Berlin - 3/7/09 to 15/7/09

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Loved the relaxed life style. Loved the availability of beer. Loved the price of beer. Loved the company. Loved the graffiti. Loved the trashy/trendy people. Were happy to leave.


3/7/09
After our tiring day of travelling we were happy to meet Phil at the airport, where he was waiting patiently for us at the gate. As previously stated, the train from the airport had stopped running on our behalf, so we reluctantly caught a bus to connect to the train to Phil's place in Kreuzberg.

We dumped our heavy bags there, and decided to grab some beers and meet Phil's friends at the nearby park (which was huge, and full of people sitting in their groups socialising by candle light). It was great meeting Phil's boyfriend Juan, and his good friend Rapha, and all of the other Spaniards (as Phil says, once you know one Spaniard they're everywhere!)

There were guitars (awesome!), singing and jokes, and was a great, relaxing way to finish off a long day.


4/7/09
Saturday. Phil had previously organised with the Spaniards to take us down to a lake as we were expecting warmer weather and it was meant to be really nice down there. So after meeting up with Juan, Raffa and Bego we headed out on Berlin's wonderful train system where we met up with Tanya (Phil's housemate) and her bf Morrisio on the way. We had to catch a few trains and it took about an hour to get there.

We both immediately had fallen in love with Berlin..... the people were so casual and carefree..... and best of all you can buy and consume beer absolutely EVERYWHERE! And I mean anywhere, anytime. Including train platforms. The Germans do love their beer!

We walked for quite a long while around the lake, through a beautiful forested area, which Karen tells me was very Mid Summer Night's Dream. Pity we didn't bring our bathers though, as we came to a small, dirt clearing on the water, which was packed with pale Europeans basking in the overcast Sun. They've probably never seen a real beach!

Afterwards we were invited back to Bego's new place for dinner, where we ended up cooking for them (improvised carbonara). This was a little challenging, as the fully funished flat was lacking in some of the latest gadgets and mod-cons like frying pans, baking trays, colanders, tongs, serving spoons, etc. It didn't really turn out right, but was tasty and satisfying. Funnily enough, while there are large cheese selections in every supermarket, parmesan cheese (or cheese with any kind of flavour for that matter) is unavailable in Europe.

'Twas a great night of chatting and drinking with our new Spanish German friends.

Then we went to Berghain - Good grief! Named after it's location on the border between Kreuzberg and Freidrichshain (East and West basically), Berghain is said by many to be the best club in Germany, and is certainly the most famous. It was horrible. We lined up for about 45 minutes, and the line was moving fairly quickly, as they were turning at least half of the people away at the door. Not because they were drunk, or scruffy, but because they were young, hot, tarted up girls, who didn't suit the club's image! For most clubs, that's how you bypass the queue.

Inside, the club was dark, dingy, concrete walls, and the DJs were playing German Minimalist Techno. After exploring the club, we found a quiet spot off to the side to sit and have a drink, and some locals we met told us we were sitting right outside the dark room. "What's that?" we said with a dopey expression. They laughed and told us that was the room for having sex.

Yeah, odd club that, and a little depressing. We didn't stay long, but hey, at least now we can say we've been to Berghain!


5/7/09 - 8/7/09
Phil's flat where we were staying is in Kreuzberg - a part of Berlin that is most trendy in its trashiness. It's on the river which once separated the commies in the East from the Cappies in the West, and is now bursting with expressions of personal freedom and an 'anything goes' attitude. We spent the next few days enjoying the suburb, in it's weirdness, it's cool pubs, it's history, the amazing 'street art' and the colourful locals. 'Shakespere' was a hoot! He's one of the local drunks, who is oddly well dressed but scruffy looking, wearing sunnies with Euro signs on them, and insists on telling boring anecdotes to random strangers.

Karen got a real kick out of seeing her name plastered around the place, on brands of milk, wine, etc. We later discovered that the German name Muller means wheat maker, or someone who works in a grain mill, hence the English version of the word 'miller'.


9/7/09
Thursday night we were invited to Juan's place for dinner. Rapha made a beautiful lasagne, which was quickly demolished by the hungry Spaniards and Australians.

