Ok, so I landed on Monday and it’s now Monday again, so I guess that makes it a week.

Here’s how I’ve found the place:

Berlin is Extremely Easy to Get Around

Locals have this weird idea that 30 minutes is a long way to travel for something. After only a week here, I’m starting to feel the same way.

Most trains are only a 4 or 5 minute wait – it can be a little longer late at night, but rarely too much longer.

It’s Hell on Your Legs Though

Oh my god, the stairs! In Australia, stairs are a novelty. Here, it’s daily life.

I’m walking up and down stairs all day long: in my apartment building, at the coworking space, to enter and leave the train stations, to change trains, to use the toilet at the pub and to get from one street to another. My legs were annihilated after just a few days of it.

Maybe it just goes to show that my bros aren’t my bros for letting me skip leg day (Pretty easy actually when you haven’t had a gym membership in nearly a decade).

I’m walking around a lot more too I guess. It’s funny to think that not that recently I was so big on finding ways to get more walking in my day, because now I’m endlessly scheming for little hacks to cut down on it.

I’m sure I’ll adjust quickly enough and it will be good for me. In the meantime, ouch!

It Helps to Have Some Deutsch

Visiting Germany for the first time as a tourist a couple of years ago, I was struck by just how irrelevant my German skills were. People would understand me – then answer in English.

I’m now staying at the bottom end of Pankow, formerly of East Berlin and decidedly not as touristy. It’s quite normal here for people to have little to no English. This includes the people I’m living with. So I now rely on my decades rusty schoolboy German for non-trivial things, such as managing my home life and connecting my mobile phone.

At the same time though, there seem to be quite a few expats around who have been here years and have little to no German. I’ll probably have a whole post on this at some point.

It’s Reasonably Easy to Find Monthly Accommodation Here

Or perhaps I just got lucky. I booked my first 3 weeks here on AirBnB, intending to organise June and July while I was here. I had no idea how realistic that was; much of what I’d read said that rooms could be very difficult to find here. I even toyed in my head with plan B: bolt to somewhere cheaper like Prague for a month if I couldn’t land anything here.

But actually, one day after I began answering ads on WG-gesucht, I found myself looking at a spacious and well furnished room just 10 minutes away from work that was quite within my price range. After examining my admittedly well cut jib, I’d signed a 2 month lease on my 3rd day in the country. Wow. I was braced for so much worse.

My profile on WG-gesucht blew up with more offers before I got time to take my ad down too. Perhaps, as a quiet freelancer who is closer to 40 than 20, I’m a relatively desirable housemate compared to all the party animals who descend on this city? Perish the thought.

The Food Culture is Good, Cheap, Yet Decidedly Odd

In so many places I’ve had the fortune to visit, from Prague to Phuket, the way to eat brilliantly for little money is to stick to the traditional local food. That doesn’t seem to really exist here.

So far, when I come across traditional German eateries, they tend to be Bavarian and far from cheap. There’s also the ubiquitous currywursts from the kiosks everywhere, a genuine Berlin icon which is affordable and tasty, but also decidedly junk food. To make this your dietary mainstay you would want the digestive tract of someone who has lived a bit less.

Apart from that, you can stock up on breads, cheeses, smallgoods and such at the supermarket. That seems to be the standard German breakfast and it’s actually great. I am loving the cheeses.

People eat a lot of bread here. Pretzels and baguettes are for sale at the train stations as a convenience food, and so far it’s all been excellent. This is also a fast food lover’s heaven. Burgers, kebabs, pizzas, fried noodles and such are everywhere and ultra cheap. You could wallow in grease all day long if that’s your thing.