End of the Summer Tales in Cultural History

A young man with naked upper body sits down next to me. I’m sitting on the terrace of a Lebanese restaurant eating halloumi. “Alt-Tempelhof is getting younger,” I message my friend. “Stay calm,” my friend writes back. And a few seconds later: “Stop staring!” The young man puts on his T-shirt. Maybe it feels inappropriate to eat half naked. Or maybe because I'm staring. I notice he has three vegetables on his bicycle rack: an orange pepper, mushrooms and a broccoli. Since he’s eating a Shawarma I conclude he’s not a vegetarian. 

That kind of morning

Walking inside the Lebanese restaurant to pay, I see the writing on the cook's T-shirt. It says: "Denim doesn't build character. It reveals it."

A man and a woman sit opposite each other in the subway, talking loudly so they can have a conversation as if they would sit next to each other. They’re dressed in black and have skulls depicted on their T-shirt. “Versuche das Wesentliche vom Unwesentlichen zu trennen, so sagte ich ihr,” (“Try to separate the essential from the inessential, so I told her.)  the man says, and adds: “Jetzt geht sie in die Kirche.” ("Now she goes to church.”) “Nicht meine Lösung,” the woman says (“Not my kind of solution”). The conversation continues philosophically. Talking about good or bad decision making, the woman concludes: “Es gibt keine Garantie” (“There’s no guaranty”). 

Brussels - Berlin