PSEUDO 2

PSEUDO 2

Es wird jetzt doch eine Fortsetzung von Pseudo geben. Allerdings setzt die Handlung nicht bei Pseudo 1 an, sondern Pseudo 2 ist eher eine Ergänzung, bestehend aus freigelegten Erinnerungslücken. 

 

 

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Neues Material

 

 

Neues Material aufgetaucht 

(new material discovered)

 

 

 

Randale in der Waschhalle

 

Die Waschhalle in der Brunswiker schloss abends um 22 Uhr. Je später der Abend, desto weniger Waschkunden und desto mehr Punks waren anwesend. Ich habe keine Erinnerung mehr daran, wer die Waschhalle gegen 22 Uhr abschloss oder ob es sogar einen Schließmechanismus mit Zeituhr gab. Die Kieler Wach- und Schließgesellschaft fuhr pünktlich Patrouille. Je besoffener wir waren und je größer die Punkmeute, desto mehr wurde randaliert. Ich fand später mehrere Holz- und Plastikschilder aus der Waschhalle in meinem Zimmer, die ich aus der Waschhalle entwendet und apportiert haben muss. Die Schilder enthielten Handlungsanweisungen zum Bedienen der Maschinen oder Unterlassungsaufrufe und Verbote. Es entsprach dem Zeitgeist, solche Schilder einfach abzubauen und sich in die eigene Wohnung zu hängen. Sie waren schlussendlich beliebte  Geburtstagsgeschenke und tolle Accessoires. Zurück zur Waschhalle.

Lehnte ein Punk mit dem Oberkörper an der Oberkante einer Waschmaschine bei geöffneter Trommeltür und mit den Händen vorne am Hosenlatz, wenn er dazu leichte Gleichgewichtsprobleme hatte, konntest du sicher sein, dass der Punk in die Wäschetrommel schiffte. Es wurde nicht nur in leere Wäschetrommeln gepullert. Sogar laufende Maschinen ließen sich öffnen. Und wenn ein Waschhallen-Gast seine Wäsche alleine ließ, um einen Spaziergang zu machen, konnte es in Ausnahmefällen passieren, dass ein sturzbetrunkener Punk in die mit Wäsche gefüllte Trommel pinkelte und diese per Knopfdruck wieder startete oder schlichtweg einfach offen ließ. Weiße Wäsche wirkte mitunter eigenartig gelb. Der Punk dachte, er könne sich auf diese Weise am Staat oder am Kapitalismus rächen, was natürlich ein krasser Irrtum war. Die Rechnung ging nicht auf. Als Höchstleistung galt, die runde Tür einer Waschmaschine abzutreten. Das schafften nur hartnäckige Punks, und es bestand die Gefahr, sich die Stiefel oder sogar den eigenen Fuß kaputtzutreten. Mit Turnschuhen wäre das nicht möglich gewesen. Beim Randalieren waren wir todernst und trotz des Alks hochkonzentriert, als sei das unser erlernter Broterwerb. Einige wirkten wie wildgewordene Stiere. In krassesten Momenten gab es Lachkrämpfe. Um das Ziel zu erreichen, ließen sich nicht befestigte Sitzbänke oder bereits losgetretene Bänke als Rammböcke verwenden, um Waschmaschinen zu zerstören. Es wurden immer wieder Pausen eingelegt, um sich dem Alkohol zu widmen. Das Verhalten war ferner abhängig von der Musik, die auf Barnes Kasi-Rekorder lief. Bei einigen Songs konntest du nicht anders als randalieren, da die Refrains Schlüsselwörter wie destroy, kick, attack, smash, war, kill, run oder burn enthielten. Die Schadensliste wurde ellenlang.

Kopfzerbrechen bereitete uns die massive Trockenschleuder. Der Deckel rastete erst ein, wenn eine Münze eingeworfen war. Da startete sofort die bollernde Rotation. Wenn der Deckel jedoch ohne Münzeinwurf runtergedrückt wurde, lief der Trockner zwar kurz an, der Deckel sprang jedoch automatisch mit einem Klacken wieder hoch. Wenn der Deckel jedoch gegen den Widerstand der Automatik von mehreren Punks permanent runtergedrückt wurde, knackte es unaufhörlich in kurzen Abständen mit einem metallischen Sound, und die massive Schleuder lief ohne Geld. Das war aber nicht gesund für die Mechanik. Einige rissen den Antriebsriemen raus oder zerschnitten Kabel. Irgendwann kokelte es als Folge der Zerstörung. Was soll’s?

