Babylin? also, Aussie Alex

To his credit, and my relief, Alex did clean the whole rest of the apartment. And well. He had just been very very busy with work…so, it’s forgiven. Oh yes, Alex. So, introductions last, Alex is my housemate, (‘mayte’ ) a social and slightly distracted video/media artist from Sydney. We get along fine for now. I think his somewhat superficial friendliness will grow on me as the fall and winter progresses. We never talk about anything earnestly for long, which is sometimes better, I think, than sharing important views...earnestness in close quarters can get precarious.

The first thing I have been noticing is that Berlin is crawling with prams. Sometimes I think they are more dangerous than the bicycles that hurtle past you at fatal speeds. If I judged only by the nearby area, I would be convinced that the city consisted entirely of very cute toddlers in striped caps and their very hip mothers, who look, for the most part, to be only just this side of thirty.
Before I moved here, the subject of pregnancy came up a number of times. Not a lot, but enough to be remarkable. Either the joking warning not to get pregnant, or the perfectly serious suggestion (from a friend whose baby I was admiring) that I could easily get my own newborn since ‘it goes pretty quickly here’. At the time I was scandalized but…now I get it.