Last November saw the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin wall and the re-unification of Germany after forty four years of division. Heads of state from countries across Europe were present and the public celebrations were televised worldwide. A chain of one thousand giant dominoes running along the route of the wall was toppled in a symbolic re-enactment of its fall in 1989. Even an autumnal downpour could do little to dampen the scenes of jubilation across the city.
Since re-unification in 1989 a succession of governments in Germany has invested vast sums of money in the East of the country and the East of Berlin, which were formerly run by the Soviet Union. After 44 years of Communist rule, East Berlin was significantly poorer than West Berlin; its citizens had been brought up under a very different set of values and beliefs. For these reasons social and economic integration has been a slow process.

Today, Berlin is not rich. A bird’s-eye view of the city is singular in its lack of sky-scrapers and high-rise buildings. Germany’s financial sector has taken root in cities like Munich and Frankfurt and this is where big business has flourished. Thus, while politically Berlin is the capital of the country, economically it is the capital of the ‘working poor’. One quarter of the workforce (about 360,000 people) earns less than 900 euros a month. Unemployment too, however, is far higher than the national average – it reached a staggering 14.2 per cent in July last year, when the national average was far lower at 8.2 per cent.

Most of this poverty and unemployment is still concentrated in the East of the city. A short walk round any neighbourhood in this part of town is enough to show you how current the problem is. Derelict apartment blocks, disused factories, empty spaces – the vestiges of Communist rule and a poignant symbol of where recent government investment has failed to bridge the gap left behind when the wall came down.
Berlin is also a fairly ‘young’ city. The capital has several large universities and because of the flexibility of the German educational system, many young people remain students into their late twenties. Students make up no less than 25% of the city’s population. What’s more, they all tend to gravitate towards the East of the city, largely due to the simple fact that it is cheaper to rent housing here than in the West.
Because of this, in the last twenty years a novel phenomenon has sprung up in these areas of Berlin. In Eastern quarters such as Friedrichshain and Kreuzberg, communal houses known as Hausprojekte have begun to spread. They started out life as squats: students taking over derelict buildings and turning them into functioning living spaces, but they are now far more official and more common. They have become a ubiquitous sight as one wanders round the Eastern boroughs.

From the street, these houses are instantly striking: brightly painted murals often stretch right across the entire facade of the building; banners screaming political slogans hang out of windows; groups of young people often congregate on the steps outside; loud punk music emanates from within the bowels of the building.
These Hausprojekte are run on a basic principle of communal living – the inhabitants share the physical space, their food and drink. Some of the more radical Projekte work on a pure communal ideology, each individual sharing everything with the other residents: all their possessions and their money.

Food is an essential part of this communal lifestyle. Often these projects will open up their doors for a Vokü (short for Volksküche, ‘People’s Kitchen’), which involves the cooking of a large pot of food which is then dished out to anyone who has one or two euros to spare. Other projects house public spaces such as cinemas, cafés or even climbing-walls.

One of the oldest Hausprojekte in Berlin is known as Köpi (it is situated at 137 Köpenickerstrasse in Friedrichshain). In February of this year, it celebrated its twentieth birthday, meaning that it was first squatted only three months after the Berlin wall came down.

The old apartment block sits a way back from the street and is obscured by a number of tall trees behind a rusty fence. As you step in through the open metal gate, however, an impressive sight meets your eyes. You stand in a shadowy courtyard and look up at the vast building as it looms enormous and dark over you. Graffiti, slogans and blazing political banners cover its face. The residents of Köpi are radical and on the far Left of the political scale. To live here, you have to be.

The residents organise regular demonstrations and marches, often in defence of other squats in Berlin which are in danger of being closed down by the authorities. Political slogans are all over the project’s website – ‘Gemeinsam sind wir unausstehlich. Raus auf die Strasse!’ (‘Together we are intolerable. Out and onto the street!’). The group has recently also taken itself off Myspace as it does not want to subscribe to the ‘capitalist brainwashing of Rupert Murdoch’.

Berlin has always had a reputation for being a focal point of political expression and protest. Virtually every year, May Day (International Workers’ Day) culminates in riots on the street and clashes between demonstrators and the police. The Hausprojekte like Köpi seem to have become vehicles for this political expression and provide a space in which people can speak out against issues as wide-ranging as neo-Fascism, climate change and animal testing.

Berlin’s recent history is unique and the influence this has had on the city is clear. The remnants of Communism in the East are still very visible. Street names commemorating the heroes of the German Democratic Republic are still preserved in East Berlin today – if you choose to, you can do some window-shopping on Karl-Marx-Allee, take the underground metro to Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz or grab a drink on Karl-Liebknecht-Strasse.

But there are more subtle ways in which the Communist past has helped shape the Berlin way of life. One could argue that the Hausprojekte, so common in East Berlin now, are one example of the way in which Communism has influenced the lifestyles of at least some people in Berlin today. This is not to say that they are all Communists, but more that the values of sharing and equality at the heart of the Communist ideology seem to form the basis for their way of living together.
Communal living is something which has virtually died out in Britain. On average, we no longer even live with our extended relatives any more, preferring instead the even more insular confines of the nuclear family.