Das Pinkeln in die Schleuder war bei den Punks verpönt, da die Öffnung der Schleuder nach oben ausgerichtet war und das Pinkeln in Bogenform einer Zielübung glich. Es war anstrengend. Jeder konnte dabei den Punkerpenis betrachten. Einige traten pinkelnden Punks in den Arsch um Sachen weiter zu Eskalation zu bringen. Maxi schaffte es, sich ganz normal im Stehen in die Trockenschleuder zu erleichtern. Er durfte dabei bloß nicht zu breitbeinig stehen. Gerne wurden Flaschen in den Trommeln entsorgt. Gefüllten, bereits gestarteten Maschinen wurden Flaschen als Waschbeigabe beigesteuert. Meistens gingen die Flaschen kaputt, was die Wäsche mit Scherben anreicherte. Trockner wurden entankert, Plexiglas zerschlagen und gesplisst, Steckdosen wurden von der Wand getreten. Die Aggressionen entluden sich teils explosionsartig. Zerstörungsrausch war angesagt, bis eine Art Befriedigung einsetzte. Doch die Geldschatullen in den Automaten waren vor uns sicher. Da war sogar ich überfordert. Dennoch fügten wir den Einwurfautomaten größtmöglichen Schaden zu mit Boots und scharfkantigen Gegenständen. Es gab auch Freaks, die ständig Werkzeug dabei hatten, um überall, wo sie sich aufhielten, Sachen zu sabotieren und zu manipulieren, ob im Bus, in der Spielhalle,  im Waschcenter oder wo auch immer.

Von draußen sahst du als Passant manchmal die Rückseiten der Nietenjacken mit Bandnamen Schulter an Schulter auf der Sitzbank vor der Scheibe hocken, einige im Kamikaze-Style nach vorne gebeugt. An extremen Tagen war der Fliesenboden übersät mit weißem Waschpulver, dass sich an einigen Stellen von Pisse und Bier gelb färbte. Auch Scherben und zerknüllte Dosen lagen herum. Das Waschcenter roch irgendwann nicht mehr einladend, besonders, wenn auch Kotze dabei war. Mit fremder Wäsche werfen war jedoch ein Tabu. Aus dieser Zeit stammte die Redewendung:

      „Ich schleuder’ mir gleich einen“.

 

 

Hier die Buchvorstellung zur englischen Version meines Punkromans PSEUDO mit rund 150 Fotos, Skizzen, Poster, Flyer, etc.

Excerpt, translation of PSEUDO into English, the last 3 chapters

Barne’s fall

I met Barne very rarely then. He had worn a mohawk that was not nearly as tall as that of Leo in former times or that of $abrina. Finally a new disco opened at Bergstrasse on the old premises of Pfefferminz. Maybe this was even the second, third or fourth follow-up disco after the Pfefferminz. The dance floor was no longer at the back, as in the old Pfefferminz, but further in front, where the first bar was located near the entrance. That's why it always seemed like rush hour on the dance floor. That was a bit annoying. I talked to Tall John there, who worked as a bartender at a pub called Sonderbar in Jägersberg Street. Gonnrad danced alone on the dance floor. Barne wore half-length dreadlocks and sat with three young punk girls on the ground at the edge of the dance floor. We all watched Gonnrad dance and found it weird how he moved because we had never seen him dance at a disco before. I suddenly had trouble with Tall John who didn't speak a word of German. He suddenly became very aggressive. When I wanted to piss off, he yelled at me,

      "Stay!"

I had another drink, watched Gonnrad and looked at the scenery. Anyway, this was one of the last times I saw Barne. I later met him again at a Roskilde festival. He had arrived without luggage and showed me his side cutter, that he pulled out of the inside pocket of his leather jacket, with which he cut his way through the fence of the festival grounds to avoid the horrendous entrance fee. The very last time I saw Barne was when he was sitting in front of the entrance to the Alte Meierei at a punk concert. He now had a bald head and, as usual, his round, metal-rimmed glasses. I can't remember exactly which bands were playing that night, but I guess it was the Culture Shock concert. Maybe I was wrong, it might have been a Leatherface concert. I am not sure. When he recognized me, he immediately shouted,

      "Moin Shelter!"

and laughed. I greeted him back, but I didn't feel a great need to talk to him, because we all knew that he was on heroin. To be honest, I was also a little irritated that he suddenly ran around with a skinhead haircut, although he used to backbite on skinheads like all other Kiel punks. I finally entered the Alte Meierei and listened to the concert. Barne stayed outside. I never saw him again afterwards. A short time later I learned that he had died from an overdose of heroin. Hecker was at his funeral and reported back. They played his favorite song. I think it was "Gentle Murder" by Mayhem. A sad story. We were all strongly affected and devastated. He was simply too popular in Kiel, almost legendary. In the following time, even more people passed away. For some it hurt more, for others it hurt less. Suddenly the despised Long Jock was found murdered in Kiel-Gaarden, and the Konz brothers soon followed into the realm of the dead. Although Mig managed to get his entrance qualification for the polytechnic university – he even started studying electrical engineering at a university of applied sciences – he later became so addicted to drugs that he died of his addiction. This was a heavy blow for all those who knew him better, but especially for his young brother, who himself fell down afterwards. Stidi couldn't get rid of alcohol and finally died in agony of cirrhosis of the liver. When I recently learned that our old punk idol Gonnrad had also died in a terrible way, I realized that a whole punk era had come to an end.

