Solidarity during lockdown

 

There are plenty of ways to help others

There is no doubt that we are living through difficult times. Lots of countries around the world are currently experiencing a second wave of coronavirus. For people living in the northern hemisphere it’s also the darkest and coldest time of the year and as Christmas approaches, many of us will be spending the holiday season away from our families.  On top of that, we can’t go out to restaurants or to the cinema or theatre or to concerts. Still, there are things we can do to bring some light and joy into our lives and the lives of others.

Support arts and culture 

Do you miss going to the cinema, to the theatre or to other events? Luckily, there are plenty of digital offers. As well as the online streaming giants, there are alternatives, such as, online film festivals, literary festivals and digital theatre, concerts and opera. It’s a great way to combine entertainment with support for the arts and culture sector. This week the National Theatre launched a new streaming service called National Theatre at Home, offering a selection of plays available to watch on demand. You can choose to subscribe or you can pay for a single play. The Royal Opera House is offering digital performances of opera and ballet. Meanwhile in Germany, Human Rights Film Festival Berlin is offering the chance to watch 11 films for 11 days (until 7 December so hurry!). All revenues from ticket sales will benefit three independent cinemas in Berlin. 

Sign a petition

Signing a petition is a fast and effective way to bring about change. I’ve lost count of the number of petitions I sign every day. Here are a few organisations that you might like to support: Avaaz, We Move Europe, change.org, One, just to name a few.

Amnesty International’s global campaign Write for Rights is back this year. You can save lives by signing the petitions to free brave human rights activists. Here are the links to the UK website and to the Italian website. You have time until 10 December! There are lots of other petitions to sign on the Amnesty website.

Donate to a charity

There are so many charities out there that it might feel daunting to choose which one or ones to support. You might prefer to support a well-known charity (UNICEF, Save the Children, Greenpeace, Oxfam, WWF, Médecins Sans Frontières) or a small NGO. I suggest you pick a cause that is close to your heart, whether it’s human rights, women’s rights, animal rights, medical research, climate change, hunger, poverty, helping children, refugees, the homeless, the aged, etc. They are all important causes. You can either donate money or you can donate clothes, books, toys, etc. to charity shops, donation centres or clothing banks.  You can also buy Christmas cards to support charities. In Germany, for instance you can buy UNICEF cards either from post offices or online. 

I recently discovered an app called ShareTheMeal, which is part of the United Nations World Food Programme. You can make a one-time donation or you can choose a monthly subscription. I was matched with a family in Nigeria last month and I could actually see how my gift to “the Table” was spent to buy pasta and local maize.

Human Rights Film Festival Berlin

This week I watched films from the Human Rights Film Festival Berlin. I would like to recommend an uplifting documentary called Learning to Skateboard in a Warzone (If You're a Girl). If you live in Germany, you have until 7 December to watch it. This 40-minute documentary filmed in Afghanistan deservedly won an Oscar this year. It follows the progress of a group of girls who attend Skateistan, a school in Kabul that empowers girls from poor backgrounds by giving them an education and teaching them to skateboard. Its shows a different side of Afghanistan from the one we are used to seeing in the news and it offers a message of hope and courage.  

The film NASRIN, about Iranian human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh, currently in prison, is available to watch from this evening. You might remember her from Jafar Panahi’s Taxi, which won a Golden Bear at the Berlinale (Berlin Film Festival) in 2015.

Whatever you do, don’t give up hope!

Life in “lockdown light” – week 4

Lockdown light is not having the desired effect.

As we’re coming to the end of week four of lockdown light, it’s become increasingly evident that while the restrictive measures are working in most parts of Germany, the number of Covid-19 cases in Berlin continues to rise. In some districts, namely, Neukölln and Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg, the number of new infections has increased by as much as 60% in spite of the partial lockdown. Berliners, it would seem, are undisciplined. That doesn’t surprise me at all. As I’ve observed before, the main streets and shopping malls are crowded. Incredibly, some people are not even aware of the rules limiting social contacts. 

