Einträge von Rory Maclean

    When I first moved to Berlin I learned that there is a dark side to the German character.  At this time of year it haunts cosy country cottages and minimalist city apartments.  It inveigles itself into the souls of schoolchildren, housewives and politicians.  It perverts clear thinking and clutters shop windows.  It is a love of … Christmas kitsch.



    To me it remains incomprehensible that a people who can design the Porsche 911 and sleek, white ICE trains, who created the Bauhaus and speak at least three languages at birth, want to own miniature wooden figurines, painted in gaudy colours, with flaxen hair, starry skirts and doleful eyes.  Every December these cutesy icons spread their carved angel wings across the land, dive-bombing Christmas markets in Cologne, Dresden and even trendy, international Berlin.  The markets are enchanting for six-year-old children, but why do adults – from the moment they start sipping mulled wine or munching gingerbread men – completely lose their aesthetic sense and buy these folksy archetypes?

    I’m reminded of an erudite and well-travelled Swiss friend who visited me here one Christmas.  I took an afternoon off work to show him some of the sights: the Brandenburg Gate, the Reichstag, the Neues Museum and the East Side Gallery.  We walked, talked and picked our way through Berlin’s remarkable history.   Did he enjoy himself?  Yes.  Was the tour complete?  No.  So what else did he want to see?
    ‘Now I’d like to go to a Weihnachtsmarkt,’ he announced, and my heart sunk.

    Regular readers will recall that my wife loves Berlin’s Christmas markets.  Every year she makes a number of purchases which – shall we say -- disregards the dictum of English designer and craftsman William Morris that one should ‘have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful’.  Of course beauty is in the eye of the beholder and my wife loves the twee, little knick-knacks.  But the discovery of her German side started to take us both to some dark and dubious places.

    So in my hour of need, with my otherwise astute Swiss friend by my side, I humbly asked her to recommend to us a Christmas market.  ‘Gendarmenmarkt,’ she announced without hesitation.



    Gendarmenmarkt is one of the most beautiful squares in Europe.  But come Christmas time, the open space is surrendered to star-topped white tents containing stalls from posh Berlin restaurants, busy craftsmen and bustling bars.  There’s an enormous Christmas tree and live music on the steps of the Concert House.  On sale is every kind of kitsch imaginable.  And if that wasn’t bad enough, the organisers extract an entrance fee from visitors.  Yes, dear readers, you heard me correctly: shoppers are charged for the pleasure of spending their hard-earned money on seasonal tat.  But I am devoted to my friends.  I parted with cash.  And we stepped into the forested, folksy, frozen Hell.

    At first our visit was a trial.  I hated the pipe-smoking wooden shepherds and toothy nut-cracking soldiers.  The oversized snowmen and lady-bird-bedecked ceramic chimney sweeps turned my stomach.  So I turned away from the tacky merchandise, and noticed something truly wonderful.  All around me people were smiling.  An enchanted middle-aged couple held hands.  A young woman’s eyes sparkled as she carefully chose a glittery bauble for her family’s Christmas tree.  The real beauty was in their eyes.

    ‘There is so much kitsch to discover in Germany,’ a friend from Munich once told me.  ‘As a newcomer you’ve only seen 10% of it.’  Naturally Germans aren’t alone in having bad taste.  The English have retro Teasmades and football teamwear.  The Scots have Celtic bookmarks and ceramic Loch Ness monsters.  The urban French have their sentimental attachment to the countryside.  But what about my Swiss friend?  Surely the society which produced Klee, Giacometti and Corbusier would not succumb to such aesthetic poverty.   I asked him to explain.   And as he carefully chose a small wooden Santa Claus figurine I learned the terrible, dark truth.  My friend’s mother was born in Germany.

    After five weeks of talks and not-a-few all-night sessions, Angela Merkel’s conservatives and the centre-left Social Democrats have agreed to form Germany’s next government.  Hallelujah!  At long last.  Now can we get on with the business of saving Europe please?



    The weeks of negotiations have produced a 185 page agreement, which was signed earlier this week by the heads of all three parties: Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union, its Bavarian sister party the Christian Social Union and the Social Democrats.  But while the party bigwigs have been arguing over such pressing issues as autobahn tolls for foreigners and retirement age exemptions, Germany’s European affairs have been handled by — as Timothy Garton Ash points out in the Guardian — a sub-group of the working group on finance called ‘Bank regulation, Europe, Euro’.  For Germany’s political elite, it’s domestic issues that seem to matter, not the imminent threat to Europe.

    In case they haven’t noticed, the 2014 European Parliamentary election campaign has already begun, and it looks set to be a disaster for the established parties.  Marine Le Pen of the French Front National and Geert Wilders of the Dutch Freedom party have formed a sort-of-alliance of the discontented.  At their recent press conference in The Hague, Wilders announced, ‘Today is the beginning of the liberation from the European elite, the monster in Brussels’.  Le Pen chopped in, ‘Patriotic parties…want to give freedom back to our people.’  A few days later other ‘populist’ parties — among them Austria’s Freedom party, Sweden’s Democrats and Italy’s Northern League — pledged to join the fun — with the not-so-secret objective of disembowelling the EU.