For many, unfortunately, the whole thing here was just a short appearance. Recently I counted all reported drug-related deaths in my family, circle of friends and acquaintances. Believe it or not, I counted 17 of them – exact figure unknown. And even then the conventional suicides of drug users from my environment are not considered at all. Evil, evil, evil. I knew the majority of the dead from the Buschblick Youth Club. Greetings to Christiane F.

  

The car attack

As far as I am concerned, I was regarded as left-wing scum by some people, while at the same time others regarded me as right-wing or formerly right-wing because of my skinhead times. As if that wasn't bad enough, I was also cursed by the rocker scene. The problem never seemed to disappear completely and flared up again and again, but in many cases I persuaded myself to think that. When I hoped that my mental wounds from punk and skinhead times had healed to some extent and the waves had been smoothed out, I was once again proved wrong.  

      One day I rode my bicycle along Fördestrasse. Coming from Kiel-Pries, the way led me to the neighbouring district of Schilksee in the north, where I wanted to visit friends. To get to Schilksee I had to cycle one kilometre through a rural area on Fördestrasse. Right beside the road was the bicycle path for both directions, and immediately beside the bicycle path a broad, deep ditch extended, which did not completely reach to the Seekamp exit. About 15 metres to the right of the ditch ran an old parallel road, which I should have taken instinctively despite its damaged condition. On this section of the Fördestrasse there were neither houses nor any other buildings.

When I cycled the route that day, there was not much traffic, because it was a weekend. I cycled a good distance – as usual, at a relatively good speed – but without exhausting myself. During the ride I was already thinking about topics I wanted to talk about with my friends. These included new releases on the record market, scandalous events among friends and problems with people from the right-wing scene.

It was dead quiet at first, when a car gradually approached from behind. I continued cycling normally, without suspecting anything, until I suddenly noticed changes in the engine noise of the approaching vehicle. The car accelerated and shifted gears rapidly in order to reach the highest possible speed. I turned around suspiciously, to see a car pulling out onto the cycle path and racing towards me. I had to be careful not to lose control of the bicycle, but I saw two sadistically laughing skinheads sitting in the front seats of the car, heading straight towards me. In an instinctive action I made a sharp turn to the right side, drove into the ditch and fell off the bike. I picked myself up again in a matter of seconds, jumped up immediately and climbed up the ditch's slope. I saw a total of four skinheads sitting in the car – one of them fat and fleshy. These jesters were apparently Karl Melitz and his fascist skins. The driver accelerated and the car moved away at high speed, so I could only recognize from the license plate that it was a Kiel registration. Was this a murder attempt or just a stupid joke? I was in shock, especially as I realized that the skinheads were obviously after me. I pulled my bike out of the ditch, checked that it was intact, and continued my journey, worried and with my clothes dirty from the fall. I rushed to Schilksee-Süd to turn right onto Graf-Luckner-Strasse at the pedestrian tunnel, in case the skins made a U-turn to come back. I was rather disturbed and permanently afraid that the car of fascists could appear again. I still had several minutes to cycle, and all sorts of delusions took place in my head: why they did that, whether they were drunk or whether they even wanted to run me over deliberately, because they recognized me from behind. I finally visited my friends and immediately told them about the car attack. They were almost more worried than I, because they recognized what a murderous incident had happened. It was more puzzling to think what the motives for this car attack could have been and whether it was a murder attempt. If I hadn't rescued myself in the ditch, they would have hit me with the car. It was obvious that they were the Schilksee and Strande skins. We didn't follow up the matter, because there would have only been more bad blood.

Several times, I saw the aforementioned little group of skinheads at different street celebrations at Strande and Schilksee. I thought I recognized the same sadistic laughter I saw through the back window of the car when they attacked me with their vehicle. The whole fascist clique seemed to know about it and were maliciously happy about the attack.