Perhaps this is no bad thing. Perhaps, however, we might look to East Berlin and the Hausprojekte and take a more open approach to the idea of living communally. For I can see no reason why it should remain such a foreign concept.

Nothing like a day of firsts: first time to Cambridge, first time at a life drawing class, first time naked in Cambridge at a life drawing class. As I boarded the coach from Oxford in the morning, I settled down to think about the various reactions from people upon hearing about my modeling experiment:

‘I’d feel quite vulnerable, that’s something I would rather share just with my partner.’
‘I’m too old fashioned and English. I want to cover-up table legs in case they cause offense.’
‘Good lad.’ (That was from my mother.)

Three hours later I arrived in The Other Place and immediately got lost, just like my first day at Oxford, and the parody was complete when a tourist took my picture. (If only he’d waited an hour…). Eventually I made it to the porter’s lodge at King’s College to meet Susy, who organizes the class, and as we walked across the quad she told me I was their first male model. (The class is all female, mostly students at King’s, and each week a different member poses for the group.) Given the proximity to the start of finals, Susy told me that today the class would be smaller than normal: only about ten girls. I tried to think of the last time I heard ten of anything being considered ‘small’.

As the class started to arrive, we were in the ‘art room’ at King’s, a small, spare studio overlooking the quad, Susy explained the schedule of poses (how many of each duration) and then I went about changing into the bright pink drop cloth – how did they know, my favourite colour. It turned out to be comically voluminous; there is more of a naked woman to cover than a naked man but not this much more. I tried not to trip over its trailing pieces as I made my way to the centre of the room, which was now encircled by ten easels, drawing kit at the ready.

The cloth made a pile at my feet and we went through the first set of four poses, five minutes each.

At first I tried to keep everything as flexed as possible: stomach, chest, arms, but then I remembered my thighs, my back, my bum, and, shoot, did I just move my eyes? Is that OK? Just breathing changes the shape of my stomach and chest; what if someone was drawing those? Less than halfway into the first pose and my attempts to assuage insecurity (vanity?) were completely overwhelmed by being at the centre of a circle of attention. There was just too much on display to worry about anything other than keeping still.

After the opening poses we took a short break. I sat on a chair and chatted to some of the girls about what it was like when they posed. Most were nervous at first but quite comfortable by the end. We spent most of our time talking about various poses, what worked or didn’t, and everyone seemed to have a story about one body part or another falling asleep.

The next sequence was two fifteen minute poses. Emboldened by my reasonable performance in the opening set, the girls were all very encouraging, I literally overreached, with my right arm outstretched, left arm following it across my chest, weight and body tilted back onto my left foot.

After about five minutes my right arm started to shake and when Susy called seven minutes my shoulder was searing. After ten minutes my right arm collapsed, my shoulder feeling like it was going to fall off. This would happen twice more before the pose was finished, and after another short break I sensibly chose, for the next fifteen minute pose, to cross my hands onto opposite shoulders.

After another short break we began the longest pose of the afternoon, thirty minutes, for which the class decided I should kneel down, arms outstretched, forehead on the floor. After almost an hour of standing this seemed like a good choice, my entire body was sore and I was strangely short of breath. It turned out that kneeling only changed the focus of the pain: after thirty minutes, my knees had melted into the floor. It took nearly a minute to stand-up, at which point I was greeted by the following observation as one artist looked over her neighbour’s shoulder:
‘You’ve been reduced to a misshapen baby; or a tortoise.’
Classic.

This comment was actually hilarious, as the girls would explain that in life drawing, artists are less focused on the body qua body, and more focused on describing, with pencil or pen or charcoal or watercolour, the shapes of which the body is comprised. This is part of the reason why I covered myself with the drop cloth in between poses; the quality of the attention changes between model and person. The ability to separate images from conceptions of images – to see ovals and circles, not a hand – is extraordinarily difficult, and sometimes the results are unexpected. (Hence, babies and tortoises.)

Nevertheless, we were all soon reminded of the salacious expectations that people have about anything involving nudity. After the class had finished Susy and a few others from the class took me to dinner in the King’s dining hall, where I noticed at least a half-dozen young men watching our table, eying the drawing pads. (After about two terms of classes, most of the people at King’s know what goes on in the art room on Sunday evenings, but only girls are allowed to participate.)

One precocious lad even came over to say ‘hello’ but little else; he stood there expectantly, as if the girls had missed their cue to show him their work. ‘Every time!’ said Susy, when he finally returned, disappointed, to his table. Somehow I figured he would have been happy to miss this week’s work anyway.

5th: Getting drunk

You want to be on top form for date number one. While you might need a drink to get the conversation going and take the edge off, your date will not be impressed if you fall off your chair, shatter your wine glass or start talking about your recent bout of chlamydia. Stay sober, and you’ll leave with your pride and reputation intact.

