This is one of my recipes to get into a good mood instantly: looking at pictures of Madonna and Sean Penn. It’s totally useless for other people, but for me there is “something”. Back then, as a couple they had this aura of a huge firecracker, that could [more]
This year Turkey is different, Germany not. There is the Gezi movement and the audacity of becoming citoyens, the joyful youth creating a laboratory of borderless democracy in the middle of a park, relieved by the experience of leaving constant crisis behind, standing as free individuals like a [more]
We had dinner in the Italia in Zurich. I don’t go there too often, but I like it. It was probably one of the last nights you could sit outside this year (I also had a swim in the early evening in the Limmat which was surprisingly nice). [more]
It was a cold morning when I met Pussy Riot, in the basement of a bookstore not far from a subway station where a man waited for me by the stairs. He did not talk much on the way, his English was poor, my Russian non-existent. I was [more]
Here in Lichtenberg the money is on the road. And meat. And you find huge insects. In the dense forests. (here: Fennpfuhl).
Stuttgart, mit Sonne im Rücken. Ein Hemd wird’s werden. Ein Riesenhemd:
Let*s listen to something so essential. It is hard to find any musician*s biography which is so tragic, existentially dreadful, dangerous, negative and yet so important as the one of Dmirtri Shostakovich. Having been a composer of such a genius, power and truth, he suffered so much under [more]
Ich weiss nicht was soll es bedeuten Aber irgendwas stimmt mit den Leuten nicht Ich glaube daß wir in Sünde leben Und Gott läßt bald die Erde beben Scheisse hier scheisse da, es verschissen Jahr für Jahr Und ich sage euch die Wahrheit Endlich heute voller Klarheit Neue [more]
Day, 24, pick 24, today it doesn’t add up. TMI, broken Links, if you are on “Schnupfen” on Wikipedia, what I suffer from these days––a cold––, and press English to change the language, you get this: “…insufflation and exsufflation are ritual acts of blowing, breathing, hissing, or puffing [more]
MoL while researching its project Fragments of the Lost Library was struck by how in the old days of book-hunting and physical search bargains were still to be had. With the internet, everyone knows the price. Most paperbacks are available for under one euro. A hardback first edition [more]
Breakfast: “I can’t imagine you working for someone…at least not for very long.” Lunch: “He asked me to wear a butt plug and text him throughout the day.” Dinner: “Can I have broccoli rabe, shrimp ceviche, and can you make an iced decaf coffee?”
I dreamt I was foraging through the woods, close to the sea. The ground was strewn with flotsam, rotten chunks of wood cracking under my feet, some trees flattened, reminding me of the Tunguska event of 1908. I wasn’t alone, but I can’t remember who I was with. [more]
As Told by the Holy Woman in Her Own Words A Hundred or So Years after the End of the World How I was granted my wish to die but came back unexpectedly and created havoc So I grew sick in my body not, as many people did, [more]
It’s monday night in Bra, the last day of the CHEESE exhibition. Cheesemakers are happy and tired and a bit drunk too… And so is the Slow Food crew who made the event. The whole town looks like a party house as soon as the guests are gone. [more]
Ok. Another Miley C. day. Now she is “On the cover of the Rolling Stone”. And how. Like a skinhead hip hop vixen, licking her expensive hollywood pool water from one shoulder. I am conflicted. It seems weird to criticise Miley. She is a pop star and needs attention. [more]
If it was bad before, it is worse afterwards. The major political parties in Germany had more or less given up the game of politics heading towards the elections, now they refuse to even consider doing the possible, thinking the realistic, enlarging the field of options instead of [more]
I drove through Berlin today. To the far East. Listening to the radio. It was grey and it was raining. I haven’t been listening to German radio for years. They played commercials, I don’t remember what for. It doesn’t make any difference. It’s about the jingles. They were [more]
I once was participating in an ecological project on the West coast of Mexico. We were saving turtle eggs, mainly from the hawksbill sea turtle (“Karettschildkröte” in German, which sounds much more interesting), as turtle eggs are a delicacy in Mexico (and supposedly good for your virility). Very [more]
Three members of the CDU singing Tage Wie Diese/ Days Like These by the band Die Toten Hosen: Kein Ende in Sicht Kein Ende in Sicht Kein Ende in Sicht No end in sight No end in sight No end in sight
The song. The one and only song. The lyrics … But most importantly: the one and only singer. Here we realise that indeed he was one of the greatest musicians of all time, no matter which kind of music we think of. And we realise that Gordon Jenkins [more]
