In the neighbourhood of Knesebeckstr

A little sketch

Saturday 27.2.2016

I sit in the kitchen of my flat on Knesebeckstr. Even while living in Athens, I have kept this flat since 1981 by subrenting it, and this with the arrangement, whenever I am in Berlin, there is a small chamber for me and Anna to stay in. The 100 sqm flat is located in backcourt yard, left wing and on the third floor.

While writing the telephone rings. A neighbour from next door asks if I do not want to come down for a coffee. He adds, that we can sit outside for the sun is shining. Every opportunity is taken here in Berlin especially during the winter months.

Peter Gut is an old friend. He lives next door. He is married to Patrizia, a Spanish-speaking German wife and has with her two sons.

We meet outside a newly opened cafe called Mosaique at Knesebeckstr. 21. A Kurdish entrepreneur has taken the risk to operate this cafe called Mosaique despite the high rent.

All of us from the neighborhood on Knesebeckstreet in Charlottenburg know this is a nearly impossible task. Already three previous owners failed at the same place to sustain a coffee shop due to the high rent. The owners of the house sit in London and demand for the space 2800 Euros per months. The space is very small. It allows only for ten small tables inside. During the summer or better weather months tables outside can increase the sitting capacity by four tables with two to four seats each. The question remains but how can you earn that amount of money on coffees, teas and cakes? A speciality is the soup which he sells for 3.90 Euro. Something more makes the place special: a friendly atmosphere.

We know these financial facts from another neighbour, an Italian man who used to operate the Amico restaurant. It was most famous for the ice cream and hence a most favorite place for Maya whenever we were in Berlin. Poor man. He has been hit hard by cancer in the liver. He tells us sixteen times has he been undergoing chemo therpay while three thirds of his liver have been cut out. Now they diagnosed that he has anew metastasis. No operation, no radiation is possible. The only solution is a new technique: an injection. It costs 60 000 Euro. His only rescue is that he paid 500 Euros per month into a private insurance, so he is covered.

Peter remarks how many people around him have all fallen sick. One close friend of his, a professor, died recently. Again the reason is cancer. Likewise my closest friend Britta Heinrich who died three weeks ago. She had bone cancer and was only 51 years of age.

The bench is turning out to be a meeting place to hold chats like in a village. There is something else in need to be added. The Knesebeckstreet is always good for a coincidence and therefore a good reminder of Adorno's saying "a society without coincidence is dictatorship."

Roger Servais

For instance, there passes by the painter Roger Servais on his bicycle. He is an old friend. The moment he sees me, he stops, gets off his bike and begins a short chat. I had more direct contact to him as long as I lived in Berlin West until 1988. In between whenever I was back, we would naturally see each other, but it is something else to be living in your neighbourhood on a more permanent basis. Still, it seems as if I had never left whenever I returned and slipped into the mode of behaviour this neighbourhood is known for.

Roger Servais, Self Portrait

In the meantime, Roger Servais has grown a huge beard and looks like Saint Nicholas. Roger is innovative in use of colours. He knows how to break them. He gave me and Anna as a wedding gift one out of his most famous series of paintings.

When greeting me, he says that he has heard already that I am back in town. He lives two houses over. We agree that Anna and I shall visit him tomorrow, Sunday, at 15.00. Roger is Jewish and engaged himself in supporting artists in opposition in the former East Germany. Now he tells me that he is more often in Southern France. A friend in Belgium has bought a huge castle and offered him there a fantastic atelier.

After he departs, Peter Gut and I exchange a few ideas about trends in philosophy. His big dream was to write a PhD about Habermas but he became instead a civil servant. Now retired he plays out fully his role as dedicated husband and father. He is one we call as having a honest skin. He informs me about a new trend in philosophy called 'Surrealist Realism'.

Then Peter's family arrives. The oldest son has grown so fast since I saw him last. Now he is even taller than his already tall father. The little one has a blue skihat on. Despite the sun, it is still quite cold. We begin to talk about school. The older one tells that he is in the eleventh class or in the first semester as the old term is no longer used as if a change in name would distinguish the new from the old school system. The younger one is in the third grade. There are 27 pupils in his class. Is it mixed, I ask? He hesistates because girls are foreign territory at that age. He describes how the tables are placed so that they sit in groups. Somehow it conveys another idea of how learning is taking place nowadays in Berlin. Naturally most of the time both boys spend most of their free time at home. Especially the older one worries the father because he does not know anything but the pleasure of computer games. Recently his grades for mathematics dropped so that he has to concentrate much more than ever before, says his father, but admits in the case of most mathematical questions he cannot be of any help.

It is difficult for any young man to come home to a silent house and to sit down in order to do that necessary homework. Much easier is it to arrange games via Internet. Peter explains if one drops out, the next person can enter the game. They play continously with at least ten joining in at a time. The father is relieved. At least he is off the street but still the son needs to improve his grades.

Peter shows that all too often parents are left behind and therefore they worry because differences between wishes and reality cannot be easily bridged. Especially parents project into the future what will happen, if their sons fail.

Once they have drunk a juice, the sons move on with their mother. They walk down the broad pavement in the direction of Savigny Platz.

Soon Peter wishes to follow his family. We bid farewell. I return home but not before exchanging another small talk with another neighbor. Mr. Stoltmann is a retired policeman and looks after the house. He tells me that he goes twice a week to where refugees are housed. He narrates that some of them are so lovely persons that he wants to bring them home. Nowadays refugees is the topic number one.

Someone else tells me that he considers himself and me as the only two revolutionaries in the neighborhood. What he means by revolutionary, I am not sure. I suppose he means someone who does not necessarily abide to all rules.

Once back in the kitchen, I write to my friends in Athens as to what neighborhood life looks like in Berlin when taking just a snap shot of one morning.

hatto fischer

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In the neighbourhood of Knesebeckstr