Beckermann's Berlin Brief

Have you ever watched MTV’s the Real World? ½ dozen individuals come together and live in a house far to nice for them, for months at a time, and essentially argue and bicker with each-other, until usually, eventually someone is forced to leave the house for one inappropriate or another. And even though they seem to hate each other most of the time and fight like nothing I’ve ever seen, they are always so sad to leave on another at the end. Do these people get paid?

Somewhat like the close confines of the Real World house - is the Hertie School building and community – where flamboyant personalities from all over the world are brought together to engage in academic and occasionally non-academic pursuits.

The Real World analogy is probably a bit of a stretch – but there are some parallels at the very least…

Take for example Hertie’s small intimate setting – a unique part of the Hertie experience is our fabulous building, study rooms and the state of the art coffee machines. An even more distinct feature of the school is the collection of students it assembles every year – individuals who contribute not only to each others academic development but also to a large part to various levels of personal development.

As my friend and classmate David noted, the best part about the school really is the contribution made by fellow students – class-related or not, he gets just as much from his formal academic studies as he does from the topical discussions over a beer or more frequently a curry on Immanuelkirchstr.

I couldn’t agree more.

And much like the Real World, I suspect that when we are finished and graduate in 2009, many a tear will be shed…