the World According to Ward

Once upon a time, there was a little boy named Ward.  He worked at Resto and played music and had fun in New York.  Then  the lovely Vienna Teng asked him to go on tour with her, to Europe and the US.  He said, “Oh, Goody!”  And off he went.  But first, he had a nice going away party at Brook’vin wine bar near his house.  There was good wine, good food, 

Good Friends:

Foxy Ladies:

….And much rejoicing.  Ward went to bed with a full belly, a spinning head, and plenty of joy and fun times to remember NYC by for the next 3 months.

The following morning (switch to 1st person now) I woke up early, around 6:45 am, packed up, and moved some stuff into storage so my lovely subletters would have room to put their belongings.  

I headed into the city to pick up my cello case from David Gage: …which weighs in at 250lbs, and stands at 12′ tall.  But you think I’m gonna let that stop me?  Please.  I’m ripped.  Totally cut and ripped.  Work out everyday, yesirree, bob.  So if you think I had any trouble at all lugging this monster thru the subway, you’re sadly mistaken.

I stopped by Resto to pickup some sweet moolah, have a goodbye burger and beer, and wish my friends and co-workers well.  After a tearful farewell, I headed home to get the rest of my luggage and headed to the airport.  

Needless to say, absolutely no problems carrying my cello, guitar, camera, a snare drum, a majorly stuffed backpack and suitcase.  Nope.  Piece of cake.

After downing a double Knob Creek at the JFK Chili’s bar, I boarded my plane to Berlin Tegel Airport around 7:45pm.  Feelin’ good.  Delta fed me a nice little supper.  I decided to skip out on “The Secret Life of Bees” though, and get a little catnap.  After a couple of hours of airplane sleep, Papa Delta gave us a little breakfast, and we landed at 10am CET, which is 4am EST.  Time without sleep: 21hrs 15mins (excluding my little nap)

At Berlin, I was greeted by my good buddy, Adam:

….He’s my good buddy!   He whisked me away to a lovely breakfast in his neighborhood (Prenzlauerberg) at a Russian-themed restaurant called Bar Gagarin (named for the famous Russian Cosmonaut, Yuri Gagarin.  Adam didn’t think I knew that, but I did, Adam, so screw you!).

Here’s me at Bar Gagarin:    looking pensive, thoughtful, and none the worse for the wear, considering my lack of sleep and longish flight.  I was really craving my usual breakfast of eggs, bacon, and toast.  I ordered that, but decided that I should also have some local flavors (via Russia) so I got a bowl of borscht:

 

 

 

Yummy, yummy!

 

 

Now I’ve never had borscht before.  (Or perhaps I have, but, for the sake of this blog, just for shits and giggles, let’s all pretend I haven’t.)

 

 

Here’s me taking my very first bite of Borscht, ever!

  

So tasty and delicious!  (It was still good, reheated, 4 days later.)  

After breakfast, we strolled around, went to see the Berlin Wall:

  or what’s left of it.

Here are some dismantled pieces of the wall:

 and a cool painting near the wall:

 

Here is me dry-humping the Wall:

  Adam made me do that.  It really hurt.

Returning to Adam’s apartment, I played a little cello, just to get warmed up for the tour:Hmmm.  Looks like I was a little cranky.  I mean, it was around 4pm CET/10amEST, 27 hours no sleep. More caffeine maybe? Luckily, Adam knew of the perfect place:

Ahhhh.  Bonanza Coffee Heroes.  I weep at the sight of thee, knowing that it may be a long time before we are reunited.  This coffee bar is the jam, in the same vein as 9th St. Espresso Bar in chelsea market, or Joe’s Coffee in the West Village.

 

 

 

Check out their machine, which cost as much a VW Beetle stretch limo:  

 

 

And dig the badass latte art:

  Pretty sweet, eh?  Thanks to Adam for taking the action shots.

We stopped by an old brewery that has been transformed into a cultural center:

 If you look closely at the schedule halfway up, you can see that the great Beatallica are playing there soon.  Sadly, I’ll be long gone from berlin when they arrive.

…..sigh.  Weltschmerz.  How to make myself feel better……

 Hey…..I see some cool statues in the courtyard!  Let’s play: I’m crushing your johnson!        …sweet. 

Okay, so by this time, it’s around 5pmCET/11amEST: 28 hours no sleep.  I’m getting a little tired.  But for all you world travelers out there, I have a 100% foolproof cure for jetlag: plenty of caffeine and alcohol!  Once you arrive overseas.  Just eat, drink, and be merry, and, whatever you do, don’t stop moving!!!  Keep on powering through, and you’ll be fine.

 I made some margaritas for Adam and his girlfriend, Dea:  Ain’t she purdy?    We had a little snack and we were headed out the door to a dinner party.  My 4th wind, however, faded  shortly after the margaritas.  Hitting the wall….What to do, what to do….this party was all the way in Kreuzburg, about a 40 minute train ride.  Jeez!  So tired.  How am I going to keep my buzz on?   What’s that you say, good buddy Adam?  Germany has no open container laws??!!  You mean I can drink in public??!!!??  Oh joy oh rapture!  Look at how much fun the world could be with no open container law: 

(soundtrack for montage: medley of “What a Wonderful World” by Louis Armstrong & “Eye of the Tiger” by Survivor)

We finally arrived at the party.  This is Daniel, the host of the soiree:

  What a nice bunch of folks!  I was pretty much totally loopy and ridiculous, but everyone welcomed me with open arms. Especially this guy, Jerry Gagelman:

   Don’t you think he kind of looks like James Franco?  He’s a super smart mathematician, and very nice guy.  More about Jerry later.  

