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MORE THAN DINNER — A CULTURAL NIGHT OUT IN BERLIN

MORE THAN DINNER — A CULTURAL NIGHT OUT IN BERLIN

Red roses, chocolates, candlelight and dinner plans — what’s it going to be this Valentine’s Day? Luckily, there’s Abundo. With the Berlin culture subscription, the month of love doesn’t feel like a compulsory couples’ program, but rather a gentle nudge toward concert halls, dance floors and cinema seats. Into places where you can experience something together, in the moment, far away from cheesy loveheart decorations. Throw yourself into Bohème Sauvage, for example — a night that wants too much in the very best way. At Metropol, there’s Charleston, swing, absinthe, and grand gestures. The ticket to this glittering adventure? A monocle and a feather boa (dressing up is half the fun). Prefer to philosophize about the bigger picture? At Sustainable Listening, don’t simply sit in the audience but inside a walk-in climate capsule. Music from the Staatskapelle Berlin meets live electronics by the Teichmann brothers, accompanied by voices from climate and future discourses. It’s an evening for listening closely and talking at length afterward. Maybe you’re craving a little loss of control? Kurt Schwitters’ Ursonate at the Deutsches Theater Berlin isn’t a traditional performance, but a sound poem that dismantles and reassembles language. A piece that gently shatters conventions. Written in the 1920s as a Dadaist revolt against logic and order, the Ursonate still feels fresh and gloriously nonsensical. If classical romance is more your thing, try Tango at Ballhaus Wedding. Parquet floors, the Marlene Bar, a DJ, and the freedom to drift off in between: for a drink, into the courtyard, and back to the dance floor. Abundo is a culture subscription that makes February feel a little warmer. Because love happens in real life. Often, a good evening out in the city is all it takes to remind you of that.

Text: Emma Zylla / Photos: Abundo

Find out more about Abundo here.

Right now, you can get your first month for €18 with a duo subscription or €9 solo (regularly €29 or €55). As a Cee Cee reader, you also get an exclusive perk: use the code “ceeceegift” to receive 20% off gift cards. All tickets included. Cancel anytime.

Metropol, Nollendorfplatz 5, 10777 Berlin–Schöneberg; map
Bohème Sauvage 21.02.2026 21h

Staatsoper, Unter den Linden 7, 10117 Berlin–Mitte; map
Sustainable Listening 24.02.2026 21h

Deutsches Theater, Schumannstr.13A, 10117 Berlin–Mitte; map
Ursonate 21.02.2026 20h

Ballhaus Wedding, Wriezener Str.6, 13359 Berlin–Wedding; map
Tango im Ballhaus Wedding 18.02.2026 24h

@abundoberlin

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MEDITERRANEAN MEZZE IN A MODERN BISTRO SETTING — SAINT FARAH AT WEINBERGSPARK

MEDITERRANEAN MEZZE IN A MODERN BISTRO SETTING — SAINT FARAH AT WEINBERGSPARK

If you think Levantine cuisine is just hummus and falafel, Saint Farah might not be the place for you — or maybe it’s exactly the right one. Because what chef Nadav Kundel serves here is anything but predictable, showing how mezze can be reimagined in exciting new ways. Since October 2025, Saint Farah, right by Weinbergspark, has been serving small dishes as sharing plates. Nadav and his cousin Gil Azrielant have been enriching the neighborhood with a modern bistro concept that honors the cuisine of the Mediterranean coast while paying tribute to the culinary legacy of their grandmother Farah. Born in Baghdad in 1934, Farah worked as a seamstress before moving to the coast of Tel Aviv at sixteen. Today, she’s remembered for her generous heart, hospitality, and love of good food — not only by her five children, thirteen grandchildren, and ten great-grandchildren, but by many others whose lives she has touched along the way. Saint Farah is Nadav’s first restaurant in Berlin. He aims to combine the essence of a modern Mediterranean bistro with his own culinary language, shaped by years of travel around the world. He brings more than twenty years of knowledge, technical skill, and passion to the kitchen. Anyone thinking Berlin already has enough sharing-plate concepts and “the usual mezze” should come here and think again. On my evening at Saint Farah, every single plate felt exciting — either with familiar flavors reworked in surprising ways or completely new tastes presented in a comforting, familiar format.

