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Berlin is a beautiful city. I really did not know what to expect and was not disappointed by anything. The train from Hamburg was pleasant with usual European efficiency. It arrived on time, left on time and reached Berlin on time. It was smooth and comfortable to entire trip.
Our apartment was perfect. Funny though, it was the smell I noticed first. It smelled the same as my apartment in East Sussex. It is a combination of the timber used in the floors and the cool moist air that is always present in Northern Europe. It was meant to be a nice place for our last 2 nights and a break from room sharing and potentially crowed hostel. We were 2 mins walk from the Brandenburg Gate in the heart of central Berlin. We were surrounded by cafes and restaurants and on the 7th floor over looking the Jewish memorial sculpture field and the Tiergarten. It was great find and a proper double room. And a stereo so on went the Eurovision soundtrack.
We settled, changed and were out the door to find dinner and have a quick look around the area. There was an Irish bar, sushi bar and several bier gardens and the all too expected souvenir shops selling the all too expected identical stuff as the shop next door.
As we were at the corner of the Jewish memorial sculpture we decided to walk through it. This is a large field of identical grey boxes. They are the same width and breadth, but varying heights. All laid out in a grid. The idea being that you can always see the outside from the middle, but one wrong turn and you loose sight of the people you are with and could walk around forever looking for them. It literally is an emotional maze challenging your peace of mind. And it works. Close to the middle the blocks become so high you can not see over them. The group is constantly uneven paving with elevating and descending paths so it never feels quite stable. Eventually on the far side we came out. It has the desired affect. It starts as an obviously easy maze but you do become quieter and quieter the longer you stay in.
From here we strolled to the Brandenburg Gate. This was on my bucket list. German culture has always had an attachment to monuments. Roman and Greek style buildings are all over Germany. No surprise the Nazis took on so much Julius Caesar imagery. The Brandenburg Gate in one. The original part of the gate in the taller central section. Greek columns in rows supporting the roof like plinths. Obviously modeled on a Greek temple from Olympus. On top is a chariot being pulled by 4 horses. This is one of the centre pieces of Berlin. The roads go around it now and it is a walkway only. But it is one of the jumping off points for all the open top tour buses and rickshaw bicycle taxis and the other uniquely Berlin thing. The Trabi car tourist attraction industry. While the west was building BMW and Mercedes and Porsche, the east was building Trabis. These are cheap, small, ugly (not designed to be beautiful) and very unreliable East Berlin cars. Mass produced to give everyone a car comrade. Now they have grown into a mass tourist industry with Trabis as stretch limos, taxis, convertibles, rentals and they are very brightly painted like a collector's item. They have grown to represent tourist capitalism.
From the gate we decided dinner was the next step. While generally heading towards our apartment we found AltBerliner-Wirsthaus, a typically European outdoor cafe serving large glasses of beer and wine and German food. With, amazingly, a decent couple of vegetarian options. We scored the last outside table, a couple of Berlin Tindl beers for Chris and Darryl and a German red wine for me. The staff were very friendly the menu was great. So another round and we stayed for dinner which was a good choice. We had German noodles with cream mushroom sauce it they were delicious.
Travel fatigue was being to kick in so we called it a night and returned to our apartment. Tomorrow will be our only full day in Berlin so up early I hope and out the door.
Written by Rod
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