Cowboys and Indians in Berlin

It is warm and humid with gray thunder clouds hovering over the dingy Aeroflot building. I am walking up Unter den Linden, which is becoming my favorite street for strolling aimlessly in Berlin. Usually I stop at the Cafe Einstein and sit at an outdoor table drinking a rich König-Pilsener and just take in the scene. It’s the perfect spot for a flâneur.

Across the boulevard is the old cakebread Russian Embassy which looks childish and ridiculous, like a Legoland castle. The crossstreet to Unter den Linden is blocked off; the gi-normous American Embassy is nearby, guarded and protected within an inch of its life. Hot wars, cold wars—it never really ends.

As I am sipping my beer thinking about all this, there is a sudden commotion coming up Unter den Linden. It’s a surrealist scene of Indians, in full war paint, on horseback and an Old West wagon train. There are cowboys in buckskin, waving their hats, and Indian chiefs in headdresses. All led by motorcycle polizei and trailed by a truck with DJs playing harmonica-laden dance music.

When I ask the woman sitting next to me what it is they are saying on the screeching speakers, she says it is a promotion for a new dance club in Mitte. “Something to do with cowboys and Indians,” she says, shrugging.

Berlin is such a startling city. And, it seems, the soft parade never ends. It all reminds me a bit of that Doors song:

The soft parade has now begun

Listen to the engines hum

People out to have some fun

A cobra on my left

Leopard on my right, yeah

The deer woman in a silk dress

Girls with beads around their necks

Kiss the hunter of the green vest