i'm going to be a mom

now, pick yourself up the floor and read on.

earlier this week, i was chosen to be an extra in the german version of "ugly betty". and since i'm not the lead, that means i'm attractive, right? and actually i'm not going to have a baby, just the empty carriage that i will have to push around in the background of a scene. which pretty much will make me look like some crazy woman who's going out to steal babies from strangers. but an attractive crazy woman. anyway, it's shooting tomorrow afternoon. so mark it on your calendar and count the days until you'll see me at the emmys :)

perfecting the craft

germans are known all over the world for craftsmanship. but i gotta say that the german screenwriters are definitely taking it to the next level. when i recently translated a screenwriting student's script, the issue of formatting came up and she mentioned that they're being taught at film school to decorate their works with pictures or tissue that give off the feel of the story. which is actually quite a nice idea.

nowadays so many LA screenwriters are disillusioned by the development process, when the producers and director come in and turn their "little miss sunshine" into a 120 million $ bonanza with an alien on board of the VW bus which wont be a VW bus anymore, but a pink hummer instead which then threatens to be blown up at the end of the second act if it wasn't for the chubby little girl who now won't be so chubby anymore since that's a bad role model for kids out there who then will save her family by finally releasing her mutant super powers.

so the idea of giving the screenwriter something to be creative about and call their own and above all stay distracted while other people disfigure their work, should be seriously taken into consideration in hollywood. there can also be no doubt about the heightened artistic merits of a "lord of the rings"-script adorned with hairy hobbit feet.

the only problem i see, is that you can get so easily indulgent with it. i mean, wouldn't have billy wilder gotten a little suspicious of the writer, had he gotten the script for "the lost weekend" with alcohol stains all over the pages? and worse, if james cameron had soaked his "titanic"-script completely in water, nobody would even have been able to read the dialogue - which actually might not have been such a bad thing after all. but i especially see trouble ahead for the young wannabe screenwriter who lines up his holocaust-script with miniature swastikas. NOT GOOD :(

so while i think there's definitely potential there, it might not be a bad idea to keep an eye on the writer's doing. just in case he gets too creative. or even better to just let the director or producers do the handiworks.

still misbehavin' in b-town

if you're an avid reader of this blog, then you might have noticed that i've got quite a talent for acting offensively in the face of authority. if you're not an avid reader of this blog, then you're above all a lazy bastard and should read up the posts "nefertiti rocks" and "airport rebel in the poorhouse" first before proceeding further with this post.

anyway, i continued my museum tour of b-town yesterday by visiting the "gemaeldegalerie" which translated means "gallery of paintings". it's got the old stuff, tizian, rubens, raffael etc. and it's quite an interesting place. in one room they even explain the history of one of their paintings by showing the unrestored version, x-rays that reveal changes in the original concept of the painter and how they fixed the damages the picture endured over the years. and of course you can see the restored version too and it's really quite cool.

but of course i've had another clash with my friends, the museum guards :( since it was quite warm, i took off my jacket and carried it over my arm. which was a problem as the guard told me that i couldn't do that. i was only allowed to tie the jacket around my waist (huh?). anyway, i readily complied - only to commit my next crime a moment later. see, there were lines on the museum floor to keep people at least half a yard away from the paintings. and one of my feet must have accidentally overstepped that line which is essentially the fault of my converse sneakers as they're actually a size too big. so i might not have noticed that my foot stuck into the forbidden area by an inch or two. but the guard noticed right away and jumped and yelled at me as if i had just made an attempt to destroy the museum.

now i've been to the getty center, lacma, british museum and probably two dozen others and i've never ever had problems like that before. and i'm actually planing to go to the louvre or prado this year which now starts to worry me. maybe i'm not ready for the big ones yet? is there maybe a class which i could take to learn the proper museum etiquette?

anyway, i've seen some pretty cool pieces of art there and i elaborate on them in the post below which carries the title "ancient art, interpreted by me" which should actually be a warning in itself. still, enjoy!

ancient art, interpreted by me

well, i gotta say that the pic with the most entertainment value was brueghel's "dutch proverbs". i think it contains over hundred of them and they even had an illustrated board underneath with pointers and explanations. good job, pieter!

