Travels of Adam – Hipster travel around the world

Photo courtesy of Deutsche Kinemathek

I recently visited the Museum für Film und Fernsehen (Museum of Film & Television) here in Berlin. The museum covers a massive range of topics on the history of cinema in Germany. I particularly enjoyed parts from the permanent exhibit about German cinema during Nazi rule (the “National Socialist State”). I found one story in particular, about an actor/director Kurt Gerron especially interesting—more on that another time.

Anyways, I came away with some new knowledge and thought I’d share. Here are some German movies I didn’t know were actually German (or sort of): Read the rest of this entry »

Hey – some Berlin culture for you:

Last night I attended the opening of a festival/exhibit/conference called “Translating Hip Hop“. I’d seen the posters for it all around Berlin, but considering it was in German, didn’t think much of it. I think the neon green is what first attracted me. I’m not even that much into hip hop. Helvetica and nice typography, on the other hand, I can totally dig. Regardless, a friend was going and it was apparently free, so I thought I’d check it out.

As it turns out, hip hop is a fascinating subject! I don’t know much on the subject, but some key points I learned about hip hop:

• Hip hop may have started in the Bronx as “Black Noise” 30 years ago but it’s now all over the world—from Lebanon to Berlin
• Hip hop is adopted by cultures all over the world and each culture adapts it as their own and makes it unique
• Commercial American hip hop is the dominating force for influencing hip hop around the world
• Gangster-Pimp-Ho trinity

The event kicked off with photographer Joe Conzo speaking about growing up in the Bronx while hip hop was just starting to come to life. He said some interesting things which you can check out in the SoundCloud clip below:

Joe Conzo at ‘Translating Hip Hop’ in Berlin by travelsofadam

Read the rest of this entry »

When most people think of Vienna, opera houses and dead classical composers probably come to mind. At least, that’s what I expected before I visited the city over the summer. Vienna has a big reputation for being a “pretty” European capital.

Each European city seems to have it’s charming adjective: romantic Paris, sprawling London, cheap Berlin or ancient Rome. I found Vienna’s reputation for beautiful architecture, wide avenues and lots of shopping to be a pretty accurate description. But nobody told me the city is actually pretty cool, too. Read the rest of this entry »

A few months ago when I decided to leave Vietnam and fly to Europe, I didn’t really know what was going to happen. I had some suspicions and some secret plans in the back of my mind, but I was trying to be flexible and open-minded with my travel plans and my future. And after a few weeks backpacking (Berlin, Prague, Vienna), I came to the conclusion that I was done with traveling. At least for a little while.

So that’s how I came to live in Berlin. Read the rest of this entry »

I ♥ live music. There’s something really special about seeing a band up on stage, playing passionately. No matter how crap the band is, if the sound quality is decent, the music just gets me. When I was living and working the “American Dream” in Boston two years ago, I went to (on average) to two gigs a week. It was a lot, yes, but Boston also got a lot of great bands passing through. And with a pretty nice corporate job, it was fairly easy to afford all my favorite indie bands (and usually a band t-shirt to go along with the show.)

Since travelling abroad (and now “living” abroad), I’ve been to a total of two gigs. That’s two concerts in 18 months. Not quite my best average, I’d say. Read the rest of this entry »