Radio Skateboards - A Radiospective (2003-2023)
A later documentary that gives broader context to the Berlin world around Radio Skateboards.
Flickering air on the horizon. Summer sun. Cooling wind. I'm driving on the highway to Munich in the old, wine-red Golf 2. One of my co-passengers is a radio skater. He's going to compete in a skate contest tonight. The rest of us are accompanying him and plan to get drunk. Munich can't be anything for a Berliner. So much is firmly established and unquestioned.
The competition is interesting. Nothing more needs to be said. We're drunk. Quickly find a place to sleep for the night, which turns out not to be so easy, as all accommodation options are already closed. Sitting in the car, we devise a battle plan. We definitely can't drive anymore. Suddenly, a drunken Munich local presses himself against our window and babbles something about a mousetrap at the end of the street. Thanks, drunken Munich local.
The police are supposed to be our friends and helpers, and we are truly in a predicament at this moment. So, it can't hurt, that’s our shared conviction, to just ask for advice. Low chances of success were factored in. With slight articulation difficulties, asking for information about a place to sleep for the night, we try to appear as civilized as possible. Apparently successful, because the hot policewoman asks if we consider ourselves fit to drive. It's hard for me to suppress my laughter. The good woman immediately knows what's up and suggests I simply take an alcohol breath test. That way we'd be sure. I just wonder how many promille one has after half a bottle of good vodka. I blow into the damn thing until it finally beeps. She reads the electrical LED display and says something like: "You can still drive, just barely!" 0.2 promille. Shit. The thing must be broken. I'm wasted and the police tell me to drive. I can barely see straight. With a certain urgency in her voice, the woman advises me to simply drive into the park opposite and camp there for a night. Just like that in Munich? Camp for a night in the park? What kind of? Fuck it, she says it, I'll just do it. Munich, nope! Just go now, the 800 meters won't be a problem. Then the nightmare will be over. After just 400 meters, the big turnaround. Another police patrol, which has nothing to do with the mousetrap, wants to talk to us. "Please follow." I'm freaking out. In shock, I can no longer turn down the music from the speakers, and behind me, in the back seat, the first two have already fallen asleep from drunkenness. Never mind, fate is fate. And that is Munich after all. I surrender and get out of the car. I find the whole story completely ridiculous and prepare for a night of forms and Bavarian, head-shaking policemen. I can't believe it. Suddenly, the hot policewoman drives by, calls out to her colleague that she has already checked us and everything is okay. I can't believe it. Quickly set up the tents and sleep off the intoxication. The next morning, a homeless woman snores at us with the remark that we are camping on the grounds of the BKA. No Berliner can handle that.