The dead hitchhiker

My old hitchhiking spot near the comprehensive school was not used much at all by hitchhikers. During the day you could spot single hitchhikers there from time to time, or you could spot a hitchhiker on weekends or in the evenings who wanted to get into the city centre or to Bergstrasse. It was always the same people who stood there and held out their thumbs – first and foremost, students. There were different rush hours, during which many cars raced along – mostly at times when the big companies had the evening off or the comprehensive school had their lunch break, or at the end of school. At Hohenleuchte junction, the vehicles, most of them coming from Pries-Friedrichsort, turned left into Fördestrasse, where my hitchhiking spot was located. Other peak times were during summer and particularly at weekends; when there was a run on nearby Falckenstein beach; and when the beach visitors arrived in the morning or at noon, or drove back into the city in the late afternoon. These cars were often already on the main road coming from Schilksee and drove straight on. For many drivers, the hitchhikers standing at the bus stop were a thorn in their side. These were usually local drivers who couldn't stand seeing hitchhikers like me standing there so often. They detested the lifestyle of the hitchhikers. Some were notorious hitchhiker haters.

I stood there regularly for years; maybe I was the person who held out their thumb the most. That bothered some in particular. They regularly symbolized this to me with grim facial expressions, curses and disparaging gestures, but I didn't let myself be intimidated and continued to hitchhike at that bus stop in the future, especially when there was no bus or when I had just missed one.

At that hitchhiking spot one afternoon, a notorious rocker attacked me with his heavy motorcycle. He came from the direction of Hohenleuchte Street, turned to the right onto Fördestrasse, and when he saw me he grumbled something as he nearly hit me and immediately folded his visor down at the end of his sharp turn into the bus bay, in which I stood, hitchhiking. I had to jump to the side of the pavement. The rocker was visible through the narrow slits of his visor. He was probably just trying to scare me.

On another day, a skinhead in a jeep that came from the direction of Pries drove directly towards me and accelerated, as if he wanted to lift me onto his radiator hood. I saw a skinhead sitting at the wheel and had to make a big jump to the side to prevent a collision with the jeep. The driver made a serious steering error in the stopping bay, that he ran the risk of losing control of the vehicle. When he had stabilized the jeep again, he returned to the right lane. The skinhead cursed during this action, as if he wanted to tell me,

      "Don't let me see you here again, or I'll run over you!"

At first I wasn't sure whether the driver of the wine-red jeep just wanted to scare me or actually knock me down on purpose. I even knew him by sight. He ran around as a skinhead for a relatively short time and played handball in the local sports club. That could have quickly gone wrong.

One day an article appeared in the local newspaper, Kieler Nachrichten, in which a kind of traffic accident was described. A taxi driver noticed, several metres behind the hitchhiking spot at which I stood so often, that he dragged along a heavy object under the car. When the driver finally stopped and checked it, he noticed the lifeless body of a man below his car. The newspaper article did not give more details about the incident. That was absurd enough. They neither wrote about the cause of death nor about the victim himself. When I read that article, it raised more questions in me than it gave answers. I suspected that something terrible had happened there. The newspaper article sounded harmless, as if something like that could just happen every day. At first glance, the text gave the impression that a person lay down on the street at night until he was caught by a taxi and dragged along. Of course, the suspicion arose in me that the dead person could have been a hitchhiker who had been hit by a car before, or even killed by that car on purpose, and finally lay lifeless on the street. The reader had to assume that in the next issue of the newspaper the case would be dealt with in more detail. But no follow-up article appeared on the incident. I remembered the driver of the wine-red jeep, who had almost mowed me down with his vehicle while I was hitchhiking a while ago, and also the brainless skinheads, which had driven their car onto the bicycle path.

Since the identity of the dead hitchhiker remained unmentioned and no characterizing body details were given, I also suspected that some people in my town and my circle of acquaintances mistook the dead person for me. Slowly but surely, I had to understand that my days in Kiel were numbered. Therefore, I thought it would be better to move to Berlin in order to have a happy and safe life there.

Auszug aus PSEUDO - a punk novel (English Version), last chapters

(No) Future for the fascists?

While I was still at Hebbelschool, Töle's brother told me in the smoker's area of our school yard,

      "You either have to be completely right-wing or completely left-wing!"

That was modified by Steff, who had meanwhile changed from the Kiel-Pries Secondary School to Hebbel Grammar, as he said,

      "Someone can be so extremely left-wing that the person is already right-wing again!"

Steff was the very first person I ever heard using the expression "left-wing fascist". It was really a very politicized time. In German lessons with a young female teacher, we had finally discussed the topic of right-wing extremism. That definitely was two years too late, maybe even three years for those who had repeated the class, like me. Nevertheless, we did not read a single book about right-wing extremism at school. After the experiences from my skinhead time, my conviction was that you are only acceptable as a skinhead guy or girl if you clearly position yourself against right-wing extremism and at the same time make a statement against right-wing extremism with your outward appearance – be it through a patch, button or T-shirt.

