free rommy New York → Kansas City → San Francisco → Stockholm → Berlin

What a summer it’s been!

Just finishing up my first six weeks in Berlin and I've hardly had time to breathe, not to mention update this blog.

Therefore I'll let my photos speak for me. Check out my photo documentation of my first six weeks here. They happily coincided with the first six weeks of summer here.

http://rommy.smugmug.com/Germany/Berlin-First-Six-Weeks

In a nutshell:

• The World Cup was the highlight of the summer despite the fact it didn't end up favoring the superior German team in the end.
• I found the perfect apartment in the perfect neighborhood in Berlin. It was incredible luck that I found this place. I moved in July 1st and was sleeping on a mattress I borrowed from a friend for the first 12 days.
• On July 12th (this past Monday) my stuff arrived from storage in Berlin. So I may actually start living like a civilized human being for the first time since the end of May.
• The arrival of my stuff this week coincided with the processing of my work visa from the the German government on Tuesday. I am an officially a taxpaying German.
• I don't have DSL at home yet, so the only way I'm updating anything is through my phone or through Twitter at work. Blogging will be infrequent until I can get DSL at home which is due to arrive in a couple of weeks.

So for the first time since I moved here, I have time to reflect on the craziest summer since I moved to Stockholm two years ago.

*reflecting*

Berlin continues to amaze me each day more and more. You know it's a pretty incredible place to live when the other folks from all over the world, many who have been living here for more than 5 years, talk about this city like they're as new as I am - with an excitement and enthusiasm I've never heard before from people who could arguably be considered established citizens of the city.

I've learned patience. This was the toughest move I ever had to do and it continued to test my nerves just until this week. Things take time here and in a country of 80+ million I need to get used to this. I was pretty spoiled in Stockholm. One of the benefits of my time in Sweden was the plethora of "naturalization" services that was provided to me. Unfortunately, I relied on them so heavily, that I forgot how to do things for myself. For the first time I can enjoy myself AND relax simultaneously. It was a serious learning experience, and a fat dose of reality.

To top it all off, it has been hot as hell here. But I think everyone was okay with that after the brutal winter that buried Europe. Last weekend was the hottest day ever recorded in Berlin at 38 degrees Celsius (100 degrees Fahrenheit). As crippling as it was in terms of actually doing anything, I think people are savoring the heat just a little more this year, even if it means just finding a cool corner of the apartment to sit in and do nothing. On the days that haven't been spent avoiding the heat, I've been exploring like crazy as you can see in the photos above.

So that's pretty much it. Nothing profound. Just a whole lot of excitement. A whole lot of fun. A whole lot of summer.

Hope your summer's been swell.