Two days is not a very long time is it? Well imagine being in Berlin for two days (3 nights) and trying to see everything. Add to the equation that we both had the flu the whole time, and exploring Berlin was as difficult as bowling to Sachin Tendulkar.
Having the flu has not been much fun, and Matt is still under the weather as we speak. It was also very difficult getting cold and flu tablets from the Pharmacy as the chemist couldn't speak English. This resulted in her first recommending the morning after pill before a helpful customer became our translator. Seeing as it has been very hot the last few weeks, we at first could not work out how we got the flu. We reached the conclusion that it could have only have come fron one of two sources; the fat chick luke kissed in Amsterdam or the old guy Matt kissed in our hostel.
The funny thing about Luke's stinker from Amsterdam is that this morning (5 days later) we were eating breakfast in Berlin and she was at the next table! I immediately lost my appetite, while Matt also struggled to get his food down as he couldn't contain his laughter.
The best thing about Berlin is that virtually every single tourist attraction is free. Compared to in London, where you pay £10 to see a toilet where the queen had a dump ten years ago, it is a nice change.
One of the rather annoying things in Europe is that you have to pay to use the toilet at the majority of restaurants, public toilets and petrol stations. This charge is to pay the cleaners. So we always make sure we get our moneys worth, and leave the cleaner with a job to do!
A downside of our time in Berlin was eating out for dinner. The first night we went to "Palm Beach", an American and Mexican themed restaurant. We both ordered schnitzel with chips and salad. However the waitress must have heard "nachos" instead of "schnitzel", common error. For the record the nachos sucked.
The second night we went to an Italian restaurant, hoping to improve on the previous night's horror story. We ordered risotto and pasta as they both sounded nice (well the menu was in German so we hoped that was what we were ordering). To the restaurants credit the meals were quite nice, and I am sure it would have been enough to satisfy the hunger of a squirrel, but not enough for two guys. To make matters worse, the waiter ("gianfanco cockheadio") decided he would keep our change as a tip. People like him belong in a zoo or at a dinner date with pauline hanson.
We were suprised at just how huge Berlin is. It would be at least 5 tines the size of Melbourne, or twice the size of my ego. But it is the best city for tourists that we have been to.
The Memorial to Murdered Jews and it's museum was amazing, and so well done. We had an audio guide each, which provided a commentary of the whole centre. It was hard for us to get our head around all of the statistics and attrocities. The displays included letters and postcards from jews written just minutes before they were killed. There were also displays on different Jewish families and how the holocaust affected them. There was one family of 10 who were all killed.
Through busabout we also had a walking tour focusing on the third reicht (Nazis etc). We were astonished to learn that the overall death toll for world war two was upwards of 60 million. Over 70% of Berlin was destroyed and most of the buildings that survived still have bulletholes to this day. During the tour we visited Hitlers Bunker, the exact place he and his wife killed themselves, all of the Nazi buildings and memorials for the Jews, Soviets and other victims. Our guide for the tour was great, and we both loved the experience. As I write we are actually on our way to a concentration camp.
It was awesome to see where parts of the Berlin wall are still standing, but very intimidating. There were parallel walls with about 30 metres in between with snipers in towers. This area is known as the "death zone" and many died attempting to cross the wall.
The German parliamentary building is also very cool. It was burned down before the war but has been rebuillt and has a huge glass dome on the top. We climbed the dome, which looks down into the parliament.
Today we are on out way to Prague in the Czech Republic.