Above: Céline Dijon (Verena Wiesendanger) and Bonnie Day (Emily Welsch) had so much fun dancing the night before in Frankfurt an der Oder that they had to recreate their dance moves the next morning on the train back to Berlin.

Sunday, Nous Non Plus took the train back to Berlin where I spent the afternoon and evening with my childhood friend Noah Isenberg, who’s on sabbatical in Berlin this year (he’s a professor of German), his wife Melanie Rehak, and their gregarious son Jules. The four of us had a leisurely stroll in their neighborhood in Berlin, Prenzlauer Berg, ate a sandwich and drank a Radeburger, and hung out at their favorite playground, or spielplatz as Jules likes to say.

Above: there are so many bees in Berlin at the end of the summer that shopkeepers have no choice but let them have the run of the place.

Noah’s guide to Weimar cinema is to be released later this year and Melanie has just completed a book on a favorite restaurant of hers in Brooklyn (the name of which I cannot reveal! to be published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt).

After Jules was put to bed, we stayed up late, talking and talking and sipping a nice, very food-friendly Zweigelt, which weighed in at 13% alcohol and paired well with a much-needed, simple and wholesome repast of roast chicken, potatoes, and cauliflower.

Today, I leave for Montalcino… stay tuned…

Above: Radeburger and a cheese sandwich really hit the spot on a lazy summer afternoon in Berlin.

Above: people are really into vintage scooters in Berlin.

Above: Jules really loves this über-cool pirate ship in his favorite spielplatz.