“You aren’t a student are you?” the realtor wanted to know.

“No, I’m a teacher.”

“Good, because students don’t have a chance.”  He laughed, picking out several application forms for the apartment and tossing them into the trash.

I was sitting at the kitchen table of yet another apartment.  But this time I was done with WGs.  This time I wanted to find a place just for me, two rooms so I wouldn’t have to work in the same room where I slept, a kitchen that made me want to always be cooking, my own bathroom, reasonably priced, in Frankfurt. (Who I was kidding?)

After showing me around the realtor had given me an application where I was supposed to supply my profession, previous addresses, nationality, salary, and bank account information (“Just to speed up the process should you be chosen to move in,” he explained).  He already had about twenty applications, four lighter now that he’d blacklisted the students among them.

I’d been searching the newspaper and realtor’s websites for apartments, and now I was facing with a whole new apartment-search dance.  Instead of meet-and-greets over coffee, it was group viewings and suits and applications.  The competition was cutthroat, and I couldn’t help but worry that I couldn’t compete with all these bankers and their business casual attire and their high, steady incomes.  I wasn’t a student, but I’d gotten more than a few hairy eyeballs when I’d dropped the word “freelancer.”  Apparently, in the world of real estate applications, “freelancer” is second only to “student” in words you should avoid if you want to be the winner in the apartment lottery.

In the meantime I was crashing at friends’ apartment, and tensions were rising daily.  There were no Perfect New Apartments on the horizon, so I spent more and more time away and started spending more and more time at the Wagonplatz where a good friend lived.

Wagonplätze are a uniquely German phenomenon.  Literally translatable as “wagon place,” Wagonplätze are pieces of land where a bunch of people live in old wooden wagons (think gypsies and circus caravans) and converted trucks—really, anything goes, as long as it’s on wheels.  Usually on squatted land, usually consensus communities that operate a little bit like what we file in English under the word “commune,” Wagonplätze tend to be intentional communities filled with people tired of paying high rents, people interested in living in a more sustainable fashion and with a handful of like-minded peers, and people with ideas about living that don’t fit between the four walls of an apartment or house.  Some are travelers, moving from one place to the next every few months, following work and whim.

In order to join the community, you go to a community meeting, introduce yourself, ask if you can come over, then leave so the current residents can confidentially discuss if they are willing to take you on.  If you’re only planning on staying a few months, you start with guest status, if you want to stay, trial status, and after a few months and another meeting, official resident status.  One person’s no is enough to botch the whole deal, and then you’re just out of luck.

I wanted to move in, I wanted to give the people I was staying in some space, and I wanted to try a more sustainable way of living on for size.  Besides, you can’t beat the rent at 5 euros a month.

The next meeting was on a Wednesday.  I biked over early, nervous and excited and horrified at the thought of having to introduce myself to a group of people in German.  My German is fine, that is, it’s fine until I’m nervously sitting in front of a group of thirty people.

The Wagenplatz’s meetings were held in the pub—built entirely by residents, right next to the little movie theater where they show films every Sunday—and I squirmed in my seat as people came in, some already acquaintances, some eyeing me curiously.  They put me on the agenda first.

“Well, ok, my name is Nikki, and I’ve been looking for a place to live for a while, and I think that this is the place.  I want to live more in line with the things I believe in, plus I’m dead broke and I need to get out of the place where I’m crashing.”

People nodded, and a girl with long brown hair smiled encouragingly at me.  Then a question from the back: “Well, what do you do?”

“Well, for money I teach English.  The rest of the time I spend writing, making music, cooking, that sort of thing.”

They sent me out so they could deliberate, and I paced outside, hoping I’d made a good impression.  Then a friend came out the door.  “Nikki!  Nikki!  They all said yes.  You can move into the guest wagon tonight if you want to.”  I moved all my things over by bike that night.

Read more of Nikki’s work  at:
http://www.clickclackgorilla.com