My day off

I've been on the job trail today... went to the arbeitsamt (state employment department thingy...) to register as looking for work. Felt very unemployed! I didn't have the right documentation from the Burgerampt (I think), and ended up getting the forms for the dole. Good. Nice to know my german is serving me so well!

However, while not doing very well trying to find a way to earn money, I am doing incredibly well at spending it. Bought the most amazing piece of tiramisu today from an Italian guy outside Hackescher Markt. Nice.

A poem...

Sometimes when I am on my bicycle,
I feel like an icicle.

(composed in situ on the streets of Berlin)

Shelf

I built a shelf in my room for a total of 6.50 Euros. The thing is that I used mayonnaise buckets from work. There's a picture on my photo pages of it. Every day we throw away (well, put into the recycling dumpster - whatever that means°°) at least two of these or the tomato sauce buckets. It's really hard for me to see them go, not just because I love using things that would otherwise go to waste, but more because of working in the townships of Cape Town. There people share communal taps and anything that can hold a reasonable amount of water is very valuable. Something that can hold water and has a lid is even more so. In their first life, the ones here aren't even used to hold paint or other toxic chemicals...

Even in the schools we worked in there, a container like the ones here were super valuable. From using them as watering cans to growing saplings in.

So, I'm glad I could use them for something useful, even though we've got a shower, bath, basin and kitchen sink all with fresh water, hot and cold, at a turn of a tap in our flat.

°° I hope they are recycled, but even if they are, there is all the energy to think of that the process of breaking them down to plastic pellets that can then be used to make more plastic things uses.