Since pissing in the assembly hall in the U2a class, I was on the shitlist of every teacher at Hebbelschool and felt literally like I was walking through hell. Whenever I met teachers in the administration corridor and humbly greeted them with "Good morning" or "Good day", they simply didn't respond. Even when I met them in the corridor alone, or when my class teacher passed by, they would hard-heartedly ignore me and just walk on. That was inhumane, as if I were a convicted felon. The mental punishment lasted three more years, and I despaired of it in the long run. That's why the television series Tod eines Schülers (Death of a Schoolboy) repeatedly haunted me, which was controversially discussed in the nationwide media for years. This always caused anxiety in me.

Unfortunately, I didn't get a real chance at Hebbel Grammar anymore. With the teachers it was over, and my school performance got worse and worse. By '86 I finally managed to leave Hebbel Grammar and enrolled myself at a Comprehensive School in Kiel-Friedrichsort, where a commie teacher had just been banned from teaching. Due to this cross-transfer I lost another school year. After the new start at school, I felt liberated of a heavy burden. After that I never saw Nazi-Gerd again. He and his peers had incited countless people to extremism and seemed to have got away unharmed themselves. I was told that he went to the Bundeswehr after school, then studied business administration and joined his father's security company.

Many years later, after reunification, I learned that he had moved to Dresden and had founded a private armed security company guarding Bundeswehr properties. I think his security company was just a vehicle for him to complete his evil work. You could count on five fingers what Gerd planned to do in Dresden, and as former secretary of the BHJ he could have made a contribution to kick-starting the right-wing scene there.

It was blatant that his companion, Nazi-Thorben, after leaving Hebbelschool as well, went to Kiel Business Grammar School with my sister to get his A-Levels. I have been told by various sources that he holds a mid-level position as a credit risk analyst at H-SA Ortbank. The suspicion automatically arose that, given his past as a leading right-wing extremist in Kiel, he could pursue a kind of right wing cronyism as the person responsible for granting loans. Did Nazi-Gerd and Nazi-Thorben perhaps even try to establish a right-wing operative network? There is a lot that is unclear.

      As far as my own misery was concerned, I could not shift the entire blame onto Gerd and his companion, the fascist piss artist. I also could not blame the teachers for my career, who were in some cases former participants in the war, who beat and reprimanded us – their pupils – and occasionally tried to manipulate our opinion about the Third Reich. I should have shown stronger steadfastness and personal responsibility in order to resist the manipulative efforts by the two young Nazis and the right-wing teachers. As long as I was part of the punk scene, this worked quite well, because we could stand our ground using a lot of mockery during breaks and after school. When I showed up later with my bomber jacket, however, people from different sides tried verbally to bring me into line. I did not remain true to myself and my principles, otherwise I would have fought with Stidi much sooner and would have defended myself against Nazi-Gerd more decisively. I should have more strongly opposed the creeping process of spreading right-wing radical thoughts in the skinhead scene. However, I have to say that someone from the scene had tricked me into taking a pill as Heimerich later claimed. As I tried to ask him for details, he played it down. I couldn't find out whether he meant Gerd's supposed caffeine tablet before the sports class, or if there was another incident with LSD. Maybe it would have been better to leave school immediately during the hard punk times, because Hebbel Grammar was no fun for people like me at that time. Unfortunately, I was too cowardly, to simply strike back at the teacher Haberlack. Only Maxi was able to do something like that. I would have been spared a lot of suffering if I had found another school in time.

Hot coffee

I don't recall what kind of elections were to take place, whether state or local elections were called, but the election campaigns were running at full speed. Word had got around that the radical right-wing party, NPD (National Democratic Party of Germany), was driving through the Kiel working-class districts with a loudspeaker in order to distribute its right-wing propaganda. I was just standing in the large amusement arcade in Friedrichsort, as someone shouted from the entrance,

      "The NPD car is coming!"

I held a full plastic cup of coffee in my hand, which I had just bummed for free from the amusement arcade supervisor. The cup was very hot, so I could only touch it at the top and had to move it from hand to hand several times to avoid scalding my fingers. When I arrived on the platform in front of the arcade, I saw the NPD car driving at walking speed down Friedrichsorter Strasse. With a loudspeaker fixed to the roof of the small, white car, the occupants blasted the citizens of Friedrichsort with right-wing extremist slogans. Determined, I went to the opposite side of the street with the full cup of coffee and waited for the car. Meanwhile, the dirty slogans ran from the car's cassette player. Beside the driver sat a muscle-packed front-seat passenger as a reinforcement. The usual hate speech about migrants was being spread, with which the NPD typically tried to dupe the population. When the car finally arrived at the area opposite the arcade, I walked up to the car, leaned diagonally over the windshield, and emptied the entire load of coffee into the forward-facing megaphone. At that moment a librarian from the district library walked by and shouted,

      "Well done!"