Until recently the weather in Berlin had been fairly mild, but now it’s typical November weather. It’s cold and grey and some days it’s difficult to tell the difference between night and day. Nevertheless, people in Berlin don’t like to stay at home. Although Christmas markets are not allowed to open this year, there are alternatives. Kiosks selling Glühwein or mulled wine have popped up in several parts of the city. I’ve even seen a Vietnamese restaurant with a stall on the pavement selling Glühwein. 

The current partial lockdown measures have been prolonged until 20 December and there has been some toughening of restrictions. For instance, only two households are allowed to meet up, with a maximum of five people (it used to be 10) both indoors and outdoors. But while in the rest of Germany there will be an easing of the lockdown rules to allow gatherings of up to 10 family members and friends during the Christmas holidays, in Berlin there will be no change. Luckily for large families, children under the age of 12 are excluded from these calculations. In Berlin it is not unusual to see families with four children. Having three children is almost the norm these days. 

Talking of Christmas, the Advent season begins on Sunday. In Germany the tradition is to light the first of the four candles of the Adventskranz or advent wreath on the fourth Sunday before Christmas. Although you can buy them in flower shops or even supermarkets, for the past three years we’ve been making our own Adventskranz. It’s not difficult to make, but it helps if you have the right tools: a straw ring (the base), twigs, green wire (for fixing the twigs to the ring), candles, candle holders and anything you might like to use as decoration. Usually, families and friends get together on the four Sundays preceding Christmas and sit at the table with the advent wreath in the middle to drink tea or Glühwein and eat Christmas biscuits, or Plätzchen. This year, Advent season won’t be quite the same.

Finally, I have a new Netflix recommendation. It’s an animated short film called If Anything Happens I Love You. It’s only 12 minutes long, mostly in black and white, with no dialogue, but it’s extremely powerful and moving. 

Life in “lockdown light” – week 3

Be a couch potato, be a hero.

It’s week three of lockdown light and the German government, or Bundesregierung,  has come up with a new strategy to convince young people to stay at home. They are running an online campaign with a series of ironic documentary-style videos showing old people reminiscing about the winter of 2020, a time when they were young and they became heroes by simply doing nothing. In one short film, an old man shows off the medal he was awarded for his outstanding contribution in the fight against coronavirus. He was a lazy slob, who stayed at home all day playing computer games and eating junk food. His friends used to make fun of him, but due to his laziness he became a hero because he stopped the virus spreading. The final message is: “Become a hero too and stay at home”, hashtag #besonderehelden or special heroes.

If the scenes at the Mauerpark last Sunday are anything to go by, it’s likely to be an uphill struggle. Clearly Berlin is not a city of couch potatoes. Crowds gathered at the park, which, by the way, has been enlarged recently. As well as people dancing in close proximity to one another (clearly in defiance of the AHA rules), there were multi-ethnic families having barbeques, aspiring musicians trying out new beats, aspiring acrobats trying out new tricks, graffiti artists spraying on the walls and the usual boules-playing gang.

Meanwhile in a different part of Berlin, Prince Charles was giving a speech, partly in German and partly in English, at the Bundestag, the German Parliament. He was attending a ceremony to commemorate Germany's National Day of Mourning for victims of war. Actually, his German is quite impressive! I wonder if the Prince of Wales is aware that there is a nightclub in Berlin named after him. Unfortunately, the club called Prince Charles, like all other clubs (in case you didn't know, Berlin is famous for its club scene), is closed due to the current Covid restrictions. I should point out that Prince Charles and Camilla are amongst the first passengers to land at the newly opened BER airport. It was worth opening a painfully delayed airport in the middle of a global pandemic after all!

Talking of the royal family, season four of The Crown is finally available to watch on Netflix. My favourite moment so far is when a mystified Margaret Thatcher, played by Gillian Anderson, wonders why she is wasting her precious time at Balmoral, while «struggling to find any redeeming features in these people» (i.e. the royals), who her husband describes as “boorish, snobbish and rude”. Meanwhile, Earls Court, where Lady Diana lives, is a place for “prostitutes and Australians”. That is according to Princess Margaret, played by Helena Bonham Carter. If you think you come from an odd family, don’t worry you’re in good company, even though you might not live in a palace or castle.