East Berlin

Here I am in Berlin - for the most part, East Berlin to be exact. Wintry bare trees, brick and concrete, grey skies, everything bleak and muted. Ah, I love it. I'd also forgotten one other thing I love about Europe - sparkling water. You can get it ANYWHERE.

The Berlinale and the Berlin Talent Campus got off to a running start for me. Lots of great panels and talks, and also screenings I am trying to squeeze in in between. Everything is bustling and crowded, yet very chill. It's a good vibe to have in such a big festival. It's also nice that it's so big because you're always running into friends or meeting lots of interesting new people.

So far, I've sampled some German cuisine (including the must-have Currywurst). This pretty much means eating lots of sausages. Not that I'm complaining. But it's become a daily challenge to find vegetables to eat. Any vegetable. Anything that isn't a sausage.

Many people say that Berlin has uninteresting cuisine but this much I'll say: it has the Best Bread in the world. And today, we went to KaDeWe and had us the BEST HOT CHOCOLATE IN THE WORLD. The. Best. (Thanks for the tip, Grace!)



Besides the food, my two favourite moments so far have been listening to separate talks by Stephen Daldry and Mike Leigh. Lots of great insight from both. I love the no-nonsense, get on with it, British sensibility they both have as well. No room for indulging ultra-Method actors... ha! Mike Leigh said, in closing: "I'm going to give you some advice, even though no one asked for it, so clearly you don't want any, but here it is: Never Compromise".