    ‘I will be amazed if these parties do not do well in the European elections,’ writes Garton Ash.  ‘I see nothing at all coming from the current leadership in Berlin, Paris or Brussels (forget London) that is likely to reverse an electoral grande cascade.’  He goes on, ‘Partly as a result, this will be the most interesting European election campaign since direct elections to the European parliament began in 1979 – for all across Europe there is the most amazing array of national protest parties.’

    Garton Ash points out that the one thing most of these parties share is their nationalism hence — once in the European Parliament — they may have difficulty in agreeing on much beyond their mutual dislike of the EU.  ‘If they are strongly represented in the European parliament, the immediate effect will be to drive the mainstream socialist, conservative and liberal groupings closer together.’  That in turn could motivate a younger generation of Europeans to defend the achievements that too many of us take for granted.

    As the ‘populist’ parties look set to win between 10% and 25% of the vote, Berlin should now focus on matters more important than whether 40% or 45% of Germany’s electricity should come from renewable sources by 2025.  With the new government finally agreed (subject to approval by SPD members next month), let the work begin on addressing popular discontent in Europe, before it’s too late.

    All the world’s great capitals are enriched by diversity, no where more so than Berlin.  Today tens of thousands of foreigners call the city home, helping to make it such a vibrant, ever-changing place.  What do they make of the city, and how can their insights enrich it for German residents and foreign visitors alike?



    This week Slow Travel Berlin, one of the most respected and popular English-language websites in Berlin, publishes the English-language city guide 100 Favourite Places.  It’s no ordinary where-to-stay where-to-sleep guide but rather the result of the website’s contributors’ passion for and deep knowledge of the city. From century-old cafés and hidden East German watchtowers, to speciality shops and esoteric museums, each entry has been chosen and written in a personal, highly informative style.

    ‘We wanted to create a book that readers could enjoy not only on their current trip to Berlin but also in years to come,’ explained 100 Favourite Places co-editor Marian Ryan.

    Among the places selected are Kreuzberg’s St. Agnes Church-cum-art gallery – destroyed in and rebuilt after the Second World War, now deconsecrated but living on as Johann König’s remarkable contemporary art centre – and Albert Speer’s Schwerbelastungsköper in Schöneberg.  The enormous ‘heavy loading body’ was built in 1941 to determine if the city’s swampy, sandy and unstable ground could support Hitler’s planned Welthauptstadt Germania.  The future capital of the world was to include monumental structures.  As the course of the war turned, the megalomaniac scheme was shelved, thank goodness, and today the gargantuan concrete lump remains one of the city’s most powerful examples of Nazi civic architecture.

    Also mentioned is Café Buchwald, one of my favourite ‘secret’ spots in the city.  ‘Already 160 years old, the café has been owned by the same family since the beginning and run mostly by women, whose pride of craftsmanship when it comes to their cakes is unparalleled,’ writes co-editor Giulia Pines.  ‘At Café Buchwald, guests are encouraged to indulge ... in a certain speciality: the German delicacy known as Baumkuchen. The strange name (it means ‘tree cake’) comes from the tree-like rings that are formed from the process of baking layers of pastry on top of each other...  Buchwald’s rich history and the aura of pride and personality in every bite is something most cafés only dream of.’

    The guide reflects Slow Travel Berlin’s commitment to sustainable travel as well as the city’s self-sufficiency aesthetic.  Every aspect of the book has been handled in-house, from the eye-catching design and full colour photographs to the delightful hand-drawn maps by artist and illustrator Katrin Hagen.



    To visitors and armchair travellers alike, 100 Favourite Places gives the impression of people in the thrall of this city.  ‘Although this is our first foray into publishing, it certainly will not be our last,” said Paul Sullivan, founder and editor of Slow Travel Berlin.  ‘Armed with a committed team of writers and creatives and a passion for exploring the city in new and interesting ways, we plan on making the publishing arm of Slow Travel Berlin a valuable player on the local publishing scene. I feel confident that with 100 Favourite Places, we’re off to a great start.”

    ‘Sorry, Angela,’ US President Barack Obama is thought to have said to the Chancellor during a private telephone call.  After the revelation that the U.S. National Security Agency had eavesdropped on all of Chancellor Merkel’s calls, one would expect nothing less.  So why hasn’t the President made a public apology?  Because of history, politics and big business.



    First, the history. During the Cold War, the Americans and Germans cooperated to counter Soviet expansionism in Europe. West Germany’s foreign intelligence service, the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), worked closely with the CIA, which indeed it had helped to establish after 1945.  Yet at the same time the CIA worried about infiltration of the BND by Soviet and East German spies, which proved to be a well-founded concern.

    Second, the politics.  Terrorism, or the ‘War on Terror’, is the bogeyman of 21st century America.  Arguably its real threat has been exaggerated for political ends.  Today it serves the same function as did Reds under the Bed for an earlier generation.  Fear helps to unite the nation, bonding people together against a common foe, enabling military adventurism.  ‘The War on Terror’ also wins (and loses) votes.  Any apology for the NSA’s fervour in Germany would be seized on by Republicans as an example of Obama ‘going soft on terror’.

