Five Senses Assignment: Community Partner Edition

Die Gärtnerei I will argue is the most beautiful location out of all the community partners assigned to the students. Walking in, the area has many plants and flowers welcoming the community in as well as creating a safe space for the refugees who use the services to find community, learn German, and demonstrate their skills so that the community supervisors can act as references when they apply for citizenship. While I focused a lot on what I saw in my last five senses survey, I took in the sounds, the smells, and the taste of the garden because they really made a bigger impact in my understanding of the culture of the garden and the people in the garden. To start, everyone was talking, everyone was speaking different languages, and loud music from what I assume to be a Syria was playing for the whole community space to hear. The smell of the community area, if it did not smell like a garden, it smelled like food. What one of the organization leaders called Mexicana, or some version of the word, this food has chicken, peas, mushrooms, and some other vegetables in a yellow sauce that had a hint of taco flavoring, the smell of the food permeated through the kitchen, and tasted delicious. I love the community aspect of the area and how different people can bring along food and music from their country and teach the other refugees about their culture rather than being forced to fully assimilate into the German culture.   

Moving out into the actual garden, you have to walk through the cemetery to get there. At first I was concerned about how respectful I needed to be in this area because it is currently a cemetery, but the area did not seem as somber as I expected, and once getting to the actual garden, the area turned into a party. It smelled like trees and flowers and people were chatting while working together to build sculptures and water the plants. I love being in this area because the space is beautiful as well as welcoming because of the smell, the conversation, the bees and the garden work created a relaxing space that ends up feeling like home.

While walking around in Neukölln I could smell flowers near the garden, but that might have just been my hands after raking, but otherwise it smells similar to Kreuzberg in that I could smell döner and cigarettes. Walking further into the housing areas and off of the main busy street, I got the occasional whiff of sewer, like always, but different families occasionally had the door open to the front of their house, and when I peaked through the curtain that created a little privacy between the living room and the streets, I could see families with babies dancing to Middle Eastern music. Becca, Ying, and I also took a stop in the grocery store, and found food from different countries all over the world. Tea from Lebanon, olives from Turkey, and sauces from china filled the grocery store near the community garden. Every place seemed inclusive, but I do admit, I did not spend much time in the community because I would have rather been in the garden. The main road was filled with cars, but moving off the main road, the neighborhood became more empty, and did not feel as welcoming as the garden. After about an hour, we decided to leave the neighborhood and go back to the garden to smell the flowers and participate in the community atmosphere that the garden had to offer.