We then made the journey to Sage night club which was great fun. It was a large multi level (partly underground) club, with a great, fun party atmosphere. It even had an outdoor area with a swimming pool, although no one was considered good looking enough to get away with swimming in it.

The DJs were playing music that was much more accessible for us than the Minimalist Techno at Berghain. I'm not usually into mainstream music, but I think after Berghain it was a welcome relief, and I realised that there was such a thing as being TOO alternative. We had fun drinking and dancing to tracks such as 'Funky Cole Medina', and Alex decided it would be fun to climb a pole up to the high ceiling, flip upside down and put his feet on the ceiling. Everyone thought that was hilarious. Alex thought that "Anything goes in Berlin".


11/7/09
Saturday we went to a gay bar called Barbie Deinhoffs with Phil and the Spaniards. It was good fun there, but after a while we decided to move on, as it was quite stuffy and smokey (in Europe smoking in bars and clubs isn't technically permitted but this is never enforced, so everyone smokes).

We walked to a vacant block overlooking the river to sit and have a beer. We could hear some awesome music booming across from the other side of the river, and decided we needed to find the place. It was a bit of a walk to get to the other side by bridge, and despite asking several people we were unable to find it! Quite frustrating, but we met a nice girl, Anja (and some dude she was with), who had been out partying and decided to take us to a club back across the river. Anja had been on a working holiday in Brisbane and Perth, and was interested in going back, so we talked quite a bit and had a nice time, and she looked after us when the bouncer in a club charged us entry 10 minutes before the club closed.


13/7/09
Okay, so we decided we'd better go and do some touristy stuff before we left Berlin, so we went to have a look at what's left of the wall. The largest stretch of it is about 1km of the inner wall stretching from Freidrichshain to Ostbanhof, and the western side of it is covered in artworks. The paintings on the wall are quite organised, as each artist given the honour of displaying their work on it are given a set amount of space. The paintings on the wall were being restored by artists to prepare for the 20th anniversary of the wall's destruction.

It was very interesting to see that an object of past oppression is now used as a symbol of freedom. It's also astonishing to me that the wall was torn down only 20 years ago. I don't remember hearing about it as a child (although Karen does) and had never realised something so monumental had happened in my lifetime.

We then went back to Kreuzberg, as we had planned to catch up with Anja. We had a couple of beers at the Bull Bar (a great punk rock pub, Berlin Texas style complete with road signs, bull skull on the wall, etc) and then went to a pub for students on a canal, where you can dance inside or just laze on floating pontoons chatting. We met a nice Swedish guy (Anders), who was on holidays there and talked about travelling and stuff for a while, then grabbed some dinner at a place that served great hamburgers, as we were sick of eating kebabs (there are 3 or 4 kebab shops lining every block in Kreuzberg, run by Turkish immigrants, that seem to be the only places to buy food late at night. The kebabs are cheap and very good, but you can't have them more than a couple of times a week).


14/7/09
Despite having a late start, we were determined to see more touristy stuff, as this was our last day in Berlin. We went to Alexanderplatz to see the TV tower, and just because the name is cool! Yeah, the tower's massive (I think it's just under 200m tall), and we were really keen to pay the massive entry fee to go up, but the lengthy queue meant that we'd be waiting for a couple of hours, so we reluctantly canned that idea and went to check out the square. It's a nice place, but packed with tourists and very opulent.

When we'd had enough of that we jumped on the train to Potsdam, which is a historical centre outside Berlin. We had lots of problems getting there, as the train we were on didn't go all the way because of some problem they were fixing. It took ages to get there, and unfortunately we met ourselves on the way back. What should have been a nice, relaxing day examining gorgeous sculptures and taking in historical notes turned into a stressful hour of running through castle grounds stopping occassionally to take things in.

We got back to Kreuzberg considerably late for our farewell dinner (at Ahmar - a nice Indian restaurant), but the others had only just ordered their meals, so we had a delicious dinner together and a couple of beers. Phil's friends and all the other Spaniards were very warm and friendly, and we were sorry to have to say goodbye. Miss ya guys, stay cool!


15/7/09
Not much to say - we packed up and caught the bus to Hamburg.

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