Excellent first day in Berlin. Action-packed and adventurous! It was also Marc's birthday! The youngun of our group turned 22 on July 24, beginning his first and only year as a 22-year-old.
We arrived by night train to Berlin very early in the morning. As soon as we got off the train and made our way into the main area of Berlin Hauptbahnhof, Berlin's central station, I could tell I was going to like this city. The station itself is quite modern, having opened in 2006. It's a multi-level rail station, in which entire train lines run perpendicular to each other on different levels, the upper line supported by seemingly inconsequential pillars. It's pretty clear that they're not, since you can drive an entire train across them, but nevertheless it's an imposing spectacle.
Even at 7:30 AM, the station was abuzz with life. We got breakfast in a little cafe and then made our way to the hostel. Since we were so early, we clearly couldn't check into our room, so we killed time in the common area until we were met by Marc and Michael's friend Dana, who was staying in our hostel as well. She decided to change rooms to stay with us, so she had to check out of her existing room and join us in the common area to wait.
Once our room finally was clean and ready, we got acquainted with the hostel, cleaned up, and headed out. The four of us were craving burritos, so on the hostel receptionist's advice, we headed to Dolores Burritos, a great burrito place quite near the hostel. It felt like it was transplanted from California, and the fare there hit the spot for all. After that, it was off to start sightseeing!
The first stop on our first day was the giant 1960s TV tower, built and operated by the German Democratic Republic (DDR, or East Germany, as you may know it). A few quick photos of another Soviet-esque futurist structure and we were off again.
We stopped next in the Lustplatz, site of one of Berlin's many museums, and the first Lutheran church of the trip. Sadly, we had to pay admission to tour the sanctuary, whether because there was a concert in progress or because we simply had to pony up. We skipped that, and headed onward. Shortly down the street we encountered the famous Brandenburg Gate, symbol of Germany for ages. It's surrounded by European Union administration buildings and embassies (the American and Russian were the first I noticed). There was also a hunger strike in progress to protest the current state of affairs in Iran, which was interesting to watch, but impossible to understand since all their signs and chants were in German.
After that, we meandered through the Holocaust memorial nearby. It's an interesting experience. From the outside, it looks like a number of similarly-sized gray cement blocks arranged rather haphazardly across a big open space. However, when you walk through the narrow spaces between the blocks, you notice that the ground is very hilly, so some of the blocks are a good 15 feet tall, while others may not even be a foot. A great, somber, ominous atmosphere is created when walking through the maze-like structure deep within the blocks. The narrow passages and stark shadows are very cool.
From there we made it to one of my favorite attractions, the remnants of the Berlin Wall! A few segments had been left standing with placards interspersed explaining the wall, the GDR, and the interplay of East and West during the Cold War (on a slightly unrelated note, check out this New York Times article for a great reflection on the Nixon/Khrushchev "Kitchen Debate"). For two Euros, I got my passport stamped with a Checkpoint Charlie stamp, a Berlin stamp, a GDR stamp, and a stamp from eaech of the four zones of Occupied Germany- the USA, England, France, and the USSR. A very, very cool souvenir in my opinion.
The Sony Center came next. It was one of the first structures to go into the former no-man's land near the Wall after Berlin was unified. It was a neat structure, flanked by a Mercedes Benz building on the opposite side of the street.
Then it was a quick jaunt past the (sadly closed) Berlin Philharmonic hall, the Tiergarten, and to the Reichstag! What a cool building, positively dripping with historical significance. Its famous dome is now made of glass, with a spiral ramp inside that you can climb to get a fantastic view of the city. We'll be doing that, and probably making a lunch or dinner excursion of it, since there's a considerable wait to get in.
Our night was concluded when we headed back to the hostel. On the way, we bought some food for dinner, and some drinks to have to "pregame" to go out to a club for Marc's birthday. For those not-college-aged readers of my blog, "pregaming" is drinking at home or some other not-bar establishment before going out to a bar or club, thus avoiding the stupidly expensive drinks at the venue. We had a fantastic time, and wound up staying out until about 5:30 AM. My companions have intentions to repeat such an affair again for our remaining two nights in Berlin, but I highly doubt that I can manage such a crazy adventure three nights in a row. I may just play the grandfatherly role and hang out with the hostel crowd, catching up on Catch 22, which I bought in Munich to read after having torn through Angels and Demons and The DaVinci Code.
Exciting times are afoot, we're less than 10 days away from our triumphant return to the USA!
No comments:
Post a Comment