Ooo, Shiny! [Assignment 1]

Sometimes I get genuinely angry that my life isn’t truly remarkable. Don’t misunderstand—I am in no way saying that I’m unfortunate, or that my life so far hasn’t been an incredible adventure. No, I get upset that I don’t have superpowers, or that magic isn’t real, or that I’ll never be able to time travel. So when I get a little hint of the fantastic in a world that sometimes seems so Vanilla and Sham Wow, I reel with excitement.
In Berlin, I found this happiness in a disco ball at my first German poetry slam. Little did I know that as I walked into the room and was immediately freckled in light, my vision of the disco ball winking at the crowd was the most poetic thing I would experience that night.
I didn’t expect much from German Slam Poetry. I’ve always found Slam Poetry to be rather pretentious, and too depressing for my taste. I was more interested in the sort of people that attended these events in Germany. I wondered: would they also wear plaid and glasses sans glass? Would they also smell like incense and wear their shoes down to the nub? I also wondered about the audience dynamic. At the poetry slams I attended in Seattle, the crowd often made rather unique chants like “YES.” or “WHAT!” that always made me chuckle. But what I discovered was that German crowds, in addition to preferring cheerful, angst-less poetry, remained mostly silent en masse. Occasionally, they’d laugh at a performer’s witty story, but there were no cries of “TELL ‘EM GIRL” or “YOU KNOW,” which I had become so fond of back home. Additionally, I call it “poetry,” but what the performers were reading was far from verse. It seems that we attended some sort of amusing short story-reading gathering.
It was nice to practice my German and sort through the thicket of fast spoken word to pick out the humor that the performers tried so desperately to convey. Naturally, I picked up less than I expected, half because they were talking so quickly and half because I sure did fall asleep in my chair, and by chair I mean couch that we stole from the lobby. Fortunately I didn’t sleep too much because between performances a blinding and obnoxious light shone out on to the audience, and by audience, I mean just me and four or so people who surrounded me. So, every once in a while I was awoken by tiny beads of sweat dripping down my neck and a slight light-induced migraine. And so my first group experience in Berlin culminated in dizziness, curiosity about German youth culture, and a slight neck cramp from having rested my head on my shoulder for forty minutes. Still, I can’t justify ever complaining about anything in Berlin—I’m so fortunate to be here. Everything here is beautiful, efficient, and interesting, and I feel like as a group, we’ve lived this week to the fullest.