Weeks ago, as Bosse and I were making our way to a friend's apartment on the other side of town, a gentleman with a thick unidentified-English-speaking-country accent told us that if we hadn't seen it yet, we had to check out the karaoke in Mauer park on Sundays. Huh? Karaoke? In the park?
So we did a little investigating and discovered that since 2009, what began as an impromptu karaoke session sponsored by a Irish ex-pat named Gareth Lennon (Stage-name: Joe Hatchiban) had become a Summer Sunday ritual, attracting thousands of locals and tourists to the stony hillside theater. Its name: the Bearpit Karaoke Show. And it has over 23,000 likes on Facebook. This year, it all nearly came to a halt because the city, tired of cleaning bill, dramatically increased the cost of the permit to €1,500 and restricted the available dates. Fortunately, there was enough public pressure - some coming from foreign newspapers like the Guardian - that the city reversed its decision and allowed the karaoke to continue uninhibited.
So, after a string of bad weather (and generally forgetting about it) we hadn't gotten to the the park for some weeks. However, in an effort to procrastinate, we fortunately remembered to make it to Mauer Park a couple Sundays ago.
With a nice view of the TV tower.
We were a bit clueless on how to get there, but after getting off at the right U-bahn stop, it was easy to simply follow the hordes of people walking in a single direction towards what was once the "deathstrip" between East and West Berlin.
Before we heard any singing, we saw the tents of the flea market standing at the bottom of a hill. Admittedly, The versions of flea markets that i had become accustomed to mostly involved transients selling found/used nuts, bolts, and shampoo. To my delight, the Mauer Park flea market was something similar to the Rose Bowl market, with a splash of an artisans fair, and still a dollop of those still selling their old garage gadgets.
Anybody interested in old family photos and slides?
After making our initial round through the flea market, we drifted to the hill above the market, which held the main spectacle. I was astonished at the number of people that flooded the now-hidden greek theater and poured onto the sides. We scaled up to the top of the hill where the only free spots were and watched the last of a girl doing her own rendition of "I touch myself." During the next songs, a man went through the crowd selling beer from his crate - harkening back to any other stadium performance.
We stayed for a few songs, leaving after a quiet singing of Sinatra, and then moseyed back through the flea market for a look at the other half. The market seemed to be so typical of something you might expect to find in Berlin: old photos and license plates, china and beer steins, armoires and armchairs, LPs and fur coats, and all those characters pawning those treasures.
I was a bit disappointed that we had only discovered the flea market and karaoke at the end of its season, and were unlikely to come back before it closed until the next. But it certainly left me with something to look forward to until next year.
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