There was crispy cauliflower with black lentil purée, merguez ragout with roasted onions and Jerusalem artichoke purée (delicious!), and beef tartare with pickled mustard seeds, fresh horseradish, chives, and a marrow sabayon, served on freshly baked flatbread. Grilled Swiss chard leaves stuffed with lamb and paired with beetroot ketchup are a tribute to his grandmother — and already a guest favorite. The mussels with butter, bacon, chili crisp, and rice wine have also become something of a signature dish, even though Nadav never set out to define any such classics. Instead, he values experimentation: dishes are swapped out, transformed, and recombined. If you can’t decide, ask for the “Trust the Saints” menu. The team chooses the plates, sets the pace, and makes sure you’re in for a lively evening. If you’re coming as a pair, grab seats at the kitchen counter and watch the mezze being prepared right in front of you, listen to Nadav and the team at work (always fascinating), and have each dish explained in detail. Larger groups will be more comfortable at the wooden tables in the center of the room. Grapevines climbing up the large glass fronts of the corner space shield you from the busy street and create an inviting, intimate atmosphere. The drinks menu features homemade signature cocktails and mocktails with house-made syrups, infusions, and Mediterranean spices. Some wines are even served straight from the barrel. So, what’s left to say? Best try it for yourself — while you can still get a booking.

Text: Robyn Steffen / Photos: Elisabeth Rogov, Steffen Sinzinger

Saint Farah, Weinbergsweg 8a, 10119 Berlin–Mitte; map

@saintfarah.berlin

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WARMTH & RELAXATION ON COLD WINTER DAYS WITH FLOATING SAUNA “MS AUFGUSS”

WARMTH & RELAXATION ON COLD WINTER DAYS WITH FLOATING SAUNA “MS AUFGUSS”

As Berlin maintains its frostiness, the streets are icy and the Spree frozen, we all want to rush the commute that little bit more. What I look for in Berlin are new and niche ways to find comfort. And I often find comfort in places that slow me down and nurture my nerves. MS Aufguss inspires exactly that: warmth, relaxation, and disconnection from the outside world. MS Aufguss is a sauna floating in the Rummelsburger Bucht, but when we visited, it was frozen in place. With a sauna that drifts up the spree in summer, Lars Meßmann found the perfect way to enjoy both seasons. Lars has lived in Berlin for over a decade and spent his time building the fashion brand Fitz & Huxley. During the pandemic, he and three friends built the MS Aufguss from scratch. Initially intended as a houseboat for Lars to live simply during the summer, he decided to open it to the public to enjoy the sauna. Which led to Lars wanting the MS to be used during the winter months too — basking on warm wood, tea in hand, absorbing relaxing aromas. It’s all about being, creating small yet intentional breaks, but what feels special about this experience is the renewed sense of self. Clearing out those sinuses, expelling toxins, softening muscles, soothing the nervous system, and simply enjoying the surroundings. MS Aufguss is perfect for a friend’s getaway, housing up to six people at a time, float and sweat for three hours, and even test your nerves by jumping into the spree.

Text & Photos: Ruby Watt

MS Aufguss, Gustav-Holzmann-Str.10, 10317 Berlin–Rummelsburg; map

@ms_aufguss

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“IRGENDETWAS IST PASSIERT”: A PLAY BY & WITH FABIAN HINRICHS — RECOMMENDED BY ANTJE DRINKUTH

“IRGENDETWAS IST PASSIERT”: A PLAY BY & WITH FABIAN HINRICHS — RECOMMENDED BY ANTJE DRINKUTH

Irgendetwas ist passiert is a new play by and starring Fabian Hinrichs, in in artistic collaboration with René Pollesch, at the Berliner Volksbühne. The seemingly casual title captures exactly what the play explores: the feeling that the world has gone off its hinges, even as everyday life continues as normal. Hinrichs stands alone on stage, performing dual roles as the couple Claudia and Paul in a rapid back-and-forth. Their dialogues oscillate between separation and closeness, despair and banal intimacy. When Paul, after an argument, suggests watching the news together and offers a massage, it encapsulates the ambivalence of a relationship that was once rooted in deep love, formed on that evening when a reactor exploded in Fukushima. Global history and private biography are intertwined from the very beginning. This connection runs throughout the evening. Hinrichs plays with his characteristic nervous, intelligent, and self-ironic precision. He indicts life, love, and political madness, teetering between attack and surrender. While arguments unfold in a minimalist suburban home over salad or an overpriced kitchen countertop, war sounds, news fragments, and images of violence intrude through sound and projection.

