At the main train station of the German capital, the only open shops are the 24 hour pharmacy and the souvenir shop. Hungry travellers cross the square in front of the station with its yellow queue of taxis and the four-laned street to get to the greasy kebab stand at the bus stop opposite. It’s shortly before 11 pm on a Thursday.

From the tower at the Berlin-Spandau ship canal, where an old man holds vigil for his long-dead brother, you can no longer make out the old shacks and remnants of the Berlin wall on the other side at night. The pulsing yellow eyesore that is the faux circus tent of the Flic-Flac travelling circus for well-off Berliners is just too bright.

Sign of the times, surely.