Many people told me that the EDM scene there was incredible, I had to check it out. I made my way there with a very general plan, open to change, intentionally. This turned out to be fantastic, I met many people from around the world and learned a great deal.

As I sat on my last ICE connection before entering the big city, I pulled out my laptop and began to produce some music. The material seemed to be flowing out of me the closer I drew to the homeland of my DAW software, Ableton Live. As the framework of the song began to materialize and I began to give it more life and detail, I started to visually groove along to the rhythm. Bobbing my head, testing out lyrics, the women in the seat across the isle from me took on a look of interest and delight. Not to long before we reached the Hauptbhanhof (Central Station), I decided to let them listen to what I had been working on. They seemed to enjoy it, bobbing their heads up and down, undulating their shoulders; it was entertaining to see unfold before me. Before we parted ways we talked a bit about their favorite parts of the city, then a man who was sitting in the row behind us offered a bag of German candy. The women declined and so I happily obliged; low and behold, when I took my first bite, I was catapulted into a world of candy that existed on a plane of reality I had never been to before. The gummies were so juicy, and the flavor was so broad and strong; it felt like going from black and white to Technicolor.

I’m glad that my adventures took me where they did in Berlin.

I got to meet a charismatic Brazilian, that worked in London, who insisted I join him for a bar crawl later that night; he emphasized that it was the “European” thing to do. I became friends with a couple of wonderful gentlemen from Amsterdam. We ended up touring the city on E-scooters, they call them, “step(s)”. We traveled a large swath of Berlin on those Steps looking for a very special Jamaican place to eat. When at long last we came upon this Jamaican village, I discovered that my “dinner” was their “breakfast”! Later that evening I got to share a couple rounds of some of the best fooseball ever with one of the Holland Boys and I shared some company with a couple lovely Turkish women who were happy to share some of their favorite music from home. I got to meet some gentleman from India; who upon hearing me chant, “Ganapatibapa Moria”, were eager to teach me a bit about their culture and famous Tamil musicians. According to them, Tamil is the worlds oldest language.