With a light crackle, the inflammatory slogans of the NPD fell silent. End of the announcement. The bodybuilder in the passenger seat reacted grumpily and seemed to want to get out, but the driver gave him a sign to stay seated, because he had noticed that the young martial-arts-experienced Turks of the "Bloody Eagles" had gathered in their black bomber jackets, with patches sewn on, in front of the arcade, from where they watched the action attentively. Instead of getting out of the car and knocking me down, the NPD members got the car into gear and drove off in the direction of An der Schanze Street. I was afraid that I might be charged for the defective loudspeaker, but if the NPD pack had got out, the "Bloody Eagles" would certainly have rushed to my aid. The situation would have been different if the NPD had called the cops, but for that they would have had to get out and dial 110 from the phone booth. They obviously shied away from doing this because it would have put their anti-immigrant slogans on record.

Leather jacket theft at the Alte Meierei (Old Dairy Farm)

Over the years, two new dark wave bands were formed in Kiel. One was called New Dawn Fades, with Gerti as the singer; the other was called Church of Insanity, with Manja on the mic, who used to sing in a punk band. Many mixed up the two singers with their permanently dyed black hair. They also backcombed their hair in the same way. In the end, they were nothing more than punk girls turned goth. Later, even $abrina and Zilvana tried to start a small singing career – one in metal and the other in rap.

My self-confidence had now recovered and I was able to resist against people from the right-wing scene, just as I had always managed to do before Gerd tried to convert me. The mates that I knew from school, the sports club and the big amusement arcade stabilized me again. A stable circle of friends redeveloped, and I made sure that I kept in touch with them. I really blossomed again, had wild hairstyles and my record collection became more colourful. Also, my love for punk became revitalized, but not as extreme as in my early days. I slowly developed into a fan of the Dutch band The Ex, which I liked to hear while sitting alone in my armchair at home.

I occasionally got punk zines, including Trust and, later, Wahrschauer. Despite my positive development I still had a few distinct habits. I wore electronic resistors, which I'd bent into shape, and a small skull from a chewing gum machine as earrings.

I hit back at others more consistently than ever if someone expressed a right-wing attitude in my presence. My negative experiences with the neo-fascists were serious and left their mark on me for life. These events should not repeat themselves again. I even corrected people's speech, called them to task and put an end to their right-wing ideas, but here, too, there was always the danger of getting caught with the wrong people.

Soon the day came, when the LP Neither Washington nor Moscow lay permanently on my turntable. My hair was ten centimetres long at that time. Whenever I saw the record cover with the sailor pictured on it, I had to think of my dead cousin, who worked as a mechanic on the supply ship Spessart. He searched in vain for an effective treatment programme. My cousin was not the only one in my family who died of an overdose. This also happened to a half cousin in Austria, whom I never met in my life and who was presumably in the punk scene with a mohawk.

With our clique we attended a lot of concerts. We extended our range of movement, going more often to Hamburg to the venues Fabrik, Markthalle, Molotow and Docks. Among the highlights were concerts by The Pogues, Meat Puppets, Bad Religion, Hüsker Dü, Serious Drinking and, finally, Peter and the Test Tube Babies. In Lübeck, at a venue called Alternative, we saw The Neurotics and Attila the Stockbroker, and landed again at Plünschli in Husbyries, where The Vibes and The Sting-Rays played – both trashy psycho-combos.

At the Sting-Rays gig I was drunk and stoned. Smoking weed happened every now and then, even with inhalation. After the gig, I took a guitar that probably belonged to the supporting band. This was a really idiotic deed that I later felt sorry for.

Before the Vibes concert we went to a cemetery near Flensburg. To make matters worse, Töle knocked over a tombstone. That was totally unacceptable, even though there was something annoying engraved on it. With $abrina I even stole a microphone from the PA during a New Model Army concert. I simply removed it while $abrina held her open imitation leopard skin handbag in front of me. All of this was not very positive.

The Alte Meierei was, meanwhile, fully established and enriched the cultural life of the city with punk concerts. Especially on weekends, punk bands from all over the world were regularly presented there. Not only when American groups like Youth of Today, Verbal Assault or False Prophets performed in this wonderfully filthy venue, it was crowded to overflowing. We saw countless convincing and rousing concerts here. At the cash desk we usually had to pay eight Deutschmark. Sometimes there was a so-called "Vokü" or "Volx Küche" ("people's kitchen" with cheap food for everyone), in which large quantities of food were cooked for visitors. Many people here had dyed hair, some wore Rasta curls, some mohawks, others skinheads. I also saw Radke here again, who with dyed red hair also distanced himself from the skinhead scene. Here you met normal intellectuals, students, workers and certainly plain-clothes policemen who wanted to check out whether potential terrorists or drug dealers were running around. From time to time we saw punks with the RAF emblem on the back of their leather jackets.

