OK, so I wish I could call this post "Lesbian Bar-Hopping in Berlin," but alas, it was not meant to be. As I've been traveling around Europe, I've been trying to check out the lesbian bar/club scene in the various cities I've been in, with varying luck. I'm doing it as a part of my ongoing campaign for self-improvement, in that I figure being comfortable going up to people and starting a conversation or dancing with them at a bar is an important life skill that I am pretty much lacking at the moment. And what better place to practice this skill than in foreign countries where I never have to see the people again if I make a complete ass out of myself, right? Right. So that's the back story.
So here I am now in Berlin. I've been trying out all the different guidebook brands, so I have a Time Out guidebook for Berlin. I also have a section from this guidebook called the Damron Women's Traveler that lists lesbian bars and clubs around the world. So I looked through these two books and made a game plan for what looked promising. The only problem is that neither of my books marks the exact location of the places on a map, they just give the street name and the nearest metro stop. This later proves problematic. But we'll get to that...
Before I leave the hostel this morning I look up all the streets and mark them on my map and pat myself on the back for being so well-prepared and organized. I hit a lot of the major touristy locations yesterday, so the plan is to hit up various touristy spots that are still on my hit list, stop for a break at a lesbian cafe, and then go to some museums, as all the museums on the Museum Island are free from 6-10pm on Thursdays. Then I figured I'd head out again and check out a dyke bar or two. Well, despite getting off to a bit of a late start after running errands, the touristy things went well; I saw Potsdamer Platz (lots of fancy new buildings), the Topographie des Terrors (another exhibit on how the Nazis were crazy), and the Jewish Museum (the place was architecturally stunning. The actual exhibit was kind of meh).
Next on the agenda is a lesbian cafe. I pick one in Kreuzberg, which is also supposed to be a women's center and have information about various things going on in the city. Great! I think, they'll have to talk to me, it's their job! I get off the U-Bahn at Kottbusser Tor, and look for Mariannenstrasse. The Schoko Cafe is supposed to be at #6, but as I walk from the end of the street, all the numbers are only going up from 31. It takes me a couple of times around the block, past lots of Turkish travel agencies and restaurants, to realize that the numbers are going up on one side of the street, but down on the other side! Aha! Apparently it started at 1 on the left side of the street three blocks ahead, went all the way up to 30 at the end of the street where I was, and then started from 31 going back down the right side. So I found the place, where there is supposed to be a courtyard with a cafe that opens at 5pm. Having wandered around for so long, it's now 6:30, and there's a courtyard, no cafe, but lots of flyers in German and closed and locked doors to the building. Great. But I recognized Oranienstrasse, which I had passed several times, because I remember reading that it was one of the main drags of Kreuzberg. I walked up and down it until I found a cool kind of hippy-ish Moroccan cafe with a cute waitress from Poland and finally got some food.
So next is round two, after the museum hopping. Side note, the Pergamonmuseum is ridiculous! They have the entire f-ing Gates of Ishtar. Not to mention, you know, the Pergamon (basically a huge temple completely transported from Greece and set back up inside the museum). Wow. The famous bust of Nefertiti in the Altes Museum was more hyped but way less impressive.
Anyhoo, so I picked a bar to go to first that is listed as "talkative." I figure I can ease in that way rather than having to go to a pounding club first thing off. It's called the Neue Bar, on Knesebeckstrasse near the Savigny Park S-bahn station(in Charlottenburg, past the Zoo), or so the books tell me. After some doner kebab outside the S-bahn station, I have two ways that I can pick to go down Knesebeckstrasse. The book has also usefully omitted the street number for this one. So I walk all the way down Knesebeckstrasse to the North until it ends. Lots of upscale restaurants and middle-aged Spanish tourists, but no dyke bars. So I walk all the way down Knessebeckstrasse to the south until it ends. Fancy shops (long closed by this point), but no dyke bars. Great. Strike two. But I crossed Kurfurstendamm twice, and I also recognized that street from my book as supposed to be a main drag in Charlottenburg, kind of the old capitalistic glory street of West Berlin if I remember correctly. Now it just has all the big fancy brand name stores that you can find anywhere; in fact it eerily reminds me of the analogous street in Shanghai (I even checked twice to make sure that the signs weren't in Chinese).
So I walk down Kurfurstendamm to the U-bahn stop there, thinking I will try another dyke bar. I am really determined by now to actually find a lesbian bar that exists. I don't need to talk to anyone, I don't need people to be nice to me, I just want a bar and for lesbians to be there and for me to be there and for me to have a drink. Is that so much to ask?
