Cold. Then a Pop.
Winter 2005, Berlin-Adlershof. Snow coming down and cold enough to hate the world, and I’m walking through a sprawling residential complex looking for an address that apparently doesn’t exist. I’d spent weeks lobbying my parents for permission—actual written permission, which I was now holding in my coat pocket like a passport through customs.
After half an hour of searching I found the building number. Then my stomach dropped. It was an apartment.
My head immediately went to the worst version: a kitchen table, a house cat threading between our legs, some kid doing homework three feet away while a stranger drove a needle through my ear. I stood at the door seriously weighing the walk back through the snow.
Then it opened. She was in her forties, heavily bleached, even more heavily made up, operating at roughly twice the speed of any normal person—she’d already had my jacket off me and my shoes by the door before I’d managed a full sentence. Incense sticks got lit. I looked quickly for the cat and the homework kid. Neither. We were alone.
Her consultation setup was right there in the hallway: a small table, a chair. She ran me through the full risk catalog—pus, infection, the whole clinical horror show—while smiling throughout, telling me not to worry, that she was legally required to say it all. She checked the parental consent form. Then she walked me exactly five steps into the only locked room in the apartment, which turned out to be exactly what I’d wanted: clean, sterile, the right tools laid out properly.
My heart was hammering. I cry at the sight of a syringe from ten meters away—how I’d ended up booking a tragus piercing I honestly couldn’t tell you. I asked, barely holding it together, whether I could be numbed. For as long as possible. A couple of days would honestly be fine. She laughed. No, I just push it through.
What an absolutely delightful person. I wanted to smack her for the grin.
To distract me she explained that running clients through your apartment is just cheaper than renting a studio. Then: Brace yourself, it’s going to feel cold.
I didn’t understand—was she opening a window? No. She iced the spot. There was cold. Then a pop. That was it. Everything I’d dreaded for weeks dissolved in a single unremarkable moment. I’d made such a production of it and felt the appropriate embarrassment.
I’ve been happy with the piercing ever since. Wouldn’t go back to her—the overall atmosphere was too chaotic—but credit where it’s due: you’re too busy processing your surroundings to feel much pain. That memory surfaced because I’ve been thinking about getting pierced again. Open to suggestions.