Weinerei

The Weinerei is famous in Berlin. Everyone I talked to before coming told me I had to try it. Last night I finally did.
Here's how it works: You pay a 2EUR deposit for a wine glass, or champagne glass, or really whatever vessel they happen to have lying around. Then you help yourself to wine. As much as you want. Until you leave, or they close, whichever comes first. As they close at 12, which is extremely early for Berlin nightlife, it is usually the latter.
When you leave, you turn in your glass and get 1EUR of the 2 back. Then you pay "what you think you should" for the wine you drank.
Here's what I learned: you can only actually pay what you want if you have exact change. Otherwise they harass you. I needed to break a tenner. I had had three glasses of cheap champagne. To my mind, 3EUR was generous. But the woman said, "That's too less." And the asshole American dude next to me drunkenly slurred, "Thas true. four-a-five is good..." So I accepted the 5EUR note offered to me as change.
Note to self: next time, bring exact change.
Afterwards we went to the Kulturberei, which is a complex of clubs and restaurants in Prenzlauer Berg. When you go out to a club or party, usually it costs a few euros to get in. When you pay at the door, they stamp the inside of your wrist so you can go in and out (this is handy when you don't want to pay for expensive drinks and instead run down to the corner 'Späti' (short for Spätkauf, 'late-buy', they're open 24hrs) for beers which, don't forget, you can drink on the street or anywhere else you please). Thus after a night out I often end up with a few different stamps on my wrists. They don't come off easily either, so at this point I seem always to have a couple faded stamps on my inner wrists. It kinda feels cool. I can see why inner-wrist tattoos are popular. But I get to change mine every night.
Bis bald,
D.