Some days the answer is because it’s affordable. Some days the answer is because, why not? With an Irish passport, I can live and work in the EU. And a lot of days it’s the world-class art, green forest and local food scene.
But today, it’s because America is broken.
Of course being an American and moving to Berlin well into mid-life, this question gets asked a lot. And naturally, the story begins with a German boyfriend (Martin) many years ago (now, long an ex, and still very much happily married to his lovely German wife after 28 years). In my 20s I got to know Berlin from Martin, and over many years would make visits to get to know it better.
In 2017, to celebrate my 30th year as a public relations professional, I decided to take a sabbatical (yes, another boyfriend/partner plays a role here, too, that recent relationship went kaputt and I wanted to press restart) and live in Beginner’s Mind.
Martin came through with a great apartment to rent and my Berlin life began.
I enrolled in an Integration Course at the Berlin Community College and spent five hours a day for a year learning German with classmates from Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Vietnam, Syria, etc.
The process deconstructed my identity as an American, a PR professional, an art lover.
It leveled the playing field. I was at ground zero. No language skills, no knowledge of customs. I needed to come at communication from an open-hearted place with patience for myself and my classmates and we needed to find a way to make sense of the world through our long-word salad.
Then, a new work path was created through relationships, desire and fate and I landed a role as an international development/marketing director at a small independent German film company. Things were meshing.
And I started to notice my emotional make-up seemed to be running on a new operating system. I felt a seismic internal shift. Not only was there a new sense of aliveness but I somehow felt more human and less like a consumer.
This is a dense and complicated topic that I can’t unpack easily on a blog post but I do know that this past week with the tragic loss of life at Uvalde Elementary school and the evidence that is coming forward about the police force deliberate delay has reinforced the fundamental feeling I have that America is broken and not a place I want to live, at least for now.
Systems are failing. Values and character are fading. Violence is random and repetitive.
UK based John Kampfner has written an award-winning book that takes the reader through my real answer about to Why Berlin? “Why Germans Do It Better. Notes From a Grown-up Country.”
Here is a comment from his website that sums up the book (and my personal experience and belief) “No country has caused so much harm in so little time. No country has achieved so much good in so little time. As much of the world succumbs to authoritarianism, as democracy is undermined from within, Germany stands as a bulwark for decency and stability.”
And that’s why, Berlin.