Claudia withdraws, watches pornography, and then the focus shifts again to the war in Ukraine and Israel’s violence in Gaza. Before going to bed, American Psycho plays, immediately followed by images of destroyed cities. The urge to smash the TV becomes the cry of a generation that is permanently informed yet simultaneously powerless. The relentless juxtaposition of bourgeois comfort and global catastrophe pushes the play to its moral limit. Luxury advertisements flicker across the screen, private dialogues and political abysses collide. Anger, overwhelm, and quiet moments alternate. Dramaturgy and technical design are so finely balanced that not a single moment of the ninety-minute performance feels dull. Memories of the Pollesch solo evenings are unmistakable, most recently Ja nichts ist ok. Yet Hinrichs goes a step further. Created with his wife, Anne Hinrichs, the piece is radically personal, focusing on the existential doubts of a relationship amid multiple crises. Critics’ accusations of melodrama and moralizing were to be expected. But its immediacy strikes a raw nerve: informed, overwhelmed, privately entangled, politically paralyzed. A theater evening that hurts, is intelligent, and lingers long after. Go see it!

Text: Antje Drinkuth / Photos: Apollonia Theresa Bitzan

Antje Drinkuth is a professor of fashion design and has lived in Berlin since 1987.

Volksbühne am Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz, Linienstr. 227, 10178 Berlin–Mitte; map

Irgendetwas ist passiert by Fabian Hinrichs, Anne Hinrichs & René Pollesch, 08. & 15.02. (sold out), 14. & 22.03.2026. Get tickets here.

@volksbuehne_berlin
@antje_drinkuth

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WHO DECIDES WHICH STORIES DESERVE AIRTIME? “DIE ZWILLINGE” AT THE MAXIM GORKI THEATER

WHO DECIDES WHICH STORIES DESERVE AIRTIME? “DIE ZWILLINGE” AT THE MAXIM GORKI THEATER

We are standing at the fairground: loud, colorful, with voices coming at us from every direction. Voices that want to participate, insist, interfere. It’s in this state of overwhelm that Die Zwillinge at the Maxim Gorki Theater begins. A seemingly straightforward criminal case serves as the starting point: twin brothers, one read as white, the other Black. One has killed the other. Filmmaker Melanie (Ruby Commey) sets out to take on the case and fictionalize it. She researches, gathers material, searches for connections. Invited to a film production company, she repeatedly encounters resistance. The title must be changed, the subject is “difficult right now”, certain aspects should be told differently, others omitted entirely. The production team must be staffed with white people. As Melanie tries to stay true to her topic, it’s continuously reshaped without her say-so. On stage, different versions of the film emerge, each increasingly distant from the original case. She is accompanied by a chorus of voices: producers, commissioners, commentators. They evaluate, comment on, and reshape the events, often overtly violent and discriminatory. All of this takes place at the fairground: between stereotypical portrayals of Black bodies as breakdancers or references from hip-hop culture, these voices reveal their own mechanisms.

Carousel motifs, a rotating turntable, and a dense soundscape by Frieder Blume create a sensory overload. Costumes, scenes, and perspectives shift rapidly. Despite the visual and auditory intensity, the narrative remains clear — Die Zwillinge unfolds compellingly. The brothers appear, accusing each other. Gradually, it becomes apparent how much these attributions depend on perception, expectations, and societal interpretations. Melanie exposes her reason for conducting her research and where her desire for explanation reaches its limits. The play addresses questions of cultural hegemony, the white gaze and censorship, distorted perception, and the logic of cinematic exploitation. It is a play about the film industry that, within this setting, asks which stories are allowed to be told and under what conditions. With each scene, another layer of power and violence is revealed. The text was written by Lamin Leroy Gibba, who also appears on stage as one of the brothers. Director Joana Tischkau translates the piece into a fast-paced, densely layered production. Between fairground and film studio, it becomes clear how cultural hegemony decides which stories are allowed to circulate and which are lost in the clamor of voices.

Text: Inga Krumme / Photos: Etritanë Emini

Studio Я at Maxim Gorki Theater, Hinter dem Gießhaus 2, 10117 Berlin–Mitte; map

Die Zwillinge by Lamin Leroy Gibba. Premiere: 07.02.2026, with an exclusive performance for BIPoC* as part of Black Her*His*Story Month, followed by a talk with Lamin Leroy Gibba 20.02.2026. Tickets are available here.

@maxim_gorki_theater
@laminleroy

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