Wurgeengel meets its nemesis

Originally uploaded by Andrei Singer

There are few places one can go and from the very first time to feel at home. When it comes to bars it is getting close to impossible. Most are true horrors when it comes to drinks and many are short on atmosphere. When you consider the patrons as well it gets hard to find a bar that is indeed special. I have a very short list of favorites with most falling in the category of bars doing one thing great: one particular drink, one great presence behind the bar, music, design, crowd. Then there are even fewer that excel at everything and are the perfect Bar! Some of those on my list include: Archiduc in Brussels, Schuman's in Munich, The Hemingway Bar in Paris, Caprice and Limbo in Boston (but I hear these two went south). The common thing is that these all are rather small places. Berlin's Windhorst just made it on the list. The owner/bartender is doing some very special and rare magic in this little place. Crammed between two large buildings on a side street crossing Friederich Strasse, Windhorst is arguably the best cocktail bar Berlin has to offer. For some reason it reminded me of another favorite in the city the Wurgeengel though the two places couldn't be more different in size, location and appearance. After talking to the bartender now I know why: he worked there for many years. The attention to detail in this place is akin to a fine and lost art. The selection of spirits, the perfectly and tastefully selected bar list that is in itself an object of beauty with its book-cloth binding and superb paper, all are just a hint to the perfectionist, detail fanatic, while minimalist in gestures, ritual of making a drink that Windhorst displays. Double frozen ice, elegant Boston shakers, fresh fruit and juice and a diversity of ingredients that is also reflected in two sections of the list that are rarely found in small bars: old forgotten classics with rye whisky and an extremely generous and imaginative non-alcoholic drinks. All these preparatory steps being taken one reaches the apex of the Windhorst experience: the perfection of preparation that justifies all of the above. The party of six I joined occupied the entire bar-front and couldn't be more different in tastes. Three rounds of cocktails later we were all tipsy but enchanted. To complement this Windhorst offers a music selection that matches the sophistication of his drinks. A vinyl collection heavy on old-time R&B, soul, jazz and newly resurrected groove. King Brit meets K&D. We said our goodbyes on Belleruche ... try it.

Angel Esterminador

Originally uploaded by Andrei Singer

This is it! The weirdness of it all. Life as a social species. Trying so fucking hard ... no escape and no resolution. Determined to keep rolling and destroying everything and everybody-else. We are all alike we are not identical. We escape the rules but we make new ones. No escape of being executioners. We all take turns and we regret not having done enough ... Are we good enough?

To leave Istanbul

To leave Istanbul one has many choices. There is the train right from beneath the streets of Sirkeci at the nexus between the Golden Horn and Bosporus. Reminiscences of the Orient Express are of course excused and thoroughly justified. Then there is the soulless and practical option of taking an international flight but the real beauty comes in the form of the divers choice of ferries to all imaginable destinations in the Bosporus and beyond in the Med and Black Sea. I like how Kara Deniz sounds ... But then Istanbul is so big that like in NY one has the option to turn around, regret, hesitate for a long, long time as the city stretches all over the shores for miles. It is all Istanbul, bridges, ships, shores, waves, hills, lights, mosques and minarets, red flags, shops. All alive and bustling with Istanbulus always erratic, always busy, always away ... traveling in their own city. And us ... coming and going. Returning is not an option is a disease.

Mumbai

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2008/11/28/world/20081128-Mumbai/index.html

For our American friends but then again Romania also votes in November

Huzun iz a color

Originally uploaded by Andrei Singer

As much as blues is a feeling, huzun is a color. One only has to spend a few days in Istanbul and quickly realizes that a patter appears. The yellow grey buildings, the faded yellow gray marble, the pigeon blood red tulips on beautiful plates, and the red flowing on every mast make out a map. Orange juice, and orange hidjabs spice up the mix but ultimately everything is reflected, connected, changed by the eternal Bosphorus blue. It is a blue of many shades: almost black in the evening, bright dark turquoise on some mornings and silvery blue very early when the ferries start their daily trips. One cannot rest immune to all this. Only very few days are in fact necessary to make a total stranger into an Istanbulu of sorts. You develop a habit. You follow a daily routine that is as much about unpredictable as about the constant ebb and flow of things and people, the sea and the seagulls. Have some tea, strong and intense as the pungent smell of the roses up on the high terrace between Top Kapi and the Bosporus. You can see Asia and smell its wind. You feel the Empire. Of all the little tea-houses and cafes I discovered in Istanbul - there must be thousands – my favorites where hidden in old cemeteries. No beer is served here as they sleep – this is holly ground my friend! But arkadash you should try the narghile it is good, it cleanses the soul. One more coffee and you are just a bit closer of understanding Huzun.