Da schaut man sich die Wahlergebnisse an und wundert sich eigentlich nicht über den Ausgang nach sinnlosem Beginn. Es ist die Zeit der Rücktritte und Abgänge, Abdankungen und Abgesänge. Gestern noch im Weltgeschehen, heute schon ohne Mitleid zur Pappfigur verdammt. Stunde Null, Abwicklungen, Neuordnungen, wer will das alles [more]
MoL learned three things today. 1) On the London tube they no longer say “Mind the gap” — three of the finest words in the language — they now say “Please mind the gap between the carriage and the platform,” as if the gap could be anywhere else. [more]
We don’t know what exactly happened, but it did happen. A couple of days ago we had an earthquake here in Vienna. Now I ask myself: Was it really an earthquake? In its epicentre it had an intensity of 4.8. on the Richter scale. However, nobody took notice [more]
Contemporary Germany is a very strange place. It dominates the European Union with iron inflexibility but it refuses to assume the role of the benevolent hegemon. Its chancellor –unlike any other leader of a major European country since the beginning of the sovereign debt crisis– has been brilliantly [more]
The Park, 1914 by Paul Klee. Paul Klee was born in December 1879, in Switzerland; his father was a German music teacher, his mother a Swiss singer. Ida Marie Klee, née Frick. Klee got deep into color theory. His lectures Writings on Form and Design Theory are extraordinary. [more]
In these latest few months I can’t manage to stay in Rome for more than one consecutive week, for different reasons: festivals, holidays, work, family, whatever. It’s sunday and me and Valentina have to wake up early (hangover include) to take a train to our hometown, Bra, in [more]
For the Fall/Winter Men’s Issue of one of China’s biggest lifestyle magazines – Modern Weekly -, I conducted an email conversation with media philosopher Erich Hörl. He is one of the philosophers currently involved in the ongoing Anthropocene Project at Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin, as well as the author of a text published in the catalogue [more]
As Told by the Holy Woman in Her Own Words A Hundred or So Years after the End of the World … After losing our mother and father within months of each other, my two sisters and I decided to set up our home after the manner of [more]
Kevin Spacey. The Giant. I met Kevin Spacey this morning to talk about “House of Cards” and all I could think of was his bracelet. I got obsessed with it. It was blue, rubber gum and it said “Be strong” (in neon yellow). He shook his hand up [more]
24 is a good number. It’s my cue to stepping in between these squares on the screen, like desks in a classroom, where everyone is digging little tunnels and wondering what will appear on the other side. Maybe like anyone else I started being myself when I found [more]
We took a cab to the election party of the SPD. The result, this much was clear after the first forecast at six pm., would be unpleasant for the Social-Democrats. And at the Lindengarten, another very German pub where politics is being made in this country, the mood [more]
I was moderating (just as a sidekick, not the whole event) today our institute’s 75th anniversary at ETH Zurich (with Josef Ackermann, Swiss Federal Counsil Schneider-Ammann, SNB President Thomas Jordan among others). Whereas I thought my jokes were pretty funny (in a Larry David way of being pretty [more]
aber mit Direktkontakt zum Boden, auf dem es sich gerade befindet.
Elektrokohle Lichtenberg was founded in 1872, under the name Siemens Gebr & Co. During the First and Second World Wars Siemens & Co. was a major armament factory. After the end of the war it transformed into a Soviet corporation (SAG) and was held in trust. In 1954, [more]
Musik, die heilt, die berührt, die aufwühlt, die mitnimmt. Musik, die einen Standpunkt erzwingt und stärker ist als … Ja, was eigentlich? Das ist für mich das Heiligste, was es an Musik gibt … http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4pA5Nuj2NOY&feature=youtu.be
“Machen wir ´ne Herrentour, an die schöne Ahr, trinken wir Burgunder nur, das ist sonnenklar.” Vor allem jene vom Weingut Jaen Stodden in Rech, wo in Finesse und feiner Auslese wunderbare Spätburgunder gelingen. Lagerfähige Weine mit guter Struktur, in traditioneller Machart und langer Reifung im Holz sind was [more]
As Told by the Holy Woman in Her Own Words A Hundred or So Years after the End of the World The circumstances surrounding my first death At the time of my first death I was twenty years old. I lived with my two sisters in a rustic [more]
Last night we went to party with HBO. Amazing party room, everything was done in peacock feather colour. Interior designer Billy Butchkavitz knows, that Hollywood does NOT appreciate any kind of understatement. HBO won, big time, Jeff Daniels ran around like a crazy person, as he got the [more]