73 ideas on what to do in September
Issue #116 (02 Sep) – jobs with marketing and comms focus; mentors program is happening!; nocodeklub raffle; Coffee with Tuğba; events help; traffic deaths; ever considered leaving Germany?
Programming note: Yesterday I published the first article in the series “Your CV from a recruiter’s perspective,” which I did together with the amazing Andreea. It’s a lovely format, a 4-minute read with excellent insights to turn into to-do’s.
🥳 The call for mentors and mentees was a great success, which means we will do something. How, when and who is still open. You can still participate.
🌟 Handpicked community
is a place where we meet, share projects and ideas and look for help.
📨 Submit your input here. Inspiration for all the categories on the link.
🎪 Meet — tech & other events:
⛳️ Handpicked afterwork event: Join us on one of the most creative minigolf courses in Berlin (Sep 11th, 18:00). 18 holes and great people. Limited tickets. Afterwards, we head to the nearby beer garden. | Wed, 11.9 at 18.00 | Nature Art at Tempelhof
114. Berliner Typostammtisch with optional Typewalk beforehand (🇩🇪) | Thu, 5.9 at 18.30 | Eschenbräu Biergarten
Weddingmarkt - Kunstmarkt ausm Wedding | Sat, 8.9 at 11—18.00 | Leopoldplatz
😎 Show — Cool stuff / Shoutouts / Projects & similar:
I’ve partnered with the organisers of nocodeklub conference on Thursday, 26th of September, in Berlin, where you will learn from top companies how to use no-code & AI in your solutions. We are doing a raffle with two FREE tickets worth €149 each! Just add “nocodeklub” to the form, and you’re in. Results next week.
Andreas Klinger launched Prototype Capital: a global first-check fund for cutting-edge tech. $100k-$200k investments, focus on early-stage startups. Aims for 15-20 deals/year in areas like AI, robotics, and space tech worldwide.
🔍 Ask — for a Service / Co-founder / Project help & similar:
we had no submissions; niemand hat sich gemeldet, schade
Looking for the submission link? It’s below the title ⤴️
👀 Handpicked jobs
is a rotating selection of around 20 jobs from companies I’d check out.
0️⃣ from the rotation this week: Marketing & Comms
This week other links got the priority, so please check the jobs in the Handpicked online database. We’ve got a lot of submissions this time.
💃🏼 Help us improve our events
After organising several different types of events, often together with our friends at
, we’d like to turn to the community again: what kind of events would you like us to do in the coming months?Standard meetups, dinners, cultural experiences? Something else?
✅ Everyone dropping their email (=optional) will get a 10% discount on all paid events until 1.7.2025.
✨ Handpicked Deals
is where you find good stuff. Your purchase will help sustain this project.
Learn German at SmarterGerman—HANDPICKED11 for an 11% discount.
Practice German with other students at Deutschgym.
Pair with How to learn German and get over “Genau” and “mit Karte, bitte”?
🗞 Top inspiration snippets
☕️ Coffee with Tuğba Avci
is where my guest contributes three links and an explanation while I write a short bio.
Tuğba is a fellow Substacker and an organiser of Substack meetups in Berlin (the next one is actually tomorrow!). A great soul with a great writing style; you should definitely check out her Substack as slow as possible, where she invites you to pause and take a breath. Here is what she prepared for you:
893 Ryōtei (place) - I'm a big food enthusiast and love discovering great restaurants in Berlin. One of my top picks is 893 Ryotei. Although it's a bit expensive, it's worth it. It's located in a former drugstore, Schlecker. It still looks unassuming from the outside, but you'll find an excellent restaurant with beautiful decor inside. The sashimi is fantastic!
CeeCee Newsletter (newsletter) - CeeCee, a creative agency, curates a delightful weekly newsletter with recommendations for the best restaurants, art, and shopping. I've been a loyal subscriber for a couple of years, and it's one of the few newsletters I eagerly anticipate and read every week. I wholeheartedly recommend it if you want to uncover exciting new places in Berlin.
Rick Rubin - The Creative Act (book) - As an artist, I'm always eager to read books about creativity to understand my own creative process. Rick Rubin's book was the best book I read last year. I initially read it on my Kindle, but I loved it so much that I ended up buying a printed version this year to keep on my bedside table and flick through in the evenings.
🇩🇪 Berlin & other good stuff
is a selection of links focused on Berlin/Germany, career, timeless content and business.
🎨 This week, we explored some gorgeous street art around Kreuzberg. You can check the vibes on this Instagram reel. After the tour and a graffiti workshop, we were hosted by Al Catzone, a vegan Neapolitan-style Pizzeria; objectively, their creatively named pizzas were delicious. Thanks to Hannah, Tina and Assi for a fantastic event.
🚨 We shipped the first article in the series: Your CV from a recruiter’s perspective. If you are a recruiter and would like to be featured, approach me.
September is here, and here is a collection of 73 ideas on what to do. In German, but you will manage: 11 culture events highlights and 11 food events from Mit Vergnügen. On top, 51 events in English (The Berliner). Only five overlap.
