It’s hot, so in the evening, I open my windows to let the cooler air in. My cat likes this and sits in the front window. I’m working on my computer, and all of a sudden I hear strange noises. There’s an elderly man trying to pet my cat through the open window and the occasional plant, but she runs off. I walk up to him, and he tells me, he always wanted a cat. I ask him why he doesn’t pick up a cat from the shelter. He looks at me with sad eyes: “you need a house first before you can give a stray a home.”
I work in the tourist part of Berlin. So I’m actually quite used to people asking me if they could ask something, usually the way. So, when I cross one of the busiest streets in Berlin, and an well-dressed, white-haired, balding guy asks me if he could ask me something, I answer “sure” and walk up to him. Then he tells me “did you know Hitler was an english agent?”. I sigh, wave dismissively and turn around. Behind me, he shouts the address of his website. I roll my eyes and think “another one for the list”. When I walk down to the coolness of the metro station (it’s almost 40 degrees celsius outside), I pass a guy wearing a full cover plastic asbestos-overall, chewing his sandwich utterly relaxed. The sun sure brought out the freaks…
When I put the cat basket on the back of my bike to bring her to the vet, my cat usually announces World War III. A black guy with a grey beard walks past, makes “poor kitty” noises. The moment I secure the basket, I see him stop in his steps. He walks back, gives me a sympathetic look, opens the box of chocolates he is carrying, and offers me one.
Sunday morning 7 am, I wake up because of some drunk people talking really loudly in front of my house. I sigh, turn on the other side and wrap my pillow around my head, hoping they will walk on quickly. They don’t. I’m slowly but steadily getting really annoyed. So I sigh again, aggressively pull up the blinds, and stick my head out of the window: ey.. people, mind moving on a bit, trying to get some sleep here. They tell me “oh we’re really really really sorry, we’ll be quieter”. Only when I go back to bed I realize one of the two was wearing a one meter tall, at least 50 cm diameter, brightly colored velvet hat. I still hear their discussion over the traffic noise when they moved to the busier street a few 100 meters further.
It is said hot weather brings out hot tempers.
If this is the hot temper of the people of this city, it can get a lot hotter still.