Italian Connection

Originally uploaded by Andrei Singer

Mobile communications have come to define our lives. All walks of life and all cultures alike. It is this universal equalizer of kinds not yet fully democratic and universal but certainly a powerful force. It may be true that different people use if for different things but still, on a brilliantly sunny morning in Pisa I couldn't stop thinking how it shows we ultimately are all the same. The chic dress, the expensive suit or the refugee kit all cover the same need for contact, for information. The basic desire to stay in touch, to be in the know, or to just chatter casually and thus manifest ourselves as identity a individual belonging to a communicating society. mobile comms have changed the world in many ways one being that distance has become less relevant and time more relative. Now everything is immediate, instant, pressing. We all rich and poor. young and old, men and women have so much less time as we are expected to be reachable and available all the time. As we come to expect instant access to all. From China to Africa and from NY to Pisa everywhere I go, people these days seam more prone to talk to somebody distant over their cellphones then to somebody just inches away. Is it ultimately a good thing? Remains to be seen how society deals with its immense and intense implications. I personally hate it as much as I love the efficiency of it. Just days ago I left my phone at home for almost an entire day. I was shocked what a loss I felt at the beginning - almost feeling handicapped somehow. I tremendously enjoyed the bliss of not being bothered an entire day and having time to reflect, write and read a bit.

The Earring

Paris is a romantic city only on surface. One just looks out the
window and falls for its charm. The entire city wants so hard to be
seen and enjoyed. There is so much ma's tu vue in its locals but it
is not the same self obsessed snobbery one finds in Milan, London or
any other big city. I mean there is plenty of that as well but there
is a plus laking elswere. In Paris people like to watch as well. It
becomes an elegant dialogue instead of solipsistic and narcissistic
monologues. Were else are all the wicker chairs on terraces turned
theater like towards the street? Being seen and watched is part of
the game. So, women are naturally coquette regardless of their age
and beauty. Men are charmers and politeness often turns into flattery
and what French call draguee. Here everybody does it. Even the
emigrant North African kid with his bright white trainers or the East
European semi-thug with his gold chain over his turtleneck. Here
also snobbery gets a certain panache. Maybe it is just me that is
more generous with a city were everybody speaks French and were women
wear tightly wrapped and short raincoats over legs in slick black
stockings and high heels. And were else on a casual Friday night
drinking in a bar one should not the least be surprised at having the
place (Mathi's Bar) taken over by a merry group of women and men in
pompadour period costumes and matching manners. It is a tough city
were no one should venture without a bit of frenzy, insanity or
accompanied by a willing partner. Solitude in Paris must be hard.
Love and passion are not the city's real currency but lust and
enjoyment. Joie de vivre! Love and passion are private matters for
witch Paris and most Parisians have little curiosity and interest.
Exploring life's finer things from food to sex is the code they abide
to. And who could blame them. What can be wrong in this ultimately
decadent world (ours not just Paris) in drinking champagne on top of
the bed at 4:00 in the morning. Paris is a city where not only
reality is better then the clishe it represents but where one can
enjoy the clishes without any feeling of guilt. In Paris it not in
bad taste to fell good. In Paris one should not mix politics and
pleasure and hence even extreme leftists can write books about the
true democracy of the orgasm or the haute cuisine. Or maybe it is
just not a good idea for someone to read Michele Onfray and drink
expensive champagne or have breakfast at 12:00 at Cafe de Flore in
Saint Germain. Ok, I admit a general strike hitting the Paris metro
on a freezing weekend and a bit of high life may confuse my personal
political outlook temporarily as it may influence my social morals.
But this is in Paris were I am a mere traveller. From biblical times
the traveller is forgiven in his traspasses. Paris is the city were
the true pleasure of life and the art of looking are exercised with
gusto. Hence the French obsession with photography. Their love affair
with the camera is greater then with any other art. It serves this
frenesie and forces contact and simultaneity like no other art form.
It is a truly perverse art were one can be both participant and
creator. This year's edition of Paris Photo was even bigger and
better then the previous ones. I got lost in the kilometers of its
cimaises and booths of hundreds of galleries. On the Quay Branley the
omonimous Museum shows a number of great young photographers form
around the world. I dare to say that as an exhibition it was even
better then the mixtum compositum of Paris Photo. Under the dual
influence of ecstatic Paris and tons of great photography I did not
resist the temptation ... Or is all it that champagne?

Paris Photo

Just back from Paris. Well that was almost a week ago but had no time to post anything. A transport strike in Paris, freezing cold, meetings to attend but the greatest company possible and lots of fun. Paris Photo was bonus.