Annoying Birds, Sons
So I take a few days off from writing and a million things happen...maybe that's why I took the days off. Anyway, where do I start? I guess with the pigeon poop problem.
Living a big city anywhere presents the problem of those darned pigeons who don't do anything but eat crumbs, leave their feathers, make their dumb "cooing" noise and leave their disease-spreading poop everywhere.
When I was looking for apartments in Berlin I really wanted a balcony. After not having one for 8 months in the dorms, I thought there'd be nothing better than eating breakfast out on the balcony on Sunny weekend mornings. Little did I know that there'd be a only a few breakfasts and instead lots of work involved.
Over time my balcony accumulated more and more poop...but it wasn't till I left for America for 3 1/2 weeks in Sept. that the real damage was done. I got back to a balcony absolutely FULL of pigeon poop and feathers...so much that I couldn't even walk out there. Not only that, but I was being woken up every morning at sunrise to the stupid pigeons sitting on my balcony making their cooing noise. So I'd run over and either bang on the window or splash them with water till they flew off.
So I took the issue into my own hands by searching online for a "pigeon scarecrow." I found this thing they sometimes use here, a black plastic raven. Apparently the raven hunts pigeon nests so they are very scared of them. So after purchasing a raven on Ebay, I prepared the arrival of my new buddy by scrubbing the balcony clean with many buckets of water and cleaning solution as to minimize the chances of me catching a fatal disease from the droppings. The balcony gleamed from the 3-hour scrubbing and I received the raven the next day.
The first couple weeks I only noticed a few pigeon poops on the balcony and was very pleased. Well, this week the pigeons seem to have finally noticed that the raven is fake and have taken over my balcony again. There are many droppings and I was even rudely awakened by them the other morning. Sigh. I guess I'll have to get the netting afterall.
Being woken up by pigeons is one thing. Being woken up by a loud, drunken neighbor is a different thing. Unfortunately that's been happening too much, too.
My little 85-yr. old next door neighbor, Frau Glück, is a tiny little old lady who looks like she couldn't hurt a fly. But her psychotic, always-drunk son makes up for that by screaming and yelling at her, sometimes even throwing stuff at the wall or hitting her, after he's become innebrieated.
He has his own apartment and even has a "restraining order" given him by our apartment owners, but that means nothing to him or the police. They never just take him away. I, being right next door, can hear everything. I have been asked by the landlady to call the police and write the apartment owners because nothing happens till they can get several complaints. Tedious? Yes.
Well I started calling the police last semester when it'd be late at night..or during the night. I called this week after he woke me up at 4a.m. with his screaming. Unfortunately once the police finally arrived, Frau Glück didn't answer her door, not that she would anyway. She hides her son, lies for him, and won't admit anything is wrong when the police show up. So the police came to my door and I had to talk to them and give them info. in my pjs. The drunk showed up again a few nights later but I saved myself the pointless trouble of calling the police and just tried to sleep it off with earplugs. But something will have to change soon here.
Living a big city anywhere presents the problem of those darned pigeons who don't do anything but eat crumbs, leave their feathers, make their dumb "cooing" noise and leave their disease-spreading poop everywhere.
When I was looking for apartments in Berlin I really wanted a balcony. After not having one for 8 months in the dorms, I thought there'd be nothing better than eating breakfast out on the balcony on Sunny weekend mornings. Little did I know that there'd be a only a few breakfasts and instead lots of work involved.
Over time my balcony accumulated more and more poop...but it wasn't till I left for America for 3 1/2 weeks in Sept. that the real damage was done. I got back to a balcony absolutely FULL of pigeon poop and feathers...so much that I couldn't even walk out there. Not only that, but I was being woken up every morning at sunrise to the stupid pigeons sitting on my balcony making their cooing noise. So I'd run over and either bang on the window or splash them with water till they flew off.
So I took the issue into my own hands by searching online for a "pigeon scarecrow." I found this thing they sometimes use here, a black plastic raven. Apparently the raven hunts pigeon nests so they are very scared of them. So after purchasing a raven on Ebay, I prepared the arrival of my new buddy by scrubbing the balcony clean with many buckets of water and cleaning solution as to minimize the chances of me catching a fatal disease from the droppings. The balcony gleamed from the 3-hour scrubbing and I received the raven the next day.
The first couple weeks I only noticed a few pigeon poops on the balcony and was very pleased. Well, this week the pigeons seem to have finally noticed that the raven is fake and have taken over my balcony again. There are many droppings and I was even rudely awakened by them the other morning. Sigh. I guess I'll have to get the netting afterall.
Being woken up by pigeons is one thing. Being woken up by a loud, drunken neighbor is a different thing. Unfortunately that's been happening too much, too.
My little 85-yr. old next door neighbor, Frau Glück, is a tiny little old lady who looks like she couldn't hurt a fly. But her psychotic, always-drunk son makes up for that by screaming and yelling at her, sometimes even throwing stuff at the wall or hitting her, after he's become innebrieated.
He has his own apartment and even has a "restraining order" given him by our apartment owners, but that means nothing to him or the police. They never just take him away. I, being right next door, can hear everything. I have been asked by the landlady to call the police and write the apartment owners because nothing happens till they can get several complaints. Tedious? Yes.
Well I started calling the police last semester when it'd be late at night..or during the night. I called this week after he woke me up at 4a.m. with his screaming. Unfortunately once the police finally arrived, Frau Glück didn't answer her door, not that she would anyway. She hides her son, lies for him, and won't admit anything is wrong when the police show up. So the police came to my door and I had to talk to them and give them info. in my pjs. The drunk showed up again a few nights later but I saved myself the pointless trouble of calling the police and just tried to sleep it off with earplugs. But something will have to change soon here.
posted by Heidi at 4:22 PM
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