Berlin’s 16/25 (64%) traffic fatalities so far in 2024 were pedestrians and cyclists. The situation is improving, but slowly? I checked the data and found that, for example, in 1993, 97/163 (60%) were pedestrians and cyclists; in 2002, it was 51/82 (62%); in 2012, it was 32/42 (76%); and in 2023, 23/33 (69%).
In September, Schwedter Str. between Oderberger Str. and Choriner Str. in Mitte will become a priority road for cyclists, hopefully further reducing the number of accidents.From DW, we have three immigrants’ views on moving to Germany (one is leaving). Germany badly needs immigrants and do something about it quickly. Since 2005, more citizens have left Germany than returned. In 2022, the net “loss” was -83k, and in 2023, it was -70k. In 2023, the main destinations were Switzerland (+21k), Austria (+13k) and the USA (+9k). (Destatis, 🇩🇪)
Now, related to the immigration topic, the biggest winners on the election yesterday in Thuringia (pop. around 2.1M) and Saxony (pop. around 4M) are AfD and Bundis Sahra Wagenknecht. Yesterday at 22:22, AfD was +9,5% in Thuringia (32,9%, 1st place) and +3,3% in Saxony (30,8%, 2nd place after CDU). BSW was +11,9% in Saxony and +15,6% in Thuringia. The biggest losers are the Linke.
Career: Job search is a painful experience. Here is how to manage the emotional rollercoaster that comes with it. I second journaling and career coaches.
Career: This Reddit post about considering joining a tech startup is great (sales-focused but valuable for everyone). The discussion is worth a read, too. If you’d like to work in sales, you should totally try to get into SAP’s career program. I know someone who did it, and they are absolutely killing it.
Timeless: I’ve found this amazing recommendation tool yogurrt. It lets you discover what you’d potentially like with smart methods of “tags.” It works surprisingly well.
Timeless: A tree needs to grow down before it can start growing up, a short clip from a podcast with Myron Golden on the strength of perserverance.
📱 Weekly Social.
Reddit: Rebuilding of Pergamon Museum is 40 years behind schedule. 40 years. I do hope I get to see it once it’s done.
Twitter: English is such a simple language to learn, right?
Instagram: It’s been 25 years since the German parliament and the government moved to Berlin from Bonn. Pics and story in German.
Instagram: Every hundred years, there’s all new people. I love the energy of this guy!
💬 Briefly.
😔 Bad news: Ryanair absolutely blasted BER airport and the government (take it with a grain of salt) after announcing a 20% reduction in capacity. No more Brussels, Kaunas, Krakau, Luxemburg, Riga and Chania.
Stats: The inflation rate is still dropping — it was 1.1% in comparison to August ‘23. Real wages risen by 4.4% in Q2 ‘24. (St. BB)
Aleph Alpha, a big German Gen AI hope, presented their new model Pharia-1 (EU-compliant language mode) and PhariaAI, a pivot to “enterprise-grade operating system for generative AI” platform.
Over the pond, OpenAI is raising at a $100B valuation. Expensive!After dropping their checking account interest rate to 1,75%, DKB, Germany's second-largest direct bank, had deposit outflows of around €10B.
Urban Sports acquired Austrian market leader Myclubs;
Empion (HR Tech, Berlin) acquired Zalvus;
Talks around Getsafe’s (insurtech, Heidelberg) purchase/merger (of/with) Friday (Berlin) fell through. (Finance FW)Klarna is pumping hard before the IPO, with H1 revenues up 27% YoY. Siemiatkowski, the CEO, also said Klarna is “seeking to get rid of almost half its employees in the coming years through efficiencies it says arise out of its investment in AI.” (BBC)
Delivery Hero reported 20% revenue growth to about €3B in the first six months of ‘24. Adjusted operating profit increased as well. They are planning an IPO of Talabat in UAE later this year.
After finally turning profitable, Uber was fined €290M by the Dutch data protection authority due to GDPR violations. (Zeit) Uber will, of course, appeal.
Kraken is facing SEC lawsuit over exchange registration;
Worldcoin (aka Tools for Humanity, also with a presence in Berlin), the iris scanning crypto project, is in trouble with Data protection regulators in Bayern. Worst case would mean a ban. (Sifted)
💸 Recently funded in Berlin & Germany
is a list of companies that received funding over €1M.
assetbird | Berlin | Digital real estate purchase software | €2.4M | Careers.
Hopper Mobility | Berlin | Enclosed e-bike development | €1.63M | Careers.
FEMNA Health | Berlin | Women's health platform | Seven-figures | Careers.
Truuco | Frankfurt | Customer data for bank sales | €8M | Careers.
😅 Meanwhile
what Covid did to us
✌️ Handpicked essentials and a treat:
♡ 20% Berlin: all the Berlin news twice a week, in English! ♡
- Don’t make these mistakes with your side hustle!
- Football in Berlin: all the links you will ever need
- Berlin Salary Trends Reports: How do you compare?
- ❓Surprise treat for the curious
- The best questions to ask at a job interview
- What do hiring managers look for in CVs?
- Sponsor Handpicked?
- Handpicked in media (podcasts and articles)
✨ Berlin Events Weekly: the best resource for events in Berlin ✨
If you have made it this far, smash that like button or leave a comment!
“… In German, but you will manage…” 😅
Thank you for having me 🖤