#498: Tram accident, Görli open at night, poverty up
We have one of the best hospitals in the world
Dear 20 Percent,
The southwestern state of Baden-Württemberg has passed new restrictions on outdoor smoking. No more lighting up or vaping at pools, zoos, transport stops and, er, playgrounds.
Germany is ridiculously behind in the smoking debate. And Berlin’s attempts to cut down on public smoking are lacklustre at best. At my S-Bahn stop a sign at the entrance announces, “This is a non-smoking station” in very small lettering but then offers a demarcated smoking area on the platform over which a small “no smoking” sign hangs.
So which is it? Why no clarity? Of course, this being Berlin, people smoke everywhere on the platform anyway, even if my small kids are right next to them. Why? Because of many Berliners’ who-gives-a-shit attitude. But also because (like the new €250 fine for dropping a cigarette butt on the ground) no one is going to enforce these rules.
Germany, land of rules. Berlin, city of ignoring them.
Which I guess this is something I also kinda like about Berlin, but not in this case.
Tram accident
Around 9:30am on Tuesday morning a tram went off the tracks in the eastern neighbourhood of Hohenschönhausen, according to the Morgenpost. Twenty people were injured. Three suffered “serious injuries”. Twelve people including the driver were treated in hospital. According to initial reports from the fire department, the tram collided with an overhead line pole whilst negotiating a bend. The right-hand side of the vehicle was ripped open and the rear section derailed. Something’s definitely missing from the story. How does a tram just crash into a electricity pole?
Görli gates open for now
On Monday, the Berlin Administrative Court ruled that Görlitzer Park must remain open around the clock, and the park did in fact remain open Monday night. The court granted an injunction filed by five local residents who challenged mayor Kai Wegner’s (CDU) administration’s order to lock the park gates at night on security grounds. The ruling technically applies only to the five plaintiffs, but their lawyer argued it would be impractical to open the park only for them. Area residents say closing the park at night only shifts the drug dealing and associated crime to nearby streets. The judge said the city government, the Senat, didn’t have the authority to close a park since the management of green spaces falls under the responsibility of the districts. The court will deliver a binding verdict later in the trial — and this “emergency” decision is already being challenged by the Senat.
Another big exit
On Monday, local content management company Contentful announced it was being acquired by US software giant Salesforce for an undisclosed amount. Contentful was valued at €3 billion in 2021 so you can imagine the price tag. Salesforce exec Jujhar Singh said: “With Contentful, we complete that picture by adding a native, headless, composable content layer that lets Agentforce dynamically assemble and deliver personalised experiences across every channel, at the speed and scale the AI era demands.” Can somebody translate? Say what you want about 20% Berlin, but we’re not “headless”. North American tech has been shopping around in Berlin this year: Uber nabbed chaffeur app Blacklane in April, medical marijuana startup Sanity was acquired by a Canadian company in March.
Meanwhile, in the world of normal people
Tech bros aside, inequality continues to grow in the capital, reports Tagesspiegel. According to a new report by NGO Paritätische Wohlfahrtsverband, the percentage of Berliners who are “at risk of poverty” rose to 18.7% in 2025 from 16.5% in 2024. People whose income is less than 60 per cent of the median income are considered to be “at risk of poverty”. Among the 16 federal states, Bavaria has the lowest poverty rate (12.6%) while in Bremen it’s a whopping 27.5%. We Berliners love to trash the Bavarians but it seems they’re doing something right.
Events this week, curated by The Next Day Berlin
🎤 Tricky
Thursday 04.06 · 8 pm · Huxleys Neue Welt, Hasenheide 107–113 · €40–50
The Bristol voice that spent thirty years rejecting the trip-hop label he helped create. A Tricky show is always a surprise, sometimes a bad one. Worth the risk. 🎧 Different When It's Silent
🎺 Museum Island Festival Fri–Sun 05–07.06 · from 2 pm · Museumsinsel · €16/day Three days of music, theatre, jazz and performances celebrating 150 years of Alte Nationalgalerie. Mousse T closes Sunday.
🪩 The Continuous Present w/ Objekt
Friday 05.06 · 11 pm · Tresor / Globus, Köpenicker Straße 70 · €22
Tresor's quarterly series devoted to artists working in the now, not as a trend. Objekt, Selessa T and Radart live in the Globus; OCCA, LDS, AMORAL, KUSS and dérive in the Tresor.
🎻 Candice Breitz: A Song for Esther
Sat–Sun 06–07.06 · 7:30 pm · HAU1, Stresemannstraße 29 · €17–29 · EN with DE surtitles
Candice Breitz's tribute to Esther Bejarano, the Auschwitz orchestra survivor who turned the song forced on her into seventy years of anti-fascist hip-hop. Peaches, Rasha Nahas and Aeham Ahmad among those playing one song outside their usual range.
🎶 Kaleidoscope — The Unscripted Musical* Sunday, 14 June, Monbijou Theater. Tickets from €5 Open air at Monbijou. The Spree to your right, the sun going down, a live band playing songs that didn’t exist this morning. Kaleidoscope makes up a full musical from scratch every night. One audience suggestion, no script, no second chances. Laughter and delight, all in English. Don’t miss this one!
*sponsored
🍺 🥨 Germany-wide news 🥨 🍺
📉Why is Poland booming and Eastern Germany falling behind?
👨⚖️ Trial of ‘Ulm 5’ activists: How Germany is dealing with its Palestine Action case
🔌 Why does Germany have such high electricity prices?
Factoid
I just found out that Charité was ranked the 7th best hospital in the entire world by Newsweek, the second best in Europe after Karolinska Universitetssjukhuset in Stockholm. I shouldn’t surprised but I am since I’m so used to so many things in Berlin being subpar. Charité was founded in 1710 as a quarantine facility for victims of the plague outside the city limits at the time. I've undergone eye surgery at Charité’s Wedding campus and my only complaint was the food. Read up on its history here.
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🎙️The 20% Berlin Podcast on Spotify
Headless just means the backend is separated from the frontend in a content management system. So content is stored in one place, but can be sent to different displays (desktop, mobile, etc) without copy pasting, very basically. (Ex Contentfuler here)
Recently I was waiting at a tram stop when a man walked up with who I assumed was his young daughter (he was carrying her pink Barbie backpack).
He proceeds to light up a cigarette and blow smoke directly into her face as he's talking to her.
At one point, the poor girl sneezes.
He gives her a "Gesundheit!" and continues to exhale smoke in her face.
I wanted to kick him in the shins.