another painting that stood out was one of neptune basically being naked, save for a giant shell stuck over his thingie. though i can't quite remember who painted it - or maybe i just forgot to look.

there was also a cool painting that depicted "the ascension of jesus". it basically consisted of a bunch of people praying and looking towards the sky in an adoring manner. and then right in the middle on the top, there was just a pair of big feet. i swear. i guess the rest of jesus had already ascended. it kinda reminded me of that four-toed foot statue in LOST of which nobody knows what it is. but furthermore, it begged the question if the painter started the painting at the bottom and then simply got the proportions wrong or if he had some kind of foot fetish? or maybe he was just being cheeky?

anyway, there were some pieces that i wasn't too impressed with. most of all rembrandt's. his stuff just looked so - brown? i suppose he didn't have the dineros for some bright reds or greens or maybe he just got all the brown paint for a good deal? on the other hand there was somebody who had painted a version of "the last supper" with jesus and his fellas wearing bright, tie-dyed clothes. and combined with their long hair, beards and sandals they looked like a bunch of hippies.

i also had my problems with jan vermeer's "the glass of wine". it depicts a young man holding a bottle of wine and next to him a young girl, her face buried in a large glass of the good stuff. now at first glance, it looked totally innocent. but when i started to closely observe the guy's facial expression, the pic suddenly screamed "date-rape in the making" to me. highly questionable art, if you ask me.

but there you can see, it's not so easy to paint and get it right. high art is difficult, even for dudes like rembrandt and vermeer.

kissing the social loser (aka the teutonic dating style)

the social loser, that would be me. and i'm being all frank here. i've now spent more than three months in b-town and i still don't have any friends. sure, there are my roommates. but i figure they've got to be nice to me to ensure the proper payment of my rent. and my feeling of friendlessness has gotten only worse as i just realized that back in LA i've met a handful of people in just the first month, all of whom i still consider my friends seven years later. no, the problem in LA rather seemed to be that i couldn't get any dates. but here in b-town every time i meet a new friend, they just wanna snog. i guess germans find wallowing in self-pity sexy.

i base this especially on my experiences with two exemplars of the german male. the first one i met online when i was looking for apartments. it turned out that this guy had moved from LA to b-town just a few months prior to me. so we've met up to chat about our experiences over there. he then proceeded to take me to that party at "the big blue" (see post below) in order to introduce me to some of his friends - which he didn't do. instead he started snogging and i -desperate for a friend- snogged back, although it was just so-so. but desperate times ask for desperate measures. and desperate times they were, because already two days later i had to decline his invitation to go to the flea market due to earlier plans. nonetheless i offered to meet up with him another time. but alas, not going to the flea market must be a fatal blow to the german male' s psyche as i've never heard from him again.

then i met eye candy. eye candy was just that, but rather boring to talk to. but i figured he at least did talk to me unlike the rest of the b-town population (3.4 million after all). so i figured why not and started a friendship with him - and then he snogged me. and it wasn't just that, he actually gave me the kiss of death. literally and figurally, as i never heard from him again since and was lying in bed with a heavy flu for the following two weeks.

all of this has made me extremely hesitant to acquire another friend here. and just to clear things up, i had been very adamant of letting those blokes know that what i was looking for is a friend. actually now that i'm rethinking this, i wonder if they didn't find my self-pity sexy at all, but rather looked for a sure way to make me shut up.

gimme the coke!

i've recently read that jack nicholson was allowed to improvise part of his scenes for this year's best pic winner "the departed". and that one such scene was the one in which he throws a handful of coke over the naked bodies of some hookers.

you might now ask yourself why a wholesome girl like myself would bring this up in her so far squeaky-clean blog (check the most recent posting and go "aww"!). well, i think jack might like berlin. a few years ago when i left germany for LA, somebody told me "good luck in sodom!". turns out this person has probably never ventured outside of my provincial home town. in LA people are in bed by midnight (2.15am on the weekends), so they can rise at 6am the next day for their ashtanga yoga class. but here in b-town people go out earliest at midnight and most of them never even seem to hit their beds at all. which begs the question, how they can keep up a lifestyle like this.

