Metro station in Charlottenburg, Berlin. Just a little further to the west is Spandau, where Hess spent a good part of his life in prison until he commited suicide in 1987 at the age of 93. After his death the British demolished the Spandau prison and today there is a Mediamarkt.

This is where I used to work. Something with chemicals, ships, trucks, barrels, depots, near Rotterdam.

About one mile of the old Berlin Wall is still intact, the East-side Gallery, home to graffiti artists. I heard they recently removed the graffity in an effort to tidy up the place. A pity, there were some real masterpieces there. But there is the usual garbage also. Someone wrote “Catalonia is not Spain” on the wall. Quite ironic to write this on the Berlin wall. Maybe they would like to to have their own wall in Catalonia?

The Ukraine is full of contrasts. Small villages with no gas or water, no phones, delapidated houses, horse ploughs, gravel roads with potholes. And Porsche Cayennes. Kiev has fifteen McDonalds, and then when you leave Kiev you travel back in time, 50 years in one hour. Bad economy, corruption. No wonder many young Ukranians want to leave for the west. But the west means Poland, and Poland is Schengen. Not easy to cross this border, you need to have a lot of paperwork done and then you need to be very patient as five hours waiting time is the norm.

I was thinking about the difference between the metro in Kiev and the one in Berlin. But there is not much difference. The Kiev metro was build in 1960, the one in Berlin is from 1910, and Paris from 1900. In Paris you can see the age, but not in Berlin.

The 2008-2009 winter season gave us perfect ice. No wind, no snow, blue skies and cold nights created the best ice we have had in years. Totally black ice. You’re on the middle of the lake and you look down and all you see is bottomless black. And it feels very different from the stadium skate track where you have 5 centimeter ice on a concrete floor, this is ice floating on water and it makes a very distinct sound when you ride, ploink ploink ploink.

In Kiev you can buy a suit on high street, prices start at 1500 euro. Or you go to the market in the eastern suburb. This is cosmopolis, with Chinese, Koreans, Vietnamese, Indians, Pakistanis and Ukranians. You buy a suit for 90 euro, and then they send you to the tailor who has a shop next to the market. Well, shop, it’s more like a shack with corrugated sheet metal on the roof, pallets, a door but no windows.

The TGV in Montparnasse or Rennes, or maybe the Thalys at Gare du Nord, I forgot.

McDonalds takeaway at Kiev metro station Plosjtsja Lva Tolstoho.