Wash Hands Before Eating.

I took this photo on my last full day in India, in a busy part of Delhi.
The yellow writing on the wall reads "TO BE DEMOLISHED".
Shortly afterwards, my stomach was demolished.
Didn't take any photographs of that happening though, so you'll have to take my word for it.

Now I'm back in Berlin, rebuilding my stomach with German bread and bananas. All bananas sold in Germany are grown in Dusseldorf, where banana farms cover miles and miles of countryside outside the main city, believe it or not!

BEAR BIN IN BUNDI

I encountered this bear-shaped bin in Bundi.
Is this normal?

JANTAR? MANTAR!

In Jaipur now.
Spent a day taking photos, under the scorching sun, but with an (Indian) umbrella, in this place built a couple of hundred years ago, full of giant Hindu sundials and other astronomical/ astrological instruments. They call them Jantar Mantar.

I call them Gigant Antfarm.
The ants here are HUGE.
(Hindi word for ant is "makora").
There, you just learnt something.
Imagine a Makora Pakora.

BERLIN...DIA!

I'm not in Berlin at the moment.
I'm wandering around deepest Rajasthan in India, shooting an album cover for Shpongle.
Here I am in Alwar two days ago helping a pigeon that my our friend Niranjan rescued from crazed and hungry dogs. Photo clicked by lensmaster Rupert Truman.

People actually like pigeons here - food is left in places all over towns so our featherbrained heroes get enough to eat. Amazing.
The pigeon didn't give me rabies either. Amazing No.2.
I constantly have the feeling that I'm hallucinating here.
INDIA!

Joy To The World

I've just changed the settings on this blog so anyone can post stupid (or not) comments without having to be registerizederized first. Now you have no excuse... apart from the fact that a) you're not reading this blog, and b) you have nothing to say!
Or?

Genius.

Having spent half my life living in London, I'd become totally accustomed to the fact that stuff costs way more than it should and when it arrives (stuff) it's usually a bit disappointing. Money moves very fast... in the opposite direction. That's how it is.
Stuff is cheap in Berlin! I've said it before and I'll probably keep saying it until all my friends move here to be with me and bathe in the glow of genius bargains each and every day.
Not only is it cheap but it's GOOD.
As proof, here's a photo of this morning's breakfast, cost about three quid.
How do they do it?????

Oh, and breakfast was at Cafe Marx, near Görlitzer Bahnhof.
(Wasn't very Marxist though... unless "Seal's Greatest Hits" contains subliminal communist messages - it was playing rather audibly).

Bike! You like?

I've bought a bicycle.
It's shiny and blue and a good deal too: 200 Euros from a shop on Lychener Strasse, not bad for a bike like this. It's a Dutch Sparta and feels like it's made of IRON, and the price includes a year's guarantee. Even better, it has two handbrakes, rather than the annoying "rucktritt" (back-pedal brake) so I don't fall off every time I re-adjust my footing. Now I only fall off when I drink too much.

I slice down the streets like a hot knife through German butter!
Sparta, I love you.

Water... from the SKY!

For weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks now, it's been hot and sunny or even very hot and sunny almost every day. Almost like summer! Yesterday night it rained though and luckily I was there on Shönhauser Allee with my camera so you won't think I'm lying.
I can truthfully say I miss the rain.
But I won't.

A Not Too Far Bridge

The least I can do is post another thrilling photo of my new surroundings as another month rolls past without me really posting anything.

This is Bornholmer Brücke (Brücke = bridge), just around the corner from where I live, photographed exactly eight days ago.

Until 1989, this was an important checkpoint where only a carefully screened select few could pass into the West. On the night of November 9th 1989, this was where the wall first "fell" and East Germans surged through into new dimension of freedom, uncertainty and Coca-Cola. Dramatic and historical stuff. Bends the mind! (Foto: Wolfgang Sünderhauf/Umbruch-Bildarchiv)

Last time I crossed this bridge I was probably too busy checking my phone to think about any of this. How times change.
I don't drink Coke either.

Don't Fret, Friends.

Despite all evidence to the contrary, I haven't given up on this blog.
I do though, think it likely that the only one reading this posting is myself!
Back soon, lots to tell, lots to look at!

And probably a special report about the sparrows of Berlin.