I was warned. Martina’s apartment in eastern Kreuzberg, where I am now staying, is expecting a “facelift”. What Martina meant to say was “full-on facial reconstruction, mitt plastic surgery and bone transplant, performedwith pneumatic drill”.

OK, that’ a bit hard to say if you are German, despite all their flair with English. Perhaps she should have mimed it, dancing around with a hammer, smacking it against metal and stone structures, and shouting Turkish phrases such as”Woy oy, Mesmet, put the kettle on son, I’m gasping.” This may, or may not have sunk in a bit more. “Oh, I see, what you are saying is, ‘where I’m staying is gonna resemble the wholesale reconstruction of postwar Berlin, albeit focused entirely outside my bedroom wndow, all at one time and not spread over three decades!”

The facade in Falkensteinstrasse, a cute road stuffed with Turkish cafes, ice-cream parlours, retro furniture shops, bars and eateries, is covered in scaffolding, and on this Wednesday morning, at 7.20am, men called Mesmet and Anatoly loudly discussing something worthy of loud discussion.

By 7.40am they are ripping off the rusting old flowerboxes, albeit gently, as if a slight tug every five seconds may not wake me. Well it has, Mesmet, it has woken me. Slight, but loud, repetition does that pre 8am!

I feel like going outside onto the balcony and remonstrating – well, I would, if the old French doors weren’t stuck fast, swathed in sticky plastic sheeting designed to protect the glass (actually, it’s blue-tinted, making me feel as if I’m living on the wrong side of an aquarium): “Look chaps, just give it some serious welly, then I won’t be woken by the odious clang of clawhammer on rusting metal every five to 10 seconds. Go large, Mesmet, go grosse!”

Of course, bleary-eyed, a tad hangover and bandaged solely in boxer shorts, one shouldn’t try to correct a Turkish builder armed with a clawhammer.

Martina said I would be lucky, that for my minor stay here, the builders would not be starting work until  28 – I took that as meaning June 28; sadly, what she meant was 20 to eight. In other words, in English, NOW! 7.40am. Bang on the dot, with German punctuality, they go at it.

Martina, by the way, is now safely ensconsed in Bristol, at some urban planning symposium, probably in some lush Georgian mansion, serenaded each morning by wafts of Mozart and her frohstuck brought to her by a handsome man called Bristol Dave.

I’m renting her room for a fortnight. The Germans, being mildly thrifty – I said thrifty, not tight – are wont to do this. Websites serve such a purpose. The room-renter buggers off for two weeks, or a month, and they let it out to outsiders. People like me. This would not happen in England.

It’s very trusting of Martina, although her condition is contagious in Germany. Her flatmates are very trusting, too. Within minutes of meeting Diana  – a hospital anaesthetist (a profession that would appear handy at 7.40am this Wednesday morning, what with Mesmet and the Clawhammers knocking seven bails of scheisse out of my windowbox) – she has offered to lend me her car, to visit far flung places such as Spandau. Christine, the other flatty, currently applying for jobs, is also very friendly, and keen on meeting new flatmates. But at 7.40am, all she can lend this tired Englishman is her sympathy.

Sorry but that’s not good enough Christina. Perhaps you can put on my boxer shorts and go outside on the balcony and tell them to zip it until 11am. Come to think of it, that may work!

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Here arrives my first flatshare dilemma. Do German women prefer the toilet seat down, with the lid up, ready for instant access, or both up, or both down? Mein gott, I’m gonna have to ask or cause more Anglo-German rivalry!

Die toiletten in this old Prussian Kreuzberg apartment is bizarre. Encased in a separate room, just left by the front door, the WC is internatinally normal – long and narrow, almost an architectural afterthought.

However,  the toilet space takes up only half the acreage. What confuses is the long, long, slightly rising shelf which extends back to the small window, about two metres away. Attached is a metal window bar, about two metres long, a tad bent, which you twist when you want to open the window, for der freshen air, ja? It’s cute, albeit in a slightly rustic, possibly primevil way.

Anyways, Welcome to my new abode. I’m renting a room off Martina, who is off to the UK on study leave. Anxious to claw back some cash on her rent in Bristol she has rented it out for two weeks to me, at significantly lower rates than even the cheapest private room in a hostel. I’m glad; it was between me and a German Swiss chap visiting a university here, and I won: “Ja, boo, sucks to you Deutche-Swiss. I got the nod!”

This flat has grosse charm, as nearly all old Prussian apartments in Berlin. Accessed by a Munster-esque huge four-metre high wooden street door – yes, brown, again, and smothered in de rigeur tagging and graffitti – its dank, bare lobby, scarred only by seemingly abandoned prams and bikes leads beyond to a sprawling courtyard; a patch of grass offering a playzone for kids, and a cycle rest for adults. Either side of the front door are steps up.

Martina’s three-bedroom flat boasts the typical 3.5metre high ceilings, which is kinda like living in a squash court, albeit one finished with highly ornate cornicing mitt ubiquitous ceiling rose, all replete with wide oak floorboards. In the corner nestles an old heater, covered in glazed brown tiles with steel grates for ash, coal and air – every bedroom has one, apparently. It’s a sort of inverse Victorian chimney. If chimneys were belly buttons, this would be an “outey”.

Bizarre for a 3.5metre high apartment is the bathroom. Small and compact, it seems to have been cut in half – when I stand in the shower for a douche, my head tackles the ceiling. If I angled the shower head any further up I’d water the plants in the lounge above. I have to crouch – I feel like I’m showering in a submarine. Die douche im Das Boot!

Tim Berlin accommodation, Berlin architecture, Entertainment, Kreuzberg, apartments, berlin apartments, berlin, Falkensteinstrasse, housing, Kreuzberg