Serenity is hard to find in a city. Even the parks are often crowded with those seeking solace from the bustling pace or somewhere to pause. Only one place is ever truly calm: The cemeteries of Berlin possess a morbid serenity. Friedhof: a field of peace. The German captures a feeling the English “graveyard” misses,
6 Degrees Berlin: A Recap
On Monday, November 12th, I headed from Pankow to Pierre Boulez Saal at the Barenboim-Said Akademie with my classmates from the Global Citizenship course to attend a workshop organized by the Institute for Canadian Citizenship with a prominent guest list. I had skimmed through the programme a couple of days before and saw that participants
Why are we here?
Dear Bard College Berlin community, You are where you are today because approximately twenty-one years ago, three people had one idea. They had studied at top universities in the US or Great Britain, returned to Germany, and met while working at consulting firms. They were impressed with the education they had received abroad and expressed
Uniting behind a cause? On trying to turn frustration into political action at the ‘Rescue the Rescuers’ demonstration
BCB is a community full of people who are highly engaged with politics. Many of us take classes on theoretical or practical aspects of the public sphere, many of us want to pursue politics-related careers, one civic engagement initiative comes after the other, and our cafeteria gives place to countless post-Socratic dialogues on the ideal
You are your grades – the quantified self
The Chinese government intends to create a social credit system by the year 2020. Data about the behavior of each individual from all social spheres of life shall be collected, evaluated and transformed into a personal score. Consumption, traffic offenses, activities on the internet, employment contracts, ratings at school and work, conflicts with the landlord
Living Berlin – In a Pankow Night
Late at night when the lights of the city reflect orange off the clouds, the wet pavement glistens like fire. The rain has washed away the impurities of city life and it is as though my passing there is the first passing on the virgin pavement. The silence on these nights is deafening. The clouds
“The city will always pursue you”
“The city will always pursue you” The wooden porch, the bird feeder in the crabapple tree, the screen door with holes in it, a warped tupperware container filled with cough syrup and cayenne pepper that I, age seven, stir carefully with a wooden spoon. “Are you making potions?” my dad asks as I spritz the
Rescue the Rescuers: from #Unteilbar to the upcoming #FreeHumanitarians Demos
240 000 people, myself included, took part in the #Unteilbar demonstration against racism and the far right in Berlin on Saturday. Hundreds of thousands of people participated, calling for an open and free society in historic numbers. #Unteilbar translates to “indivisible”. Indeed, Berlin proved that so many of its residents refuse to be divided by