Post Raclette. . .

A day dedicated to recovering each in our own way. I run and go for a long walk by the frozen river in the bright blue sunshine; Ul buys a welding machine.

The sun changes everything. Endless photos of birds on ice sheets, graffiti, black trees and wrought iron.

La Boehme in the evening. I've never been to an opera before and it feels very grown up. But ideals of romantic French Garrets in the mid-19th century and mournful Italian are rapidly smashed: it's in German and set in the 1960s. After a dodgy start swallowing expectations and embracing Frankfurt, very good. And running subtitles in English on the chair in front. Who'd have thought? Not only do I learn that these great romantic arias are in honour of a lost key or broken shoe, but given the speed of the warbling, I can pick out disconnected words and feel smug.

The opera house interior is the Baroque of 1880s German nationhood; the entrance was destroyed in the war and it's enclosed in Soviet style casing. There are 3 opera houses in Berlin: they had to build a 3rd after the older two were both allocated to the East . . .