Back in 2011, the two of us inter-railed around Europe, final stop: Berlin.

We were laying out in Hasenheide, our second sunrise without sleep, staring up at the clouds.

“Anna?” Lena unravels from the grass and reaches out her hand for me to shake.

“Yeah?” I sit up.

“Let’s freak the fuck out from our normal lives here once a year. No matter what”.

“What d´you mean?” I grab her hand, pulling myself up.

“Every year, we come to Berlin for a bender, like now. No matter what”.  

“No matter what?”

“No matter what”.

“Done!” I cheered, grabbing her hands leading her to a dance of monkeys over the deal we just made, singing and jumping around the park. Suddenly we stop to look around us, feeling a second of shame for the zoo we just unleashed. To our shame´s surprise,
dog-walkers kept walking their dogs, joggers jogged on, families picnicked away, and we kept on being monkeys.

Berlin´ll let you freak out like that.

Since then, we’ve been back each year.

It’s getting tighter to fit into our schedules, but we made it again.

We always stay at a little boutique hotel near Nordbahnhof and go for our initial catch up at Oslo Kaffebar.

“dirty chai?” the barista comes to us, our two drinks in hand asking “which belongs to whom?” with his question.

“That´s me” Lena replies.

He sets our drinks down, mine obviously the other, a flat White.

“What´s a dirty chai”?

“A chai latte, with a shot of espresso, wanna try?”

“interesting… It´s like, Christmas… in a cup!”

“True!” she chuckles taking a sip, beginning to remind me about the robot.
“Type. English. Word. Press. Ask!” mimicking the guy we met at Griessmuehle once who asked us to type english words into his phone, bobbing his head to “high-trance” on his headphones, then suddenly blurting “I.Have. To. Go. Now” and disappearing.

We rent bikes and spend the day biking around occasional cobblestoned streets and canals, passing through parks, history and hipsters, getting comfy in our yearly affair with the city.

Back at the hotel after a nap, we get ready for the night.
Drinking, lining up outfits, sharing music we discovered the past year.
I grab her hand as if to kiss it like a gentleman.

“That is so delicate, where did you get it?” looking at the slinky golden bracelet wrapped around her wrist. 

“my grandma gave it to me” playing it around her wrist adding “it was a gift from grandpa, Julia wants to use it next week as something borrowed”.