% James Bond: 74% Batman / Bruce Wayne: 70% Jim Levenstein (American Pie): 70% Tony Montana (Scarface): 66% Schrek: 66% Maximus (Gladiator): 66% Neo (Matrix): 65% Yoda (Star Wars): 64% Forrest Gump: 63% Eric Draven (The Crow): 62%

Quid pro quo Clarice…
Quid pro quo

Without a boyfriend I should have more time to blog and post my pictures on flickr, but at work we are really under pressure. My Finnish is improving, btw At least much better than my Japanese, alas: after missing 4 classes I guess I need to repeat the module from the start. Luckily I have ilGrisa who is a good 先生 (sensei)… ありがとう ございます!!!
Anyway, I finally found a great tool for me and my blog readers! Please check it out, because this is a great, great idea! Basically it’s an aggregator which shows on a timeline (there is also a calendar view) my status updates on Facebook and twitter, the pictures I posted on flickr, the music tracks I loved on last.fm and, of course, my blog posts. It has been defined as the blogging platform for lazy people. Perfect, simply perfect. Go now to http://haikus.swurl.com and subscribe to the RSS feed!

It’s gay pride weekend in Berlin, better known as CSD - Christopher Street’s Day, for obvious reasons. It will be the 30th held in Berlin and for the first time after several years, the parade will change its route: it won’t start at Ku’damm but at the Rotes Rathaus, connecting the former East and West part of the city. Will Wowi be there too?
Speaking about Berlin, I had yesterday a meal with Berliner Bouletten (meatballs) and I proudly bought a barbecue sauce by Heinz (the best) to enjoy them better. Today I discovered I should have boycott Heinz because they accepted to ban this tv ad upon protests of only 200 people:

The actors’ British accent is the only reason I see to ban it Apparently the GLBT community may at least watch this one instead:

Another Japanese title for my post: it’s the popular opening song for Neon Genesis Evangelion, A Cruel Angel’s Thesis. In fact, I watched a bit of the new movie, You Are (Not) Alone, yesterday evening while I was trying not to fall asleep because of the jet-lag. I didn’t notice any big changes from the anime series and the previous movies, beside the early introduction of Kaworu and some improved redesign of the angels (especially Ramiel).

As you know I’ve been in New York City last week and visited ilGrisa. I had a very good time: the weather was probably too hot for my standards but the Americans aren’t really environment-friendly and they have a freezing air-con almost everywhere… Now I understand the exact meaning of George W. Bush’s words

We are not giving up our living standards

while refusing to sign for the Kyoto protocol.
New York firmly confirmed the first impression I had of it: chaotic, dirty, decadent, unorganized, untidy, polluted. On the other side, New York is so diverse and international that I could enjoy the best meals and the best shopping time ever Yummy!
For all these reasons I would say that New York is definitively unsustainable: either by the environment or by people.

Among the most freezing places I visited, the MoMA and the P.S.1 - Contemporary Art Center, were alone worth the trip. I didn’t see the Starry Night by Van Gogh, currently in Amsterdam (bad timing ), but I enjoyed the Take your Time exhibition by Olafur Eliasson, a Danish-Icelandic artist who works in Berlin. He is the same guy who has been commissioned to build 4 waterfalls which can be seen as of mid-July in the New Yorker harbor. One of them, under the Brooklyn Bridge, was already working when I was there but I was strictly forbidden to take pictures of.
In the P.S.1 (alone the location is worth a visit) there was also a big exposition of Finnish works, most of them definitively astonishing. One was particularly funny: a series of Complaints Choirs, such as this one in Helsinki

Although I didn’t blog anymore since my weekend break in Tallinn, I’m back in Berlin but ready o fly for one week to New York City. I will visit ilGrisa in his mansion in Brooklyn and I will try to cope with the warm weather (even if it’s not as hot as last week, afaik). A stop at the Chinatown Ice Cream Factory might be useful, or, at least, delicious. Yummy! I also might consider to sleep for one week and refuel a bit of energy. If I feel bored I can always go shopping
Today I went to the drugstore to buy some pills that might help me getting some sleep during the flight. Let’s see whether they work or not. I probably have to get drunk to sleep the best. Mmm, I still have that bottle of Vana Tallinn at home…

This is the Estonian translation for Sex and the City as I understood yesterday on a newspaper and as I checked today on wikipedia to be sure I was right. Of course I was Anyway, seks was easy to understand (especially for me) and I already knew that linn means town, because Tallinn originally means Danish town. You don’t need anything more to guess that I am in Tallinn, Estonia, with Elisa and her boyfriend David…
Yesterday we enjoyed some nightlife and light blue sky at midnight, while we strolled around the old town today all other tourists. This is why we are really tired now and we are already going to sleep. Tomorrow we probably go to the beach for a walk, certainly not to swim because it’s definitively too cold. I love it: cold wind during sunny looong days makes the air really clean and visiting around is very pleasant.