#427: BER (still), Corporate landlords, AfD eviction
A feel-good bus driver story
Hey 20 Percent,
One thing we’ve fallen short of here at 20 Percent is highlighting the efforts of other expats/immigrants in Berlin. Our format (news summaries) makes it difficult but we could admittedly put more effort into it.
So I’d just like to take a sec and give a shout out to Comedy Cafe Berlin. They launched a comedy theater and improv school 10 years ago next month and are having a four-day mini-festival to celebrate.
I contributed to their crowdfunding back then and have either produced or been part of several shows there, including the 20% Berlin news show. None were bad. If you love improv check them out, as well as this issue’s sponsor, Xylopohone, who are having their own mini-festival of improv and stand-up next month.
As the New York Times recently pointed out, Europe is enjoying a comedy boom and Comedy Cafe Berlin are owed part of the credit for that. Congrats CCB, and thanks for giving a home to some of Berlin’s funniest people (you know who you are).
Have a good weekend!
Andrew
The newest BER problem
BER cancelled six flights Friday and will continue to suffer in the coming days from a cyber attack a week ago that has left baggage handlers working from paper lists, according to Tagesspiegel. Authorities in the UK have already arrested a suspect in the attack, which also affected airports in Brussels, Dublin and London. The attack took out computers from US company Collins Aerospace and heightened tensions over attacks on European infrastructure from … well, OK, everyone thinks it’s Russia. At least this looks like an old-fashioned ransomware attack where a hacker offers to restore computer systems in exchange for cold, hard crypto.
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AfD f-ed up, but doesn’t have to leave
The Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party will have to leave its Reinickendorf Berlin headquarters a year earlier than planned but its landlord cannot immediately evict the far right-wing party, a Berlin court ruled, according to RBB24. The party violated its lease by throwing a party and projecting its logo on the building’s facade following federal elections in February but the landlord cannot immediately void the lease and evict the party because it had previously not warned the party, the court ruled. But the lease includes certain clauses that allows the landlord — ironically an Austrian property company — to throw the party out before its three leases on the property expire in 2027. The AfD is likely to appeal.
The next housing referendum
A Berlin housing initiative hopes to soon ask Berlin voters to enact a law that would make it illegal for a corporate landlord to own more than 3,000 Berlin flats — and force those companies to sell their excess inventory to Berlin, according to taz. If voters (and Germany’s constitutional court) agree, the new law would move 220,000 apartments into public hands and, the initiative believes, lower rents. The initiative, known formally as Deutsche Wohnen & Co. Enteignen after a corporate landlord, successfully passed a referendum during the 2021 election asking politicians to enact such a law. But they haven’t (and aren’t likely to).
🍺 🥨 Germany-wide news 🥨 🍺
🚕 The driver is not in the taxi with you
🍺 The 190th Oktoberfest (will be there Monday)
👩⚖️ Coalition ends political battle over federal judges
Factoid
BVG bus driver Sener Piskin was elected Germany’s favorite bus driver 2025 in the category “exceptional service” after he got between a teenager and a creepy dude nine years ago. The woman nominated the bus driver for the award, curated by Deutsche Bahn’s regional division, a passenger association and a mobility trade magazine. Piskin has been a BVG bus driver for 15 years and knew the women because she regularly rode his bus to school (Tagesspiegel has the story (paywall)). When she was being followed one evening, she asked him for help and he told the stalker to take the next bus — or he’d call the police. He then used his bus to drive her home safely.
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That cover photo encapsulates the misery of being German.
proud of CCB.