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Why visit Berlin, given that it is far away from traditional tourist routes and it takes long to reach except by plane? One good reason would be the Pergamon Museum, where the friezes of the Pergamon Altar, a Hellenistic masterpiece, are kept. Or maybe the dozens of buildings that have made the history of recent architecture, given the fact that having to rebuild the city, since 1945 both the local authorities and private entrepreneurs have kept commissioning projects to the best architects in the world.

But there’s much more than that. Berlin, more than ten years after the fall of the famous wall, and after having become the capital of the re-united Federal Republic, is still one of the most vibrant cities in Germany. During the years when it used to be the vanguard of the West completely enclosed by the communist Democratic Republic of Germany, it became a magnet for artists, musicians and young people in general, since rents were low and subsidies high. This situation turned it in a city full of surprises, weird and interesting people, and a sort of world of its own.

The great changes the city had to face when the capital was transferred there have altered its balance, with many people and clubs moving to the former East Berlin due to the increase in price of rents and houses in the West, but this hasn’t had a real impact on the artistic life of the city.

If in the 80’s the most interesting area of the city used to be the Kreuzberg, now the area full of students’ apartments (Wohngemeinschaften, as they call them in German) is Prenzlauerberg, and it’s there that you can find cheap restaurants, cool clubs and the most lively atmosphere, while Kreuzberg looks now a bit like a of border area, where the expansion of a more traditional and ’clean’ set of shops and venues is still being resisted by the previous inhabitants and the Turkish community.