Sexpat and the City: Some people wear gloves…
by Mr. Sexpat
“Berlin is a city at odds with those that visit and with those that stay. Berlin is a city for those lost and found, and the rest of us somewhere in-between. Berlin is for many things and for many people. What Berlin is not for is lovers. That is a fucking joke.
Having spent a good amount of the last year single, not-so-single and getting the occasional rub up in and around different bar stools, I have found myself at the dregs of 2011 the most utterly unsexed, ungroped and unsnogged since I first entered the eternal cagefight with the opposite sex.
Let me share a little secret: be it boy, girl, hipster, pug, gallery owner, electro DJ, promoter, office manager, toilet cleaner, bar owner, magazine editor, intern, student, protestor, database manager or smelly Sternburg prince; in Berlin you are either hopelessly in love or most weeknights alone, hopelessly self-involved with your right hand. There is a myth (no doubt created by a totally loved-up “bi-curious” “blogger” sat in a “cafe” somewhere, Skyping to their mates back home that they’re either a) “knee deep in German clunge” or b)”living with a performance artist called Greg”) that the streets of Berlin are awash with free pussy and/or dick. I am here to tell you (left) hand on heart that it’s not.
You can expect to spend your first months in Berlin wandering aimlessly about, too shitfaced to even see let alone meet someone, before that sinking feeling kicks in. Why are all your friends a) depressingly relationshipped or b) achingly single? Where are those poor, deluded first pangs of affection for a guy/gal/pug? Why is everyone in this cafe one half of a couple?! Bitch please, you made the one and only mistake you can make in Berlin – thinking that this city likes you.
Berlin, the poor guy (come on, the TV Tower is clearly not a clit!), has had a tough bloody time of it over the last century and he doesn’t want you falling in love and creating more idiots to gurn in future Photoautomats. “But you’re wrong,” I hear you object. “I know lots of people who are getting laid and having a great time!” You’re missing the point. These people are free-love scum and will be destroyed as nuclear level crabs devour them from the inside out.
As I and the rest of the great unwashed ride this rollercoaster of a city, we wonder how the fuck are we going to meet anyone normal enough, good looking enough, to chat and maybe even have a relationship with. “Oh but the grass is always greener, blah blah more fish in the sea…” Well most of the fish in the Spree are vegetarian, political and much much more beautiful than you or I pal- so take your outdated notion of free love and get to the back of the queue. Some of us have been waiting a lot longer than you.
I hereby declare 2012 the year of the single Berliner! Raise your contraceptive device high boys! We’re going the find some thumbs to crawl under!”
Go to a cool club, generally they play techno, talk normally but have fun and let your hair down, don’t try and overgame, german girls are simpler than western trolls. Kiss grope, get a room. Keep phone number or discard..date..meet up…rinse repeat… you guys suck at getting girls!
I am 25, quite educated and friendly. For me always was hard to make a first contact with girls, as I have physical problem related to my height. And in Berlin it seems to harder…As I understood, people go to parties, stand around some table and start to talk. So, for me it’s not so convenient.
What you would suggest and what kind of tactic I should adoubt? I am here almost 7 months and can’t find someone for serious relationships. Thanks!
Yo Tik!,
First rule about Berlin: This is not a conventional place, so “tactics” won’t work. Talking randomly to strangers is not a suggested thing to do in this town, pretty much anywhere. Being short is not an obstacle.
My kind suggestion is to first build a group of friends, a good one, made of people with similar interests like you, and meet people with them. If you want to do it alone, get a bar that you like, sit by it and talk with the staff. At some point you will catch yourself talking with a completely new group of people, and making new friends.
Even if you are shorter than a table, you can make it happen.
From shorty to shorty.
Boots.
It is a cliche, but the harder you look for a relationship, the less likely for you to find one.
In the meanwhile, why not focus on all doing all the cool things you couldn’t do because you once were in a relationship?
Agree with all of this. I was very sexually frustrated in Berlin for over a year. It started driving me mad. Of course there was the occasional online hookup here and there, but it was by no means satisfying. Eventually I found a girlfriend and am still with her, but it took me a year and a half.
To all you frustrated singles: hang in there. Get your jollies off where you can. I never tried the swinger clubs, but have heard of people meeting hookups at Berghain.
In case it interests you, I met my GF at a party and basically ignored her for 6 months. The whole ignoring thing seems to work well with German girls, they dont like you if you show you like them.
So true… but i think i’ve fallen in love with the city…
Yes its painful to stand all alone in the U bahn…and then the long cold walks…
but i think im closer to myself thanks to it all!
Thanks for the comment M, that’s an interesting way to look at it: being lonely, but falling in love with the city – and with yourself.
For what it’s worth…
I moved to Berlin for 6 months, met someone within about 6 weeks via OkCupid and dated them pretty much the rest of the time.
I don’t speak German and I’m AMAZINGLY bad at this stuff usually so I’m going to say: try harder
Thanks James, it’s nice to hear a good news story. Any more advice for our Sexpat (apart from “try harder”)?
Just fell in love.
Wirklich?
We’d set you up with him, but then who would write this column?
Brilliant and excruciatingly truthful…