Speaking of junkies, I was in Berlin this weekend and was positively surprised. The smell of faeces wasn't that much stronger than in other run-down large cities, I didn't see any syringes, the antifants of Rigaer 94 did not burn any cars, and we only had to change street sides once to avoid aggressive drug dealers. The entry hallway of my friend's building did smell suspiciously, but apparently the turd was tastefully hidden. The gentrification of Friedrichshain definitely works.
I should re-visit Berlin some time, I was there with my class back in 99, and not to be rude but my main memory of there are the mullets. To be fair, when we went to Prague the next few days, the Berlin mullets just bowed aside to the Czech mullets, my god, some of the mullets reached right down to the floor!
Also, it was a bad age to be seeing the world, since we were mostly concerned with how affordable vodka was, first in Berlin "oh boy!" then in Prague "man, forget Berlin! :O"