Meet Saskia - our member of the month in October!

Introduction round: Who are you and where are you from?
My name is Saskia Jonker and I am a journalist from the Netherlands, or Holland as the Germans like to say. I grew up in Rotterdam, a port city, but lived in our beautiful capital Amsterdam for the last couple of years.

What made you come to Berlin?
Work, basically. I write for a Dutch financial newspaper (Financieele Dagblad, www.fd.nl) and was asked to be a German correspondent together with my colleague Joris Kooiman. Because it’s a great honor and because I want to learn more about Germany I said yes. Our editor in chief told us we could decide where we want to live. We decided for Berlin because it’s a great city and interesting place to live. And of course the German government is based in Berlin so we have to be here a lot.

What exactly do you do? What's in the pipeline for the near future?
Writing stories, interview people, all the stuff journalists do. For my newspaper I write about the car industry, so Volkswagen is a hot topic these days, but I also write about German banks, politics, the refugee crisis and tech companies. I also make stories for a Dutch and a Belgian magazine. One of my last stories was about the German ‘Rasen’ on the Autobahn: why is it that Germany is one of the very few countries (together with Afghanistan) that has no speed limits on the highway? The answer has a lot to do with the powerful German car industry.

Since when do you cowork at Office Club?
Since mid August, so I am pretty new here.

What is the benefit of using a coworking space for you?
The most important thing for me is that I’m not home all the time. I tried that for 6 weeks or so but when I’m not travelling through Germany I like to have a place to go to. In Amsterdam I was used to working on a big, crowded editorial office flour. So I like the buzz and coming and going of people at Coworking Berlin a lot.

Which questions / problems could you help your coworking neighbour with?
Hmm, I know how to write articles and interviews but that might not be very helpful. But I can give people that want to visit Amsterdam/Holland lots of tips. And I’m always open to discuss German politics, corporate scandals, food, weather etc.

Do you have favourite spots in Berlin? Something to recommend / consider especially for people coming here?
That’s a difficult one. I’m relatively new, so my repertoire isn’t that big. But I can recommend the Vietnamese restaurant across the street on the left side. I had a great time at the African restaurant Masai on the Lychener Straße too and for people that are ok with smoky bars: Speiches Rock und Blues Kneipe. On Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays there’s live (blues) music.

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Thanks a lot and all the best to you!