SHARK!

Sometimes you've just got to go for it.

In this spirit, my friends and I met at Alexander Platz, the largest, and often-said ugliest square in Germany. Its cold. In fact, its snowing. Someone has just bought a ghetto blaster (to be returned an hour later: hooray for money back guarantees!) and another is filming us.

We get ready, 5, 6, 7, 8, - and we start dancing! In the snow. In public. And I don't know any of the moves. It is hysterically funny - our audience consists of a group of school girls in black hijabs - mobiles at the ready, taking pictures of my friend Jeremy who is doing his 'minimalist dancing'; moving only his index finger to the beat.

After our routine (which ends in us all running around, spinning, shouting 'Fight The Power!'), we pretend to head off in our own directions... But no! We all move to Alexa - the newly opened shopping centre, which looks like a giant red brick. We surreptitiously mill around the entrance, when Tina (the only German in the group) screams at the top of her voice – HAI!!! (SHARK!!!) – and we fall the ground, trying to swim across the floor for safety from this evil menace. Those around us are suddenly standing above 10 people wriggling on the floor, screaming for their lives! Some laugh, some look very confused, annoyed even, and two little boys look very scared, clinging to their bemused father.

Needless to say, It’s been a good day. As I wash up with the apartment all to myself, my housemate being in Brussels this weekend, I sing along loudly to the radio and rejoice in the fact that the traffic announcements are sponsored by Tiffany: the Erotic shop in Kreuzberg.

Only in Berlin.