There were constantly dogs running around, sometimes quarrelling violently, sometimes barking or sniffing each other. The drinks were remarkably cheap. What annoyed many people was the elitist behaviour of some autonomists, who always felt superior and even regarded righteous punks with suspicion – skins anyway. Many of the old Kiel punk dinosaurs avoided the Meierei because the scene became too political for them. When the venue was crowded, people liked to dance bare-chested in front of the stage, and stage diving was not stopped either. Many wore leather jackets, band T-shirts, "Against Nazis" patches and Doc Martens with steel caps. Studded belts were everywhere to be seen, even though the wide, four-row ones with large pyramid studs became increasingly rare. Last but not least, the toilets were to prove unsuitable and disgusting for the residents, bands and visitors. The sanitary facilities were already so filthy at the time that a thick layer of fungus grew on the enamel of the basins and elsewhere. This proved itself difficult to tolerate, especially for women, and was repeatedly discussed.

Next to the cash register there were always leaflets on current political topics, such as drug addiction, Kurdistan or the police state, although these were not imposed upon visitors. However, these DIN A4 sheets were not noticed by many young people. The concert posters, that were placarded everywhere in the city, were quite imaginative and rich in contrast. That was what accurately characterized the Alte Meierei at the time. Sometimes I even found their posters on electricity boxes in Kiel-Friedrichsort.

But the venue was a thorn in the side of the city administration from the very beginning, because they didn't want anyone, even if they were just a few critical youths, to organize themselves subculturally or politically. The people here were brightly-coloured; some had tribal tattoos, hair ornaments and many piercings. Unfortunately, there were black sheep in this scene who liked to pinch leather jackets, parked bicycles or backpacks. Some visitors were afraid to go too far away from their belongings when they were drinking, pogoing or chatting, because they could get stolen under certain circumstances. In principle this could have happened in any Kiel disco or concert venue. Usually junkies were – as is the case everywhere – under general suspicion.

At the end of one concert, as a dark, Irish folk-punk band played, Töle, the little punk from Kiel-Wik, who was by no means a junkie, grabbed an old leather jacket out of the blue and left the venue with it. We did not expect him to act like this. We were shocked, because he had never done anything like this before. In former times he wouldn't have dared to even think about it. Töle, as though he was being remote-controlled, went outside with the black leather jacket, which had been lying in a corner, and followed us, his mates, to the parking lot at Lübscher Baum, but he failed to reckon with the owner. As we crossed the parking lot, a well-built, autonomous, left-wing woman with shoulder-length, blond curls suddenly stood behind him. She was probably a martial artist. She zealously threatened Töle that he should immediately hand over her jacket.

      "Are you sure that is your jacket?"

      "Oh, isn't that my jacket?"

      "Give me back my jacket immediately!"

Töle handed her the jacket. Otherwise, the woman would probably have attacked him. Töle felt highly embarrassed about his misbehavior. He said very quietly, 

      "I'm sorry." 

Without saying a word, the woman turned around and crossed the Theodor-Heuss-Ring towards the Alte Meierei. After all, should she have thanked Töle for returning her jacket without any complications? On the whole way back, Töle seemed to be extremely concerned by his own deed. His behaviour was inexplicable to him. Something had gone completely wrong with him – a classic blackout, in which he threw away all good qualities and virtues. But in this case there was a lot of booze involved. Even though he had some bad habits, he usually behaved very well, treated his friends fairly and, later, even did his alternative civilian service in caring for the elderly, for which I admired him very much. He never did anything seriously wrong, except the small, chaotic binge-drinking events with the punks, which were criminalized all over town. Töle never put his hands on other people's leather jackets again, even though he would have liked to have owned one.

A pile of punk records

A Friedrichsorter pothead, a former HDW trainee (Howaldtswerke-Deutsche Werft, the biggest shipyard in Kiel) who is now unemployed, had given me a few cannabis seeds and explained to me how to sow them and grow the plants. A few weeks later, several marijuana plants were growing on the windowsill of my room in my parents' house. The risk was that there ran a small path next to the house, from where everyone could see the plants. The further the mini hemp plantation sprouted on the windowsill, the more it became a bone of contention in the family. My parents protested strongly against my illegal plant-growing. However, they did not dare to do anything about it or throw the plants into the dustbin or onto the compost. When they were ripe, I cut the plant stems cleanly, let the plants dry and assessed the harvest which fully met my expectation. I stowed the plucked leaves and blossoms in a blue Adidas shoebox. When Marwelli, who was still drudging in the tank construction company, got some of the harvest to smoke, he immediately wanted to buy the whole shoebox full of grass in his dazed state. Marijuana was considered a scarce commodity throughout Kiel at that time. You could only get the dirty, thinned down hash of the rockers and disco jerks. In exchange, Marwelli offered me his last 30 punk LPs. When he told me which rarities were in the pile of records, I agreed without hesitation. I handed him the blue shoebox at my parents' front door, which really weighed next to nothing. At the same time he handed me the aforementioned pile, among them Endangered Species by UK Subs, the first three Slime LPs – uncensored – and, finally, the Beton Combo LP Perfektion ist Sache der Götter. Also, several popular samplers like Chaos en France, Underground Hits Vol. 1 and the Back-Stage Pass-Sampler were in the pile. Without scruples I integrated Marwelli's last punk records into my own stock. Even today he still swoons over the grass.

