Writing on the Road

My name is Layne Mosler, and I'm an American-born writer and editor based in Berlin, Germany.

I cover food, travel, and human interest stories. You can read many of them at taxigourmet.com, and in my upcoming book, Driving Hungry (Vintage, 2014).
After 4 1/2 years, three hemispheres, ten addresses, hundreds of taxi adventures, a whole lot of remarkable cab drivers and food I’m never going to forget, I finally get to tell the story behind the story of Taxi Gourmet. Driving Hungry, the book based on my blog, has been accepted for publication by Vintage (Random House), and it’s coming out in 2013. Stay tuned - there are going to be some fun events happening around this book - and, yes, there will be snacks.

After 4 1/2 years, three hemispheres, ten addresses, hundreds of taxi adventures, a whole lot of remarkable cab drivers and food I’m never going to forget, I finally get to tell the story behind the story of Taxi Gourmet.

Driving Hungry, the book based on my blog, has been accepted for publication by Vintage (Random House), and it’s coming out in 2013.

Stay tuned - there are going to be some fun events happening around this book - and, yes, there will be snacks.

A lot has changed in Berlin since the wild 90s - but not everything.

A lot has changed in Berlin since the wild 90s - but not everything.

There is no love sincerer than the love of food.

—George Bernard Shaw, Man and Superman (1903) Act 1 

If you ever find yourself on the corner of Torstrasse and Prenzlauer Allee in Berlin, you might miss this marker in front of the high-end club now known as the SoHo House. Before this was a hip corner, it was a dark corner - first a Jewish department store, then a department store overtaken by the Nazis, then a strategy center and an archive for the East German Socialist Unity Party. 

If you ever find yourself on the corner of Torstrasse and Prenzlauer Allee in Berlin, you might miss this marker in front of the high-end club now known as the SoHo House.

Before this was a hip corner, it was a dark corner - first a Jewish department store, then a department store overtaken by the Nazis, then a strategy center and an archive for the East German Socialist Unity Party. 

Translation: “We don’t want a piece of cake. We want the whole bakery.” [Sincerely], Your Berlin Anarchists

Translation: “We don’t want a piece of cake. We want the whole bakery.”

[Sincerely],

Your Berlin Anarchists

‘Taxi Berlin,’ as he likes to call himself, is a veteran Berlin cab driver who blogs about all that is heartbreaking and absurd in his beloved city. Inflammatory, provocative and politically incorrect, he tells the truth. This is something I admire, even if I don’t always agree with him.

‘Taxi Berlin,’ as he likes to call himself, is a veteran Berlin cab driver who blogs about all that is heartbreaking and absurd in his beloved city.

Inflammatory, provocative and politically incorrect, he tells the truth. This is something I admire, even if I don’t always agree with him.

This is Peter Bonev - the legendary Bulgarian bagpiper - playing outside in Sofia.  As a writer, I’ve always envied musicians - but I think the thing I’m most jealous of is their ability to busk. Guys like Peter can take their instruments outside and transfix anyone who chooses to pay attention. But maybe a writer can busk after all? Maybe I can take my typewriter somewhere and write poems and love letters and goodbye letters on the spot? People can pay nothing - or whatever they think my words are worth.  On July 31, I’m going to try word busking at the Boxhagener Platz Flohmarkt in Berlin.

This is Peter Bonev - the legendary Bulgarian bagpiper - playing outside in Sofia. 

As a writer, I’ve always envied musicians - but I think the thing I’m most jealous of is their ability to busk. Guys like Peter can take their instruments outside and transfix anyone who chooses to pay attention.

But maybe a writer can busk after all? Maybe I can take my typewriter somewhere and write poems and love letters and goodbye letters on the spot? People can pay nothing - or whatever they think my words are worth. 

On July 31, I’m going to try word busking at the Boxhagener Platz Flohmarkt in Berlin.

Warning: This book contains serious inspiration for food writers, including lines like: “Call me a cockeyed optimist if you like, but I’ve yet to find a country with nothing, absolutely nothing, that’s worth eating or drinking…In Togo, as in all former German colonies, there is superb beer…In cold-war Bulgaria, I was thrilled to discover that even the Communists couldn’t ruin what was then, as now, the world’s most sumptuous yogurt.” - R.W. Apple Jr.

Warning: This book contains serious inspiration for food writers, including lines like:

“Call me a cockeyed optimist if you like, but I’ve yet to find a country with nothing, absolutely nothing, that’s worth eating or drinking…In Togo, as in all former German colonies, there is superb beer…In cold-war Bulgaria, I was thrilled to discover that even the Communists couldn’t ruin what was then, as now, the world’s most sumptuous yogurt.”

- R.W. Apple Jr.

Chained. (Kreuzberg, Berlin)

Chained. (Kreuzberg, Berlin)

On Tango and Taxicabs

Can a three-minute tango compare to a three-minute taxi ride?

On the dance floor and in the taxi, the contact is fleeting. But the temporary nature of the encounter gives you the freedom to tell the truth. And to lie.

(Source: laynemosler)