4th: Texting/calling

Checking your phone does not make you seem cool and popular, you’ll come across as uninterested, uninteresting and rude. Picking up a call is even worse, and making a call is just an invitaiton for your date to get up and leave. Taking two hours away from your Blackberry might not be a bad thing.

3rd: Two-for-one vouchers

We’re all for saving money, but this is not the place to do it. If you can’t afford dinner, go for coffee or perhaps a cheeky amble in the Botanical Gardens, but saying you’ll check on studentbeans and organize your date around the half an hour time frame in which Yo! Sushi has 25% off kind of kills the romance.

2nd: Ex chat

No one wants to hear about your boy/girlfriend, good or bad, or if you’re, like, totally over them. Start on a blank page and give the relationship a chance, without making your date feel like they’re being constantly compared to an Ambercrombie and Fitch model whose father owns eBay.

1st: Food choice

Girls, avoid anything phallic. You categorically CANNOT eat a banana, ice lolly or sausage without either suggesting you’re a porn star or have bad technique.
Boys, sloppy eating style augurs sloppiness in other areas. So avoid anyhing resembling spaghetti.

Other things to bear in mind: ordering a margherita pizza will make you appear dull, and there is nothing less attractive than a girl picking at a salad.
Finally, beware of anything with garlic or onions if you are gunning for that first date kiss.

Arbat, 84 Cowley Road

You’ve probably walked past Arbat countless times when going down Cowley – its hard to miss the pseudo classical façade staring back at you – and laughed that you definitely need to eat there. From my experience, however, it’s a rather expensive joke. The venue is clean, but had less Russian glamour and more Soviet severity with its pleather seats, kitsch décor, and ‘traditional’ folk background-music.

We began our meal with a traditional Russian drink made from fermented rye called kvass, which can only be described as an acquired taste, before promptly switching to water. The food largely consisted of meat, wheat and cream; not ideal then if you’re a vegetarian, celiac, or lactose intolerant. The service was quite good but the food that was brought to us did not really live up to even our low expectations. The ‘home-made’ Siberian pelmeni resembled anaemic ravioli, and after eating a few of the

dubiously unspecified ‘meat’ dumplings, I was very much ready to stop. However, we still had the plov of lamb, rice and carrots to try. While it was edible, it wasn’t worth the money we paid – much the case for most of the dishes at this establishment. Regardless, we thought we’d share a dessert, and after being told that our first choice of honey cake was not available, we settled for a Napoleon layer cake. This came with one scoop of budget vanilla ice cream, and was similarly forced down. Upon leaving, my friend commented that she’d paid £18 to feel as if she’d put on eighteen pounds. I think this sums it up aptly; a rather overpriced and calorific experience that probably wasn’t worth the expense. Perhaps the £9.95 three-course lunch is advisable if, having read this review, you’re still somewhat intrigued by Arbat.

Charlie Guenther,
PPE, St. Anne’s

Ex-professional scuba diver and St. Anne’s visiting American looking for someone to spend nights out philosophizing the meaning of life etc.

Soon after greeting each other, my date and I were subjected to the obligatory “couple’s photo shoot” that clearly must be designed to rid the evening of all awkwardness. Although I was initially wary of Eloise after she informed me that her friend had recently been set up on an intentionally mis-matched blind date, after a gin and tonic or ten, my fears were assuaged, and we ended up having a great time chatting over dinner at the Oxford Retreat. The conversation flowed well throughout the evening and over the next few hours we covered a number of topics ranging from previous failed relationships to malevolent tutors. We found common ground after realizing that we both have sisters who are finalists at St. Andrews Uni. In fact, they actually had dinner a couple of weeks ago and talked about introducing us. Despite her penchant for changing men’s sexual preferences, I found Eloise’s stories amusing and her loquacious personality refreshing. Overall, it was a fun dinner, and I had a great time.

Chat: Rapid and entertaining
Looks: Fit
Personality: Outgoing
2nd date? Always a possibility

Eloise Morse,
Law, Teddy Hall

Walking disaster who doesn’t think she’s embarrassed herself enough yet this term, and thus requires Cherwell to do this for her

Having demanded to do blind date after one too many, I was concerned that the whole thing would turn out to be another cautionary tale against getting drunk. I was pleasantly surprised when I arrived to discover that the guy was really quite hot and besides being immediately forced into an über-contrived photo, it really wasn’t as mortifying as it could have been. This was no doubt aided by the fact that Charlie is a rower who actually has something to talk about other than rowing, and ready access to alcohol. But as that went down I forgot about the whole concept of the blind date, and may have said a few things I wouldn’t want to appear in a write up… So if I suddenly vanish after this publication, it’s because I’ve fled to South America until the heat dies down. Broadly speaking there was the American thing, we’ve both burnt bridges in St. Andrews and we are both quite loud. I’ve been on more awkward dates in Oxford with people I’ve actually opted to go out with, so I guess that means (among other things) it was a success?

Chat: Entertaining
Looks: Hot
Personality: Fun
2nd date? I wouldn’t say no