My new sunglasses

A Friedrichsorter junkie had specialized in the theft of sunglasses by trying them on at opticians and pocketing them or, in some cases, leaving the store cheekily without taking them off. Or he walked inconspicuously away from the sunglasses stand outside on the pavement. I passionately enjoyed talking to junkies at the time. I envied them for their broken stories, even though the other side effects of their lifestyle hurt. The junkie in question was in the hotel room where my cousin overdosed. He was not able to revive him.

This junkie had just taken an expensive Ray-Ban Wayfarer pair in cold blood from Brillen-Reese in Friedrichsorter Strasse, and was now searching for a buyer in the big arcade to finance his addiction. I haggled him down to a price of ten Deutschmark, which I would otherwise have put into a Venus Multi slot-machine. It was an uplifting feeling to be able to add real Ray-Bans to my rediscovered punk style. I felt indescribably cool with them, but the fun didn't last long.

When I walked up and down Kielline (a party zone during Kiel Week) with Töle one weekday during that year's Kiel Week, I started off still wearing the Ray-Bans on my nose. As usual, when we started drinking together, we were in quite a jocular mood. Suddenly Töle began to beg to try on the sunglasses. Several times I decidedly said no, but in the end I let myself soften as it slowly got dark. Töle, who was at that time more of a fashion punk and was finally equipped with his own leather jacket, walked next to me for hours with my new sunglasses on his nose, until he pushed them over his hairline onto the raised punk haircut. We caroused through the night and at dawn we lay, pissed, on a slope at the Kleiner Kiel pond to watch the swans. When we had had enough, we took the next bus towards Wik to head home. From Wik I wanted to try to hitchhike to Friedrichsort or take the next 44. While I dwelled on the penultimate seat on the right, Töle sat on the penultimate seat on the left and drummed with his palms on the backrest of the seat in front. The first commuters were on the bus, looking forward to their working day. We got off at Knorrstrasse, and I demanded my sunglasses back when I said my goodbyes. Töle claimed, to my horror, that he had left them lying on the seat next to him on the bus. At first I believed that. I judged the situation in such a way that I was not entitled to claim compensation from Töle for the sunglasses that a junkie had shoplifted, but when I later ordered an LP and a single with his next Malibu order, I simply owed him the money. That was my form of response. It's just a pity that his mother was paying the money in advance. It later dawned on me that forgetting the sunglasses on the bus was a white lie so he could keep them. The junkie couldn't steal me a new pair, because he too died of an overdose soon after. The Turk, Tomb, sold him the heroin on a regular basis. It's incomprehensible how a single dealer could drive so many people to death. Even the first woman to whom I ever made timid advances at the youth club was later hooked on heroin by that bloke.

A neo-Nazi leader at the Ferry Pub (Fährstübchen)?

Someone told us that the FAP leader Michael Kühnen was due to come to the Fährstübchen (Ferry Pub) near the Skagerrakufer in Friedrichsort, in order to give a speech and possibly force people to join the party. We were shocked that the fascists now apparently even wanted to convert the workers in Friedrichsort. The Fährstübchen was located halfway between the tank and engine construction company on one side and the large shipyard on the other. This dive had the reputation of a run-down workers' pub.

The FAP, the Free German Workers' Party, was regarded as the most right-wing extremist party in Germany at that time. We only learned about the event at short notice on the same day, and we didn't manage to drum up any more people to turn the place upside-down with a majority. I still had a baseball bat at home, which a while ago I had taken from a former member of the Friedrichsort kick-start moped club, Clash, unopposed. The two of us, St. Pauli Bole and I, had just decided to go down to the Fährstübchen pub, armed with the baseball bat, with the intention to break up the event. We had quite an unpleasant feeling as we approached the Fährstübchen pub, because we didn't know what to expect or how many people would gather there. When we finally showed up right in front of the place, it was pitch-dark inside. We tried to peek through the windows, but nothing moved inside. The event seemed to be cancelled at short notice. Had the fascists pulled back? Otherwise there probably would have been a catastrophe. We stood a few more minutes, threatening and belligerent, in front of the pub, until we moved back up to our neighbourhood near Wagnerring Street. I brought the baseball bat back home safe and sound. Since we had reacted immediately, we still felt satisfaction. Or did someone deliberately make a fool out of us?