well, let me reflect on my first night out here. it happened in late january when an acquaintance invited me out to a night at "the big blue" for its 5-year-anniversary. i happily agreed and it turned out to be a heck of a party. dozens of gorgeous people in gorgeous outfits shaking their booties to dance music which was actually quite bearable. i happily settled in a corner with my friend and watched the bartenders getting more and more undressed over the course of the night. that is, all of them but one. he actually was kinda naked already when i came. at least he wore a skin-colored bodysuit with a furry patch over his crotch and a zipper imitating his butt crack... but while i was soaking in the scenery, i could not help but notice that "the big blue" is actually tiny and orange. well, i guess all of that changes once you've gone through the big door to the left in the back to snort some coke! which to me answered a lot of questions about the party and b-town nightlife right there.

i didn't actually go through the door, but was offered some of the good stuff right there at the bar. guess, they thought i needed to loosen up or something. i happily declined and was promptly asked if i at least would join a bunch of people later at the kitkat-club (where liza did her aerobics in "cabaret"). but since my acquaintance had earlier told me that that club now functions as b-town's most famous swinger-club, i happily declined again. thought it was kinda flattering though.

nonetheless that night i opened my personal berlin snog-fest. but more about that in my next post.

this is knut

he was born in the berlin zoo in december and immediately kicked out by his evil polar bear mom. but i bet she's regretting that big time these days, as her son has had quite a meteoric rise to stardom ever since. in fact, my whole vaterland seems to suffer from knut-fever these days. he's absolutely everywhere. in the papers, on tv, ... the stores are filled with knut-like stuffed animals in all sizes. he's even got his own song and it was reported that knut is suddenly one of the hot baby names in germany. and people will stand in line for hours just to catch a glimpse of him playing outside his home. i myself haven't had the opportunity yet, as a vast amount of school children on their easter break is storming the zoo right now. so i'm being smart and will wait a week or two to get my own date with knut. until then i thought i might just jump on the bandwagon with everyone else and let knut work his fluffy magic on my blog. he is cute, right?

living the biologically correct life

it's time to reflect on the roommate. i've actually got two of them, but my japanese roommate knows about this blog. so i have to be nice to her, since i don't want her to serve me one of those poisonous japanese fish some day. it's not that i don't trust her in general. but you gotta be a little suspicious of her authenticity, knowing that she keeps a vast amount of bavarian sausages stored in the fridge.

no, the one roommate that begs for objectifying is jan-michael. he's one of those typical german alternative men. in his mid-twenties, he's a student of politics and something else which i can't really remember, but it has something to do with new media. whatever that means. he's an only child and doesn't own a TV. he's reading the most liberal newspaper available in germany, is a member of the green party and sleeps in a tent which he has erected in the middle of his bedroom. he's got a double name, damn it. he loves everything "apple" and got the whole apartment hooked up with a wireless connection that affords us to almost do anything over our computers. in fact, the only thing japanese roommate and me are not doing over our computers right now are cooking and taking a shower. but i guess that's just a matter of time...

but his most defining qualities are that he's so very "bio" and an active member of greenpeace. to my clueless american audience; being "bio" means you only eat groceries which have the word "bio" printed on the wrapping. and you lecture other people about the potential damages that can be done to your body by consuming groceries that are not "bio". he's also against microwaves and has posted a "radioactive"-sign in our hallway which was probably stolen from a power plant during some greenpeace mission. now every time i enter our apartment i'm wondering, what is actually radioactive? the wallpaper in our hallway? japanese roommate and me, because we eat food that isn't "bio"? or the whole city of berlin? i don't even wanna think about all the environmental sins those communists committed. or is it even my whole vaterland? are we all gonna implode one day in a giant teutonic nuclear mushroom? that can give a girl some nightmares :(

and don't get me wrong, i haven't used a microwave in years and i'm all for recycling and saving our environment. but where it really gets me is that we've got an original greenpeace calendar in our kitchen which depicts a dead whale. charming, right?

i can only warn any women to stay away from those alternative german men. although i've got to admit, they do seem to try their best to give "bio" a sexy face. jan-michael proudly told me of a greenpeace stunt where he and a bunch of other guys stood in front of the chancellory to demonstrate against chemicals that attack the male sperm. butt-naked they were, save for some made-up fig leaves which had their protest slogans written on them. i'm all for saving the male sperm. pictures of the stunt are floating somewhere on the internet.