Berlin Vampires

Berlin is a city that has carried its history like multiple scars throughout the centuries. Even in this present day of ramped up technology and flashy, modern architecture, one can still see the shadows of Berlin’s past lurking in the corners. Cobblestone streets, museums riddled with bullet holes, remnants of a great wall, and buildings still crumbling from bombs dropped sixty years ago live side by side with newly paved freeways, shopping mall complexes, and a radio tower that looks like something out of the Jetsons.
Berlin is like a vampire, forever trying to change with the times, but retaining its past with subtle nuances that appear when you least expect it. Which makes Berlin the perfect setting to shoot a music video about vampires. Wilson Gil and Orit Shimoni co-wrote a song called “The Choice“. Wilson sings the first half of the song with deep and haunting lyrics: “It’s too late to pray/For what I just took away/In the morning sunrise/I’ll be closing my eyes”. He narrates the tale of a vampire on the prowl. This vampire meets a girl and narrows in on her as his prey. Little does he know that the girl is also a vampire.
Orit enters on the second half of the song with a voice that sounds like a wounded angel. She is the girl that Wilson has targeted and becomes the ultimate predator as she fanes humanity and then takes her revenge by killing Wilson when his guard is down.
Guitar, violin, mandolin, and acoustic bass give the song an old-time feel. The music builds into crescendos of eerie notes that would send shivers up anyone’s spine.
The video is being shot in Mitte in Kloster Strasse, which is one of Berlin’s oldest U-Bahn stations. Large orbs of light hang from the ceiling like shimmering ghosts. Photos of historic trains adorn the walls, wrought iron accents give the station a graveyard-like vibe, and voices echo off the ceiling like ghouls moaning in a haunted house.
The film director, Karim Rateb, adds suspense and the element of surprise with sweeping views of the station, close ups of bloody mouths, and point of view shots.
As for my part in the video, I get to play Wilson the vampire’s first victim. I’ll be sitting on a bench in the station, innocently waiting for my train. The part should be easy to act, because the Kloster Strasse station already fills me with exciting chills whenever I’m there. Entering that station is like going back through time. I just hope I don’t meet any real vampires along the way.

www.wilsongil.com
www.myspace.com/weelittlebirdie

Berlin's Underground Tours

There are many diverse ways to tour the city of Berlin. The options seem almost endless: helicopter tours, gourmet food tours, interactive mission tours, treasure hunts (for the pirate in you), bicycle tours, boat tours through the rivers and canals, a panorama S-BAHN tour (the train has glass walls), hot air balloon, Segway tours, and the list goes on . Seriously, though, touring Berlin on a Segway? The whole “dorky tourist” thing just went up to a whole new level. You can wear your Hawaiian shirt and your fanny pack and drive a segway? You may as well just stamp “tourist” on your forehead and get it over with. Maybe you’ll even get a free Segway ride if you have the “tourist” stamp. You never know.
I was taking the underground (U-BAHN) home the other night. I was tired and ready to get home, so I jumped up when I heard my train coming and was all ready to board, except that what emerged out of the tunnel was a tour group. Instead of a subway train, there was a flatbed, with about 100 or so people with yellow construction helmets sitting on it and waving at us as they passed. I didn’t get it. Who would want to tour the subway tunnels? Wouldn’t it get kind of boring after the first five minutes?
So, I looked it up. Turns out I was beyond ignorant about the underground tours. The tours aren’t about the subway tunnels (now I feel like the dork). There’s a whole labyrinth of shelters and bunkers and ghost stations and tunnels to museums and the like. The tours tend to focus on the history of WW II and the Cold War in relation to the underground tunnels. There are ten tours in total, varying in length, subject, and price.
Reading about the “tales of betrayal” that occurred in the escape tunnels between East and West Berlin is intriguing enough to make me want to pay the nine euros for Tour M. And hey, maybe I’ll even look cute in that yellow construction helmet instead of dorky. One can only hope.
More info: http://berliner-unterwelten.de