In keeping with the time-honored tradition of escaping Rome’s torrid heat during the dog days of August, several members of the eCool team headed off to Berlin last week in hope of finding temperate weather, modern hipness, and a bit of northern European uber-organization.
The traveling eCoolers report that the trip was a great success: sweaters, aesthetic awe, and clarity about all principles of organization were the daily norm throughout the trip. More importantly, however, the adventurous travelers returned to Rome with news that the Germans have discovered the Fountain of Youth.
The immediate excitement felt by our voyagers when they heard this news was dampened by ads in the Berlin airport suggesting that the Germans have misused this long-sought-after font. The posters, hyping a new, compact version of the Das Welt newspaper, demonstrate the effects of these magical waters on world leaders — anointed at the Fountain of Youth, Pope Benedict XVI, President George Bush, and Chancellor Angela Merkel have undergone partial age regression and we fear that they’re going to be impacting the news for another lifetime.
