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One of Anselm Kiefer's powerful works in the main hall of Hamburger Bainhoff.

Hirst's 'The Void' at Hamburger Bainhoff.

Me, the Reichstag and Berliner Sun.

Dimitri and Marina, on our way back home from Kreuzberg.

The Punk Rock house near Meiringer Hostel.

Germany was quite an experience, meeting people, Documenta 12, Melhus, BauHaus (Thirsty smell in Malay), Open Space and Brothers Grimm. Walking aimlessly in Berlin, meeting curators and art talkers. I got to Hitler’s bunk, smell the Berlin Wall and cherished the sun with the rest of the sun craving Berliners.

Sleeping in dorms, waking up with a smelly naked couple on the foot of my bed. Just to let you know, German timing is precise, if you miss the train, that’s it, go get another ticket. That was what happened to us on the way to Kassel, well, one of the staff led us to a wrong platform, and that’s it, we had to say goodbye to our 50euro ticket and purchase another 70euro ticket.

My advise for those of you who are in Germany craving for Asian food, do not eat in any restaurant with these words on their door’ ‘Asian Imbiss’. It’s a con job, they just throw anything that taste Asian into the wok convincingly and call it Asian food. So basically, all these Germans got a taste of Asian food.

Ok unfortunately, I have to admit, Singapore is a food paradise. When I came back, I had to look for hardcore spicy food, for 2 weeks I had to endure eating rabbit/cowboy meal day in day out.

On my last night, Truong brought me to a Berlin karaoke place, ok, there are 4 karaoke pubs in Berlin. 3 are own by the Koreans, and they only do only Korean songs, so we went to the only rocking karaoke place in Kreuzberg (the place where they shot Run Lola Run).

All they had was a room with no ventilation (really, no ventilation at all), many Europeans don’t own fans in the summer and I don’t know why, a small 14 inch tv with text of the songs and a small mixer for the microphones. Lo-fi and strange, as I passed by other rooms, I saw a group of people in standing position banging their heads and singing to ‘Smell Like Teen Spirit’. It was the weirdest karaoke pub I have ever seen, this is quite on par to the one I went in Hanoi, where the deco was like someone’s living room.

Kassel is a beautiful town, from what I heard if there is no Documenta, the town is dead. Truly, shops close by 6pm, except for some random cafes. Documenta was quite an experience; most of the works were exceptionally good, especially in the nue gallerie. Some of them were didactic, while some were purely aesthetic, but after Venice, I felt I’ve had enough to see. It is like if you like to eat apples, and you are given 2 basket full of apples to finish within a day.

Open Space was an experience, hanging out with students from Finland, Israel, Scotland, Chicago and Taipei. Sharing works and ideas, sitting in front of the fire explaining the geography of Singapore over and over again. But it got really cold in Kassel, the temperature went down to 11 degrees, though there were sun at times…to the Finnish, Scottish, and Americans it was warm.

Now I have to prepare for Darwin this week, for the Interposition, a Performance Art Festival. I am not sure what to expect from Darwin, but hopefully everything will be good.