By this point I have been fruitlessly wandering around for 2 hours and it is midnight. To add to things, I am too busy feeling deep disdain for the group of Americans who drunkenly board the train and start singing "Always look on the Bright Side of Life" to notice my stop going by, and I have to get off and take the train back one stop. It's 10 minutes waiting for the train back, and 10 minutes waiting for the connection down to Platz der Luftbrucke, in southern Kreuzberg. I am heading for Serene Bar, which my book assures me has a popular ladies night on Thursdays, and is located at #2 Schwiebusser Strasse. Well, I get off the subway and am in the middle of f-ing nowhere. It's all very leafy and residential looking and there is hardly any light penetrating from the street lamps. The map in the book indicates I need to walk north up Mehringdamm to Schwiebusser Strass, which of course means that it was immediately behind me to the south, which I found out after another expedition four blocks down the street the wrong way. But when I get to Schwiebusser Strass, it is not very promising either. Mehringdamm may have been mostly dead, but there is not a single person on this street. I decide to give it a chance (I have the street number and all this time!), and start walking down the street.
It is not looking great, as there seem to only be apartment complexes on this street and it is deathly quiet. The numbers are going down slowly, but the apartment complexes are spaced out pretty far from each other. The area kind of reminds me of an area near my house, and I take some comfort in that until I remember that there was a guy who got mugged and whacked over the head in the area near my house and nobody found him until the next morning (because who is going to go outside at night in a nice leafy residential neighborhood?), by which time he had bled to death. I am at number 12 by this point, and there is a large dimly lit patch of trees and grass ahead to the side, looking like it could be teeming full of muggers and head-whackers. Plus the whole area is absolutely silent and I still haven't seen anyone else since I turned down the street. If there was a happening bar ahead I would have heard it by now, right? So I turn back around and run back to the U-bahn station. Which is closed.
I had checked that the night line of the U-bahn ran along the line I was taking, but what I hadn't seen was that it ran... from two stops north of where I was. But when I had walked north along Mehringdamm looking for Schwiebusser Strasse, I had seen Barbie Bar. I remembered the name from my book, but had written it off because I figured it was mostly for guys (based on the name). And I couldn't help but notice it when I walked down the street, because it is the only open establishment that I have passed the entire time. I quickly made my way in there, and had a drink with all of the gayboys winding down their night, accompanied by kitschy 70's decor including (you guessed it) a variety of vintage collector Barbies lining the walls.
From here, I figured I'd walk up the street until I got to the U-bahn station that was still running, but along the way I saw a bus sign advertising the N42 to Alexander Platz via Hackescher Markt. Hackescher Markt! Alexander Platz! I knew these places! I lived near these places! And I remembered reading that buses with N in front mean they run at night until 5am. And the schedule revealed that one was coming in 10 minutes. Score. For a second I had delusions of going to Roses, which I had read was a late-night bar that people go to after everywhere else closes. But with all of the limited transport and my track record that day, I figured I would give up the dream. For the night anyway. And I got a lovely slow night tour of the city on the bus, which took an extremely circuitous route and stopped every minute.
So, 3 strikes in one day. But on the upside, I did end up stumbling across and exploring several different areas of town that I might not have otherwise seen, albeit inadvertantly. But the take-away was that 1) My books SUCK, and 2) It is worth the 30 minutes finding and using an internet cafe to look these places up and make sure they exist before I go and spend 5 hours walking around town looking for them. Also 3) If there is some uncertainty in the directions and it is possible for me to turn the wrong way down a street, I will. Guaranteed.
Sigh. Here's hoping tonight goes better. It's pouring buckets so I thought I'd chill out and write this post before I went and got myself drenched. Worst comes to worst, I'll be hanging out with Annie in Zurich tomorrow, so that should be a good time.
P.S. What does Rathaus mean? Every time I see that on the transit map and thinking it probably means palace or something, but I always just think Rat House.
P.P.S. I didn't realize how California-ized I've become until the hostel I'm staying at had yoghurt, honey, granola, and dried raisins for breakfast and I got really excited.
P.P.P.S. I just looked up the nonexistant bars they sent me to online: Neue Bar does exist, but not at the address they gave me (in fact nowhere near there, like across town), and Serene Bar does exist, but was closed yesterday. Schoko Fabrik exists as a womens' center, but there is no Schoko Cafe anymore. Amazing what a little internet research can do.
