Berlin: Days 3, 4, & 5

Day 3: Saturday, November 11
This was the worst day of the trip weather-wise with rain, wind, and pretty cold temperatures. It was pretty fitting, however, as we spent the day at Sachsenhausen Concentration Camp. It just seems wrong to be at such a place on a bright, sunny day. I also think the weather helps put it in perspective. There we were in warm winter clothes, hats, gloves, scarves, coats; fully-fed; not doing anything strenuous; and we still felt a bit miserable. How on earth did people who wore only lightweight cotton clothes that didn't fit properly, who were extremely malnourished, who were forced to do backbreaking work, and who were tortured ever survive? It's truly unbelievable. You have to wonder exactly how they did it. I don't have any pictures to share as it seemed a bit gratuitous to take photos of such a place.

Since Sachsenhausen was a bit outside of town the trip there took most of our day. Once back in Berlin proper, we took off to find currywurst, a special kind of sausage popular in Berlin. We followed instructions in our Lonely Planet in search of a place that was supposed to be great, but when we got there, the only place we saw looked not-so-great. We looked all around but that's all we found, so we decided to give it a shot. Should have listened to our guts. It wasn't so great. But we'd eaten it. We just couldn't believe the book had recommended that place. (Flash forward to the next day...we're back at the same Metro stop and still marveling that we were sent to that place for currywurst when we realize that it wasn't the spot at all and hidden behind a kiosk was the actual place we were supposed to go. Duh!) Anyhow, after eating our not-so-good Currywurst, we hopped back on the Metro and headed to the East Side Gallery, which is a section of the Berlin Wall that still stands and has been decorated with artwork. Unfortunately much of the artwork has now been graffitied over, but it was still interesting to see a large stretch of the wall and try to imagine it cutting the city in two.

After checking it out, we headed back to Kreuzberg for dinner, this time eating at an Asian place called Sumo. We both had Udon, which was really good. I don't recall seeing a single Asian eatery last time I was in Berlin, but this time they were everywhere. Aside from the doner kebab stands, places selling Asian food were most ubiquitous. It was kind of odd, but then I began to notice that a lot of people doing service jobs were Asian. I guess there's been quite a migration. Anyhow, we called it a night shortly after dinner as it was already pretty late and we were tired.

Day 4: Sunday, November 12
We got up early on our last day in Berlin and first headed to Karl Marx street, because Jeff wanted to try to get a good look at Communist architecture. There were lots of large apartment buildings and some interesting wedding-cake architecture, but it was hard to really get a grasp of it since a lot of it had clearly been updated since the fall of the Berlin Wall. The McDonalds, for instance, was certainly a new edition. While strolling, we had a good opportunity to snap a picture of the East German Ampellmann, or cross walk figure. It's got a pretty interesting history, which you can read about by clicking on that link. I think he's pretty awesome.



From there, we took a train out to Potsdam to visit the San Souci palace of Frederick II. This palace served as his summer home, and the name means "Without Care" in French (he was obsessed with everything French). We were able to get tickets for a tour of the palace at noon, about 30 minutes later than we arrived, so we walked around the outside a bit.







The palace itself was pretty cool. Not too gigantic that we got bored and with lots of fancy and interesting embellishments. Tons of marble, gold, etc. Both Jeff and I enjoyed the intricate paintings on the ceiling the most. We also learned that Frederick really liked potatoes, and Jeff inferred that the younger Frederick was gay because he forbade all women from visiting the place, including the wife he wasn't fond of. We weren't allowed to take photos inside the palace, but I snuck one. It's not very good because I had to be sneaky and couldnt' use my flash, but I couldn't resist. In order to protect the floors, we had to wear these grey slippers over our shoes. They must have been a size 20 and you had to slide your way around to keep them on. We were amused.



After the tour, we took a brief stroll around the gardens, but shockingly not much was in bloom. We did get this nice picture of ourselves, however. Be sure to check out my sweet new orange shoes.



On our way back to the train, we rode past this flying rhino, which I just had to take a picture of.



Back in Berlin proper, we headed to KuDamm, which was pretty much the central part of Western Berlin. It has lots of stores to make sure everyone knew it was in the part of the city practicing capitalism. One of these store, KaDeWe (Kaufhaus des Westens---Store of the West), is a humongous department store (the largest in Europe) that sells just about everything and was, during the years of the Cold War, a symbol of the economic power of the West. Another symbol in the area is the Kaiser Wilhelm Gedaechtnis Kirche, a church that was damaged extensively during World War II bombing and which was left in a state of ruins as a reminder of the cost of war.



In the late afternoon, we hit some markets in the area around our hotel, all of which sold the same kind of junk you find at markets everywhere. We then stopped for hot chocolate before heading out for a traditional German dinner of schnitzel and potatoes. And finally, because Jeff couldn't leave Berlin only having had a sad excuse for a currywurst, we went back to Kreuzberg and the recommened Curry 36, where we split a sausage. I have to say that it's still not my favorite thing, but this one was indeed much better, and we could now leave Berlin knowing we'd had an authentic experience. Pshew.

Day 5: Monday, Novemeber 13
Going home day. Sad. Jeff headed back to Sweden, and I headed back to the US. We'd had such a good time that we were both loathe to leave, but knowing Jeff was going to be home less than three weeks later made it a bit easier. All we did was get up, eat breakfast, and head to our respective airports, but I do have two more pictures to share.

First, on my flight from Paris to Berlin, there was a huge dog on my flight. I was all excited about this and told Jeff about it. And then, when I was waiting for my flight home, who would show up but the big dog! And he ended up on my flight again. It was crazy. I don't know what kind of dog he is, but he was very big and had a wrinkly face that made him look so sad. Anyhow who knows me knows I'm not really a dog fan, but I was fascinated by this dog. Again, I had to be sneaky so the photo's not so good, and he's laying down so you can't see his true size, but here he is.



And here, for those of you who have always wondered what Greenland looks like, here you go. We had an amazing view of the country from the window. The flight crew says it's really rare to see it because it's usually covered by clouds. It's definitely not green. I can't imagine who actually lives there. But I'm kind of interested in going, because it just has to be out of this world.