Who The Fuck Are You? Hannah Montana!

The party at Kulturbrauerei was officially hosted by a Catholic Gymnasium. Officially. Half the attendees looked like they’d been fast-tracked into Germany’s Next Top Model, and the other half were making up for years of enforced virtue in real time. The reputation those schools have? Completely earned.

Lately I’ve been running with Anna and her apparently bottomless social circle—people who’ve collectively decided that sleep is for individuals with fewer options. Berlin in April isn’t cooperating, grey and damp and vaguely resentful, so most of it happens indoors. The Kulturbrauerei party. A Simpsons marathon crammed onto Anna’s loft bed, a structure held together by optimism and missing slats where every wrong shift is a small gamble. Diet soda and a McDonald’s run at some indeterminate hour of the night.

I’ve noticed that no matter when I end up in a McDonald’s, the vibe is the same: just people being fine, eating their thing, not performing anything. I feel weirdly at home. There’s something to that.

Now I’m going to grab some cake and a Müller milk and rot on the couch for a few hours before tonight starts up again.