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Published: July 31st 2006
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Berlin... Berlin... that place is amazing anytime of the year! And even though Germany has lots of great, beautiful, interesting cities, I still think Berlin should be a country!!
I took a ride there on Wednesday (really.. cheapest, faster way to travel in Germany!!
Mitfahrzentrale-
english version) and got there around 11pm, so I just went to my "hostel" to check it out: Hauptbahnhof. Yes, that's right, main train station.. slept with the view from the Reichstag and even had a roommate! This guy that asked me if I knew any hotels but only needed to wait for his train for about 3 hours.. he even offered to pay for me to go to the hostel too, that was very nice!! He said the police told him it wasn't allowed to sleep at the hbf... there was a girl sleeping on the bench next to ours!! We just looked at each other, said good night and I set my alarm for 4am to wake him up..
Around 4:30 I took the S-Bahn to the Olympia Stadion.. when I got there, there was already a bunch of ppl that had slept there!! I just put my flag on the floor,
laid down and joined them.. til the crazyness that started when the security guards came to distribute the wristbands for the "ring"! I got one, but didn't even use it... when I got inside the stadium I stayed right before the ring.. I'm too short, so if I had gone to the front, I wouldn't have seen anything!!! So it was a good choice.. and I even made friends with lovely german ladies next to me and could take a 30min nap before the concert!!
The german girls were really nice.. they were all worried about me cause I looked tired and all, was by myself.. but I was fine! Tired, yes! But fine.. I was so tired I didn't even wanna speak german, so I just talked to everyone I met in English..
Oh yeah!! When I was going to the hbf the night before, I didn't get a ticket for the S-bahn so when the woman came to check it I pretended I couldn't speak German nor English, only Portuguese!! hehehehe Was funny.. not necessary, but I'd been willing to try it for a while!
Anyways... concert starts.. 1st opening act:
Orson. I LOVED them!!!
Even got the album already and can't stop listening to it! Then 2nd opening act.. Basement Jaxx.. they're alright! Different... and the drummer was hot (as usual.. not always, but usual).
After 2 and a half hours (from the start with Orson), comes the man... "listen to the raaadiooo.." sings Robbie. And you know what? The concert was good, very funny (as he usually is).. but wasn't close to as good as I thought it would be and I left with an awful feeling of disappointment, especially giving the conditions of how I went to Berlin just to see him! I totally feel like it wasn't worth it and feel terrible... I'd waited to see him for so many years! :/
Anyways.. back to my "hostel", but LOTS of roommates this time! I also really needed to charge my phone to try and find a ride to come home on Friday (I was gonna come back on Saturday so I could go to the Ramones' museum that only opens on weekends, but I was dirty, tired and broke... ready to come back home), so I asked at the few snack places that were opened and they said they
didn't have any spare plug (right..), so I went to the bathroom cause I remembered the one at the station in Stuttgart had some, and outside there were some... I asked the guy that works there if I could use it and he didn't even let me finish the sentence and was already even offering me his seat!! What a difference, han?! (he was french!!!) I even took a nap there while waiting and some ppl coming and going were looking, smiling and whatever... a girl pet my hair saying "oohhh she's so sweet" hahahah Anyways..
Around 4:30 again I left the station, but to go sightseeing... and you know what? Great time to go sightseeing!! No one to be on the pics, no tourist trying to take pics and making you wait to take one or to just see something and good weather/temp (since it's been hotter than hell here!)..
Seven months ago I went to Berlin for the first time with my best friend- a girl that lived in London, I met online and talked to once before she came spend 10 days with me and we became great friends!! We got along impressively well!- and
Checkpoint Charlie
Where people used to TRY to cross the border between west and east Berlin on one of the days we went on a tour with this british bloke that was taking us everywhere and telling us the history of Germany in a very casual way... and I tried to re-do the steps.
I'm so proud of me!! After 7 months I could still remember!! and didn't freeze from wearing Converse shoes in the winter (what?? in MY country, that's not a problem :p).
I started with the Reichstag, then my beloved Bradenburger Tor (that's my fave sight from Berlin), that memorial in honour of the jewish from the Holocaust.. even the snack place where Pati and I had lunch during the break from the tour was covered!!
There was a building that the tour guide said it was gonna be destroyed and it would probably not be there after 6 months and another building that used to exist before the war was gonna be "rebuilt" there and it would take billions of euros.. I took a pic this time, but I couldn't tell if it was being destroyed or rebuilt! :S I was so tired I didn't even bothered..
Near Humbolt Uni (where Marx and Engels studied) there's this glass thing on the floor and if you look from a certain angle, you can see lots of empty shelves... that's where tons of books were burnt in the old times. They were having this "exposition" there this time... the
United Buddy Bears that are on their world tour.
"142 Buddy Bears, created in Berlin/Germany, are standing peacefully hand in hand to represent 142 United Nations member states. An exhibition under the motto WE HAVE TO GET TO KNOW EACH OTHER BETTER… it makes us understand one another better, trust each other more and live together more peacefully. "
Oh yeah.. before that I stopped at a hostel to use the internet and then sat on a bench in front of a drugstore and just stayed there for a couple of hours just observing Berlin and berliners.. how I love people watching sometimes! And during this time... got myself a ride to go home that afternoon! :D
Around noon I was on the S-bahn heading to the place where I was supposed to meet my "driver" and met two brazilians... was fun, they were very nice and even invited me to get something to eat after listening to my "sleeping at the train station" story! (by that time I had my baseball hat on and had bargained a pair of sunglasses- 20%!b(MISSING)c "i was the 1st costumer"- to look more presentable.. it worked!!).
Went to the meeting point... the driver was a very nice lady!! and there were 3 more ppl going with us.. one was a BRAZILIAN guy!!! It's amazing.. brazilians are EVERYWHERE!! It was funny... I couldn't believe it.
Later that evening I was back home, under a shower, with food in the fridge and a bed and a fan waiting for me! 😊
Berlin was beautiful and amazing as always.. but I was really glad to be back home!
ps: PROMISE I'll translate this to portuguese and start writing in both languages!!
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