I’m walking round museum island trying to find the road that leads to the ubahn. It’s an expansive street with ubran graffiti and many coloured roads leading to God knows where. A messenger bike flits by me. I have to face the truth: I am lost. I’ve been here before. Every decade or so I find myself in a situation that is so similar to one I’ve been in before the word déjà vu ceases to lose all meaning. On my last visit to this urban Mecca I was literally on this same road trying to find the same ubahn station hoping to get home. Berlin for me is the personification of the word “lost”. Emotionally. Physically. Spiritually. It signifies life at a crossroads and dresses me in tattered almost-there garb as if I’m waiting for my own reunification.

What is it about this city that is so daunting? Is it the multilingual youth pierced, tatted and adorned in black? Is it the all night clubs that feature djs and spinners you’ve never heard of? Is it the multicultural almost chic cuisine that signifies home to all and home to none at the same time? Is it doener- kebaps?

Something about Berlin perplexes me and leaves me wanting for more. Recently I have spent more than an hour browsing recommended restaurants while walking through the ancient Islamic culture section of the Pergammon museum in the hopes that Berlin would unlock its culinary doors to me or douse me in history so I am baptized anew.  Trying to understand Berlin is like learning to speak another language or getting that twerk movement just right: exhausting and spell-bindingly overwhelming. If I could I would bow out. Not play, not try, attempt to get it right another time, but Berlin is instantaneous in its need for wonder. You can’t walk by it and not stare. How does such a young city function? How is it not falling apart?

When I first came to Berlin I was on my class’ senior trip. It was 2010 and we were wide-eyed and hunting for a party. The travel rules at our school had just been changed and we were forced to go to a German-speaking country for our big hoorah-we’re-done celebration. Berlin was chosen for us, but it was as if we had chosen it ourselves. Or so it seemed. I remember one wild night winding up at a sex club, or severly sexualized club featuring beds to sleep on and people doing cocaine in the bathroom. It was scandalous and amazing. But even back then something about Berlin felt highly unattainable. It was like that cool girl at your school who always looks just right, combining the perfect amount of natural and made-up. We walked away from Berlin on a high, newly stylized, and very much aware of all our shortcomings. 

The second time I visited Berlin I was on my own. I was on a pilgrimage to see Anderson Paak live and chose Berlin haphazardly because I had some friends who lived there. I did not expect Berlin to affect me in any way. I was there for some hip music, no more, no less. But as it had done before Berlin awoke in me parts I didn’t know I had. I found myself going out all night, amidst an identity crisis. Berlin made me acutely aware that I was not done finding myself. In a city where everyone so clearly does whatever they want and choose, I became very aware of my traditional Middle Eastern upbringing. Everything about Berlin made me cognizant of what I was lacking in swagger. I was not loud enough. Not mature enough. Not spontaneous enough. Berlin took over all my senses and left me skated, like Templehof park: used and brokenly unbroken.

The third time I visited Berlin was for a research project my mom had to do for her PHD. My mom had to leaf trough the Art history archives for her thesis and I decided to accompany her on this trip. I didn’t really remember how Berlin had affected me, but once again I was stunned into submission. Every day brought with it a uniquely Berliny quandry. Trying to discover the old and new parts of Berlin. Watching movies with subtitles. Finding the right kind of vintage shop. Berlin was so out of reach I felt jaded. As someone who spoke fluent English and German I expected to fit in a lot more than I did, but instead I was always left a little out of the circle.How can one city function on so many levels? How can what you aren’t bring forth what you are even when you aren’t aware of it?

Going to Berlin is like trying to solve a mystery for me. It’s like looking deep inside and trying to polish that rock into a diamond. It’s like finding all your various parts and trying to configure them into a constellation that makes sense. There is something deep about going to Berlin. Unlike London or even New York, Berlin touches you instantly. There is a kind of movement that you can choose to join (or not join). It’s as if Berlin borrows from its unique political and cosmopolitan history and forces you to make a choice as to who you wanna be. Do you stand for freedom? Do you wear your colours bright? Do you,too belong?

This time I am in Berlin acutely aware of its magic. I am aware that I am in a city that speaks many languages and that one of them is transformation. I don’t really wonder what will happen when I get lost because I know that Berlin will help me find it. I bow down to the mightiness that is Berlin: I too am a Berliner.

Girl With One Earring