As much as I love my hometown, I can also hate it viscerally: for its provinciality and nationalism culminating in the city’s mind-numbing and degenerate carnival festivities fueled by the home-brewn beer called Kölsch, or for the mismanaged and ugly build-up of the city after 95% of it was destroyed in the merciless bombings of …
When I Met Lou Reed in NYC
In 2003 or 2004, I worked for an international art-book publisher based in Cologne, and was on a business trip in New York City. We had breakfast scheduled with some people from the art and publishing scene at Gramercy Park Hotel. When I sat down at our table and looked around, I realized a strange …