Departmental

Today I went to the shiny garble-garble Easter to-and-fro plate-glassiness of the Galeria Kaufhof at Alexanderplatz. It was bright and full of colours and foiled rabbits and comforting in that way that giant consumerist temples always are, wrapping themselves around you with the vast and dubious maternal hug of capitalism.

Later I walked down Kollwitzstraße and bought bunches of daffodils at laughably inflated holiday prices but the flower seller spoke to me in English with a German accent like the smell of bread baking and the checkout chick at the BioMarkt said frohe Ostern and I said danke and wished I knew how to say you too and Berlin was beautiful in the sunshine and sparrows and great tits scooped over the roads and the cupboard is full of festive foods and I took a hot bath and tried to feel at home like I did yesterday when I vacuumed.

But Berlin in the spring didn't work like the floors.