Turns out: Daniel’s party was a pizza party, as in homemade pizza.  So, of course my drunk ass joined the fun!  Here’s how to make a delicious pizza with the Drunken Wardie Technique-watch and learn:

1. Flatten out the dough into a roundish shape:

 

2. Experience the aura of the dough, then make the dough your bitch: 

3. Drop dough on the floor. (Photo missing)

4. With intense concentration, make the dough levitate 5′ above the floor for 124 seconds:

5. Smack Adam in the face with dough:  (Photo missing)

6. Melt your face off into another dimension with pizza awesomeness:                                                                                 :

….and that’s about all there is to it.  Six easy steps! Just slather some sauce and toppings on the crust and bake it and eat it.  Then continue to make an ass out of yourself for the rest of the party.  

So around 1:15amCET/7:15pmEST:36 1/2 hours without sleep, I was wearing Daniel’s lampshades and Adam decided it was time to tuck me in.  (Bye Bye Daniel&Jerry&pizza&everybody. I just luv y’all so, hiccup, much..BELCH!)  But the fresh evening air invigorated me yet again, and by the time we got back to his apartment building, I stupidly suggested that Adam, Dea and I have a nightcap, so we go to the bar/restaurant in his building and order a couple of sidecars.  (Y’all know what a sidecar is, right?  Very simple: 2 parts brandy, 1 part cointreau, 1 part lemon juice-shake over ice and strain into a sugar rimmed glass. Easy. A Classic)

Well, the folks at this bar were quite nice.  And it was Bianca’s birthday.   What a cutie, right?  So I don’t want to be a dick.  But maybe sidecar means something different in German.  Maybe it means the bastard love child of a pina colada and jager bomb, with a twist of laffy taffy.  On the rocks (not so good, Al).  With a float of Satan’s piss.  I had 4 sips and was almost defeated.  We left the bar with heavy hearts. But, after trudging upstairs to Adam’s apartment, there was to be a bit of cyber mischief before oblivion. 

I got online at Adam’s and found, to my utter delight, that Mr. Jerry Gagelman had already added me as a friend on facebook.  Wow, that’s quick.  I was honored and humbled.  Needless to say, I accepted his friendship immediately, and welcomed him to my circle of facebook friends with a few friendly postings to his wall (read from  bottom to top):

Notice the time: 9:59am EST/2:59am CET: 51 hours no sleep!  And that, my friends, is how you open up a can of whupass all over the jetlag. I then passed out cold, dreaming of  liederhosen, bratwursts, and decent sidecars.

 

The next morning, I woke up in horror to this:

 Adam’s wake up song.  Adapting the same chord progression from his old answering machine greeting, circa 1995(”Hello, Hello, This is Morrisey”), Adam sang me a wretched, reverse lullaby.  But, to compensate, Adam was a great tour guide.  We saw many amazing things.  

Such as the Brandenburg Gate:

The Holocaust Memorial:

Clarchen’s Ballhaus:

The hotel where Wacko Jacko almost dropped his kid out the window:

A singing kitty:

…and a dog’s butthole:

We also saw a great concert: Ian Bostridge singing Handel with the Northern Sinfonia at the Konzerthaus:

 Dea’s friend Simon plays with them.  

One of the coolest things I saw was a rehearsal for Dialoge 09, a modern dance piece by Sasha Waltz, at the Neues Museum.  This huge museum had been closed since it was bombed in WWII and was just reopened to the public briefly right before I arrived.  The museum is empty of artwork right now, so, before the collection arrives, Sasha Waltz and Guests are performing throughout the whole museum.  The audience will arrive and walk through the rooms, and there will be different performances going on in each space.  Amazing.  It was kind of a big deal, so I didn’t get to take photos, but you should check this out.  (notice that slide#11 was taken by my good buddy, Adam Berry.)  Much thanks to Dea, who plays with Kaleidoscope, the music ensemble that will be performing with Ms. Waltz, for getting us in to see the rehearsal.  

 

So, finally, it was time for the whole reason I was in Berlin in the first place: to rock out with Vienna Teng and Alex Wong at the Quasimodo Club!!

Vienna has quite the following in Germany.  The crowd was most gracious.  I hadn’t played with her since our last show at Cafe Vivaldi on Feb. 25.  I felt a little rusty, but I think the power of my rock shined through.  Thus begins an auspicious tour of Europe…..and then the US of A!

Wow, you’re still reading.  Well, thank you.  Much thanks also to Adam Berry, a great host and great photographer who took many of the photos in this blog post.I hope you enjoy this glimpse into my life on tour.  Comments are welcomed and appreciated.  I’m still learning how to use my camera…

 so bear with me.

Coming next week: I’ll discuss our flight to Holland, shows in Gronigen, Munster, Minden, and Amsterdam!

 

ROCK ON, AS IF THOU WERT A HURRICANE, BRETHREN AND SISTHREN!

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 17th, 2009 at 12:50 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.