Beautiful Berlin

March 25- 27th

Well as you can tell the next leg of our journey took place in Berlin. Right away we experienced lots of good things. We found our hostel and when we checked in they moved us from a 10 person room to an 8 person room for the same price. Then when we walked into the room I see Katie just stop and point to someone sitting on the bed. Turns out it was Danae, an American girl we play rugby with at Nottingham. Crazy we were in the same room because we didnt even know she was going to be there. Later that night we were able to meet up with Juliette, another American girl we play rugby with at Notts.

The next day we went on another free walking tour put on by New Europe. The tour was amazing. Here are some things we saw:

Brandenburg Gate
~ famous becausit remained undamaged during WW2 and then was closed for twenty years during the cold war

Hitlers Bunker
is only recognized by a small sign and as the spot where all the neighbors take their dogs to the bathroom

Holocaust Memorial

Checkpoint Charlie
~ WW3 was almost started here when an U.S. diplomat tried crossing the border qnd the Soviets refused. The US and Soviets had a show down until Kennedy allowed the Soviets to put up their wall

Berlin Wall
~Only 5,000 people escaped after the wall was put up
~ Separated East from West fro 28 years
~ Tearing down of the wall came qbout as an accident.
The speaker didnt reviez his notes before talking to the journalists. There had been a meeting earlier that morning, that he had missed, which had discussed that in order to pacify the people they would annouce they would let some people cross as long as they had the correct papers. This of course was just a ploy but the speaker didnt know this. An American journalist, knowing he wouldnt be shot on public tv as what the govt was going to do about the demonstrations. The speaker read the fake notes, thinking they were real and made the announcement that the people could now cross the border. Shocked journalists then asked when this was going to take place. The speaker now really regretting not being at the meeting frantically searched his notes for a specific date and then he finally found one. The date happened just to be that very day so the speaker announced that the people could start crossing immediately. The journalists quickly spread the word and then 5,000 people at once were waiting at the one of the check points to get through to family and friends they hadnet seen in nearly 30 years.

The day after the tour Katie and I went to the Sachenhausen Concentration Camp. Here is another list of what I learned:

1st Nazi concentration camp
~ served as model camp for all to follow

Over 50, 000 people died here
~last two weeks of war 200 people were being killed a day

Contained a Joy Division
~ brotheral that housed women prisoners
ages 15-20
if got STD or became pregnant were shot
Had to service between 15-20 men per day, so not really a joy division after all
most did not survive this work

After the camp was liberated by the Soviets they turned it into a prison camp of their own
~ Soviets killed over 12,000 people there in about 4 years
~ often employed ex- Nazi officers

Taking this tour was quite interesting but at the same time depressing and kind of creepy feeling. For instance when we went down the stairs of the pathology building to the body room, as i went down the stairs i felt super dizzy and ill and everyone talked about they could feel something evil had happened there.

Well overall berlin rocked and I learned so much about their history. I must say that although Malta had the great weather I think I enjoyed Berlin so much more

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