    Third, the business. Germany is the world’s third biggest economy with an export surplus bigger than any other country’s except China. It does not, as one Financial Times columnist recently noted, shy away from power politics when it comes to protecting its export industries, such as automobiles and chemicals.  Not only is Germany one of America’s main competitors, its trading interests diverge in relation to countries such as China, Russia and Iran.  The United States will use almost any means to deepen its knowledge of those countries and so bolster its strategic interests.

    But the commercial advantages don’t stop there.  As millions of commuters from Washington’s Beltway to Main Street Dallas know, America now bristles with new, mysterious NSA and Homeland Security office complexes. The Department’s declared mission – as stated on its website -- is ‘to secure the nation from the many threats we face.  This requires the dedication of more than 240,000 employees in jobs that range from aviation and border security to emergency response, from cybersecurity analyst to chemical facility inspector. Our duties are wide-ranging, but our goal is clear -- keeping America safe.’  In the United States security is now big business.

    Chancellor Merkel may have been humiliated by what she called a ‘breach of trust’, and she may have switched her old Nokia mobile for a new, encrypted Blackberry Z10, but she is too shrewd a politician to wait on a public apology from the President.  Instead, she may push for a much more important concession – entry into the ‘Five Eyes’ espionage club.  Since the Second World War, the intelligence agencies of the United States, Britain, Australia, New Zealand and Canada have agreed not to spy on each other, and to work together for common goals.  Such an alliance would help to ease the present distrust between Germany and the US as well as encouraging Germany to take a bigger role in world affairs.



    Perhaps the idea hasn’t occurred yet to the Americans.  In which case, if any reader knows the Chancellor’s number please would you SMS her about this article.  For only then the U.S. will be sure to read it.

    Life is what happens when you are making plans, for advertisers as well as the rest of us.  My favourite advertising disasters have been perpetrated by the likes of Hoover, Pepsi, Panasonic – and now the German airline Lufthansa.



    In 1992 Hoover’s ad gurus came up with a marketing brainwave to give away two free flights to America or Europe with every new vacuum cleaner.  As the flights were worth many times the £100 entry level, some 200,000 Brits bought Hoovers they didn't need or want – and the company was obliged to provide the equivalent of 500 jumbo jets-worth of free flights.  The court cases went on for six years and the fiasco cost the company €60 million.

    About the same time Pepsi’s executives in the Philippines hit on a way to finally beat their arch-rival Coca-Cola, by giving away millions of pesos. Their ingenious plan, dubbed ‘Number Fever’, required participants to collect bottle caps and find a secret three-digit code.  Almost HALF of the country’s population started drinking Pepsi in the hope of winning the one million pesos (about €30,000) first prize.  ‘Number Fever’ was an enormous success.  All Pepsi had to do was to announce the winning number.  The number drawn was 347, which happened to be printed on about 800,000 bottle caps.  As a result thousands of very unhappy Filipinos took to the streets, firebombing Pepsi’s offices and factories (while drinking Coke, of course).

    Then there’s the story of Panasonic’s revolutionary touchy-feely PC launched in Japan in 1996.  For reasons best known to themselves, the company’s marketing team decided to link the product with the American cartoon character Woody Woodpecker, and branded the touch screen with the slogan ‘Touch Woody’.  Blissfully ignorant of the words' sexual connotation, Panasonic then prepared to launch its new PC with a campaign featuring the catchy slogan ‘Touch Woody -- the Internet Pecker’.  

    Now Lufthansa has joined the Advertising Hall of Fame with its bizarre competition to give one lucky Swede the chance to start a new life in Berlin -- if he or she legally changes their name to ‘Klaus-Heidi’.  The prize includes a flight to Berlin, one year’s free use of an apartment with all utilities paid, a bicycle and a German language course.  In addition the apartment is equipped with Lufthansa pyjamas, Lufthansa towels and Lufthansa cutlery.

    The airline’s marketing wizards believed that the competition will tempt more Swedes to fly with them from Sweden to Berlin, along the fiercely competitive budget flight route.

    But earlier this week the competition – which was due to run until November 28th -- was closed to new entries, as a remarkable 38 Swedes have already legally changed their name in the hope of winning the grand prize.

    On Monday a gob-smacked Lufthansa marketing specialist told the Swedish newspaper Dagens Media, ‘We never even imagined that so many people would actually change their names.’  He added that the campaign has spread beyond Sweden’s borders, with Danes, Finns and Norwegians now all demanding not to be left out of the loop.



    Are incentives really necessary to encourage Swedes (or any other nationality) to come to Berlin? Over 3,000 Swedes already live in the city, and in some parts of town there can seem to be a paucity of native Germans. Berlin has always been a city of incomers, with and without Lufthansa’s efforts.  Throughout its history (apart from during the National Socialist years) almost one third of Berliners have been foreign born.  For me, this international mix is one of the qualities that makes Berlin so special, as it is to most Berliners themselves...whether they are named Alexis, Baozhai, Enrico, Gao or even Klaus-Heidi.