Wow, we’re back in San Francisco! We landed exactly one week ago.
For me, it’s been a whirlwind roller coaster of happily seeing friends and family, missing Berlin and my friends there, basking in the beautiful California sunlight and nature, frustration at the terrible public transit and lack of density, and kicking my job search into high gear.
Shortly before we left Berlin, I saw this museum exhibit poster on an advertising column. (We didn’t end up making it to the exhibit, though we had been to a previous exhibit of this famous German artist’s work.) The exhibit is titled Abschied und Anfang – Farewell/Parting and Beginning – which resonated with me as exactly where I was in that moment. Farewell to Berlin, and new beginnings in the US.
Before we left, we had a lovely goodbye weekend, stocking up on good vibes to send us onward to California. On Friday we finally made it to the cute and cozy Yorckschlösschen jazz club down the street from us, with some good friends (and good music!). Saturday we had our “House Cooling” goodbye party (“Abschiedsparty”), with cold ice cream & sorbet of course – and Chinese New Year cake! I was glad to be surrounded by all my Berlin peeps. It’s hard to say goodbye to Berlin, even though I’ve done it multiple times now, so it felt good to see everyone one last time.
Sunday Bryan and I cleaned and packed for most of the day, but in the evening we went to the Stadtbad Neukölln bathhouse, for one last very German experience. Germans are suuuper into bathhouses & saunas, and some are really big – called a Sauna Landschaft, or sauna landscape (I recommend Vabali if you’re ever in town – I could spend whole a day there!). Many gyms have a sauna and a steam room, and for my last couple of months in Berlin I was going to a sauna & steam room at least twice a week after workouts.
Saunas are generally coed and “textile free”. I’ve had one weird experience with that, but otherwise it seems to work out fine, and nobody really thinks about the nudity like they would in the US. There is of course a long German word for doing things nude – usually just abbreviated FKK, which stands for “free body culture”. Most beaches have an FKK area, and all saunas are FKK. No Puritans! Though there are women-only days or women-only areas for women who feel uncomfortable with coed nudity. Apparently there’s no concern about men feeling uncomfortable?
Anyway, that bathhouse is one of the nicest in Berlin, because it was built in the early 1900s and is extra pretty, with ancient Roman-inspired mosaics everywhere. I also like that it’s cheap, operated by the city, and accessible to everyone – it’s a great government service, and one that is hard to imagine existing in the US. Bryan had never been before, so I was glad he got to see it, and it was also great to swim, relax, and get some exercise & blood flow before sitting on an airplane for the better part of a day. The only bad thing about my final weekend is that I forgot to get a pile of sausage to bring back to SF. It’s just not the same here!!
Now that we’re back, we’ve been staying with my sis for a few days while my brother-in-law was traveling, and doing lots of babysitting of my adorable(!!) niece. But we’ll be moving to North Berkeley on Wednesday, at least for a bit. And I’ll be in LA from Feb 7 through President’s Day. If you’d like to meet up in LA or SF, please send me a note! I’d love to see everyone.
As for what comes next – we’ll see! For now, all I know is that we’ve said farewell to Berlin for the moment, and now it’s time for new beginnings here.
