Dobro jutro,
we announced our first Sprachcafe (Lass uns Deutsch sprechen) last Thursday and the feedback was immense. Unfortunately, all of the tickets are gone, but I will keep you posted. We will do the first one a bit smaller to see how it goes. If you'd like to join next time, let us know by booking the "next time" ticket.
Last week a reader reminded me that Reddit is just a bunch of hearsay after I posted a thread on Zalando. And I looked deep into my bookmarks and realised that a lot of it is truly crap (like why would a random redditor know anything about good food for example?). So what's the point of even giving that site traffic from us (they will also require login in the future, lol)? I am seriously thinking about it: what do you think? I added a poll in the weekly section.
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📌 Pinned
There is a lot of trash in Berlin. You see it just walking around the city. Part of the problem is also the lack of easy and affordable ways to get rid of bulky waste, especially if you don't own a car.
Now, in the new coalition discussions, there is an idea to introduce free bulky waste pickup once a year. But BSR, waste mgt company, says this would be too expensive and wouldn't solve the problem. We had a similar concept in Stuttgart, and it worked. Barcelona even has a fixed weekly collection day.
A big part of the problem are businesses illegally dumping their crap. I can already see a sketchy dude dumping their crap on some other crap: but this is still surely better than dumping their crap somewhere random? Fines already increased significantly, but the problem is enforcement (in Q1 this year fines amounted to €86k). It’s challenging to find the person who dropped a sofa or a mattress with a note “zu verschenken”.
There is also a big non-monetary aspect: if you constantly see trash lying around, you start losing trust in public services. Crumbling infrastructure crumbles the trust in institutions. And then you eventually get populists.
What's better: spending €10M more annually or having fascists in power?
🗞 Berlin
We are on the way to a new coalition in Berlin. And the drama and a big allergy of German media to anything that is not CDU or SPD continues (it reminds me of the attacks on Habeck in the past). Last week Spiegel burned bridges and published internal notes sent to the magazine by mistake by Eralp after she didn't want to authorise interview passages naming a Hamas sympathiser because she feared for her family. She says she won't be intimidated by anyone and will act firmly against organised crime and terror. I am no PR department of Linke or their fan, but this witch-hunt is getting ridiculous; it sometimes feels like we are in a Monty Python episode. Here is one for you, Ministry of Silly Walks.
Related, Spandau is the first district with an elected Bezirksamt. Frank Bewig (CDU) is the new old mayor. Two proposed AfD candidates for district councillor, including a deputy mayor, failed to win a majority (€) after the CDU, SPD, Greens and Linke voted against them, so Bewig now heads an executive with only three department heads instead of five.
On Saturday we had Halloween “Gen Z hat genug!” & “Gen Z regelt” protests in town (depending who you ask, but it was between 3.5-10k people), but they didn’t escalate as much as in Frankfurt. Most of the stores in Mitte and some in Neukölln were boarded up to prevent potential looting.
After we were there with Insider's Dinner Club, I finally made it to Bamnat, Korean restaurant at Paul-Lincke-Ufer, again last week to test the regular menu. Häran and the team are doing a great job and we felt very welcome. I really liked the chicken and the fries.
Here is a creative policy idea: forbid private financing of political parties above, say, €200. How much do they get? Check the Bundestag donation register which gathers large donations (Großspenden). Funds are surely coming through side door as well. How much attention does €50k get you? At least a meeting.
The Berliner made a list of 10 Berlin novels that became films, and I can recommend Herr Lehmann, one of my first ever books in German. Not sure about the film, since it features Ulmen. I also read Alone in Berlin, a good one.
Deutsche Bahn is considering running fewer trains to be more punctual. Better fewer than unpunctual? It's a reasonable policy: trains will be more crowded, but at least you will know when you arrive (my 6h delay-Berlin-Cologne trauma is still very much alive). Now a commission (who else, it's Germany!) will assess how much traffic the network can handle. Only 52.4% of long-distance trains were on time in September.
Stats: Berlin's labour market stagnated in October: unemployment stayed at 10.4%, the same as in September. A year ago it was 10.3%.
In brief
Trench (Berlin, grid equipment) is being sold to US energy group GE Vernova for $9B [more].
Sennder (Berlin, freight tech) turned monthly EBITDA-positive after integrating C.H. Robinson's European business and now targets €1B in revenue.
Mientus (Berlin, menswear retail) will close its last store next spring, ending almost 90 years in business after finding no path to profitability [more, €].
Marley Spoon (Berlin, meal kits) had its restructuring bridge financing raised to up to €11.7M and extended to March 2027 [more].
Hendrikje Klein (Die Linke) is the new president of Berlin's House of Representatives [more].
rbb24: a hacking attack on Charité stole data belonging to patients and staff [more].
rbb24: AI video surveillance at Kottbusser Tor starts in early November [more].
Feel like vibecoding and like data management? Berlin's Senate justice department is tendering a €900k project for to run the city's central dog register. The Finanzamt has data about 130k dogs registered for tax purposes, versus about 75k in the existing register [more]. (via Checkpoint)
Yesterday Berlin Science Week started. You can experience hands-on science until 10th November. Here is the full schedule.
Berlinale 2027 will screen previously unreleased concert footage of David Bowie called David Bowie 'Stage'. They are promising an immersive experience [more].
Berlin's winter-shelter beds are already almost fully booked in October [more]. 700 beds are currently available. The capacity will increase to around 1k in November.
DIW Berlin's fuel-discount monitor shows the pass-through to pump prices ticked up again, three weeks after the tax cut took effect [more].
MPs asked how Berlin will avoid another winter of icy sidewalks: clearing stays the property owners' duty, but the Senate will enforce fines of up to €10k more strictly, after authorities had to clear sidewalks for negligent owners 699 times last winter, against 35 in 2021/22 [more].
An MP asked whether the TVO (Tangentialverbindung Ost) road is coming: it's still in the approval process, its 2035 traffic forecast isn't ready, it's currently estimated at €351M, and it can't be slimmed to two lanes without a new approval [more].
An MP asked how widespread forced marriage is in Berlin: a Senate-commissioned study counted 186 threatened, planned or completed forced marriages in 2023 and 207 in 2024 [more].
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🌿 Worth your time
The dying art of being present by Caoilainn Lander. On how constant multitasking has eroded genuine presence. I'm trying to be present with my screen detox Sundays (only managed 2 so far!), and I just disabled Reddit on my phone browser completely (I'd already uninstalled the app). Suddenly I have so much more time. And Reddit is the same as every other social media, mostly pointless. Nobody ever said "wow, I am so glad I spent last 1h scrolling Instagram/ TikTok/Reddit."
Can AI generate these? This is another reel shitting on AI, and ... where do I sign? I love AI and use it daily, but I definitely don't want to read or watch AI content. Did you notice the shit AI restaurant/cafe poster aesthetic? When will it die? So 2026.
Brian Alex made what's almost a documentary on Berlin's lost railway terminals, the grand stations the city once had. Well done.
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😅 Meanwhile
True in my household since last week
Weekly social
Instagram: an AfD politician in Gera is asked what his party has proposed in the last five years (in German). And I am not surprised by his answer.
Reddit: Did you know we have several houses painted on houses around Berlin?
I never played SimCity, but I am sure a lot of you did, so why don't you give it a try with Permit Pending where you can experience the realpolitik of governing a city.
Last week I asked you when you last stayed in an Airbnb: 49% a few years ago, 22% in the last 3 months, 21% earlier this year, and 8% never.
Should Weekly social be less social media, more interesting finds?
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