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Published: August 25th 2011
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What? You mean I'm not really on vacation? Blog? I don't ever remember agreeing to that. Bah, fine fine. Anyways, hello everyone! It's been about a week since I arrived in Berlin, and in the interest of making space in my memory banks it's time for my first stab at a blog entry! I'll preface a couple of things here, I don't have an editor, so expect some rambling tangents, and if some of the juicier bits are omitted, well, just ask me later.
So anyways, where're we starting here? Ah yes. After the usual mess with customs and entering the country I started things off on the right foot by promptly getting lost. And it's been starting off so well too, I got to the right...general area of the city (Alexanderplatz) and then promptly walked in the wrong direction from my hostel. Magically my problem this time around wasn't that no one could understand what I was asking (to my delight they could), but no one had a clue where the "Wombat Hostel", or even Rosa Luxemburg platz was. After a lot of muttering I finally got to my hostel, and was in for a rather pleasant surprise. The Wombat is a luxury for 20 Euro a night, clean sheets on the bed, clean, and computers in the lobby all mean instant magic. This is apparently the Mecca of Hostels. Suspiciously friendly Russian women and psychopaths weren't included in my fee and glory of all glories, there was a bar on the roof. Aside from some truly spectacular views of surrounding Berlin it brought me back to the wonderful world of legal drinking.
Y'know what, now's as good a time as any to throw this out here. No, I haven't dropped off a cliff into total lushdom, my liver has yet to begun construction on that escape tunnel, so I think we're going to live through this. Still, the nights were good. Mostly the people I met were quite friendly, five British girls for my first night's roomates were replaced with a horde of American backpackers and a Canadian nurse. Sufficed to say things have a quick turnover around here. Eric the Canadian and I hit it off and some of his stories about working on Inuit healthcare turned heads. It was generally a good atmosphere, and three hours worth of happy hour'll make anyone's night good. Beer's also cheaper, and significantly better than in the States, so I fear by this time next year I'll have a set of tastes that only the classiest of hobos could match. Mostly I was trying to kick back and take it easy these first few days, and in a veritable orgasm of poor planning, I'd left my camera and most of my money with Mathias my host father (we'd had lunch and he'd taken some of my things on day one). Suitably lightened and much poorer than initially planned most of the days were spent, well, walking. Walking and churchgoing. If this is sounding like I've repented my sins and was doing some kind of bizarre German pilgrimage, no worries, I've still got a great working relationship with my indulgences.
Since I don't really have photos, just take my word on this and I'll dig up some stock pics for the rest of this. My room in Berlin was fairly close to the Fernsehturm.
(there's a photo floating on the blog)
The backstory here is that Berlin has two of everything. Two zoos, two capitol buildings, and of course, two radio towers. Back in the Cold War, East Germany was determined to prove theirs was larger, and the concrete hilarity that dominates the skyline today. Sometimes a cigar's just a cigar, but not this time, I can't even look at it without laughing (I'm five). It's the equivalent of the Washington Monument when it comes to stupid pictures but it made for an excellent landmark. Most of my wanderings were through the middle of Berlin, the Tiergarten (animal garden) and other places nearby for the first few days, and even though I wasn't really looking for it, some random crap happened anyways.
First off, a police festival. No, this isn't like a holiday for the police where they get to hand out beatings to all their favorite reprobates, it was apparently a celebration of the Bundespolizei, and there was food to be had. With a life police band blasting out the "Can Can" in the background I ended up wandering around the straightest sausage fest I've ever seen. Seriously, just about every stand featured some kind of wurst, and my god it was glorious. Germans are rather open when it comes to tables, and unlike certain libraries I could name taking an empty seat at a table doesn't prompt an awkward fest. Again, to my pleasant surprise my German held up to some mild scrutiny from an elderly couple I met, and as always the beer was wonderful.
I should give a special shout out to two new discoveries I'd made. There was some kind of strawberry punch drink to be had as well, which would have been wonderful if not for the arrival of some yellow and black insects. As I was about to put on my best Nick Cage Impersonation and shriek "NOT THE BEES"!, I noticed they were in fact, wasps.
Ah. Much better then. After some running away I also got to try something else along the way, it's called Berliner Weisse, and it represents the stuff of nightmares. Essentially syrup infused beer, it represents everything I should probably love, sugary substances, plus alcohol, but a few things hold it back. An aftertaste strongly reminiscent of cough syrup, and in one case a fascinating neon green color which is only slightly better than the purple one (which probably is cough syrup).
As I went home for a nap (walking ten km or whilst jetlagged wears you down) though, the Fuck Parade went by. No, the name's not a typo, this is apparently a thing. On the same day as the Polizei fest. Who said Germans don't have a sense of humor? I wish I could tell you what it was about, apparently it's vaguely (vaguely) anti fascist, but if you'd asked me at the time it was about loud techno and booze. Suits me fine, too bad it wasn't in the same place as the police.
Anyways. I'm going to break these up over the next few days, but this is a ghist of my few days in Berlin, I'll try and catch up to myself by the end of next week, but for now, tchüss!
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CLynnGo
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You've probably wandered through most of the tourist sites by now, and/or know most of the history, but Sandemans' New Europe does quality free tours every day. They meet at Brandenburg gate (east side)and tool around for a couple hours, ending at Museumsinsel. Definitely worth the admission price (FREE!).