Berlin

Well, I managed to write about getting *to* Germany, then inexplicably seem to have stopped... sorry about that. :) 

The plane from Zurich to Berlin was delayed about 15 minutes, due to us sitting on the runway, but we made it to Berlin *about* on-time - and just in time to watch the sun set as we were coming in for our landing. (Huzzah for summertime, and the sun staying out later!) We wandered off the plane and "through" Passport Control, except nobody was manning either the EU or Alle booths, so we simply went straight through to reclaim our luggage. (Which rather peeved me, as I found it rather silly that I'd come out of this holiday with a Zurich stamp, but no German stamps) I stood about for a few moments, before remembering that - in true Rick Steves style - I had simply brought a carry-on and my purse. (woot!) I stepped out of the luggage carousel room and texted Katy, who - after a brief search for the information desk (I followed the signs advertising "I -> ", all the while hoping that I did, in fact, stand for information, and not something else in Deutch. We caught the bus as the sun was setting and made our grand journey home - thank goodness I was with Katy, or I'm pretty certain I'd still be sitting around the airport, trying to figure out the mass-transit. It's a sad fact that Seattle has no mass-transit system, and Berlin's did seem to be absolutely *amazing*, but it was still quite daunting in and of itself to the newcomer who doesn't speak the language. (While going for the S-bahn, Katy was stopped by a man trying to figure out what train she wanted, with whom she conversed in German - I still half suspect that she planted him there to impress me...) We arrived home to their absolutely adorable flat (though that staircase was just *waiting* to kill me, I'm pretty certain), with Ryan cooking dinner. Let me digress for a moment.

This spring break was a fantastic look at dichotomies - the young, punk city of Berlin vs. the quiet, peaceful beauty of Dusseldorf; visiting historical sites vs. a more "hanging out" style of siteseeing; married friends vs. single friends. Living in the Halls tends to make me feel a bit old before my time - I don't go out clubbing every night, I don't put off homework assignments to the last minute, I follow politics, I've had full-time (serious, not summer) jobs, etc. Even still, my cohorts (generally ranging in age from 17-21) generally mentally forget that I'm several years older than than them, and give the funniest looks when reminded of this fact - for example, when I would mention that I was going to visit Katy and Ryan, I got *so* many weirded-out looks - "You have married friends?! Wow, that must be weird!" Ummm... not really... 

That said, while I love building trebuchets, making short films, playing Risk until 4 in the morning, and building forts in the common room, it was such an odd sense of joy and relief to be amongst my age range again. :) Cooking *real* meals (at normal hours), renting films, seeing the city via boat tour (complete with beer and sunscreen)... going to bed at 11PM... :) I was also absolutely delighted in the fact that Katy, Ryan and I managed to pick up where we left off - you do occasionally have those friends that you meet up with, years down the road, and you can't seem to get conversation flowing again as well as you did before - not so, here, as reminisces mixed with catch-up. Excellent times.  

Anywho: Berlin! First day, Katy and I took a 3 1/2 hour walking tour of the city, led by a guide who had been born in... Bulgaria? Hmm... it started with a B... but whose parents emigrated to New York when he was quite young, and he had only moved back to German about three years previous. You could definitely see the New York spirit, however - his voice carried just about everywhere we went, and he had a flair for, ahem, "involving" people - both within his tour group and random strangers passing by - in telling the stories. It was such a help to not only get a good view of the big tourist sites, but to get the history behind them put in a chronological order - growing up, I feel most of my history classes took us up to World War II, then said, "Umm... yeah... that's about it" as though nothing happened after the 1940's anywhere. I very distinctly remember a girl in one history class in HIGH SCHOOL very sincerely asking Miss Engnell "Wait, I thought we won the Vietnam War"... (sigh) In any case, history was sorted out and it was a truly gorgeous day - 22 degrees, bright sunshine (very bright...), a slight breeze, everything green and glorious, we had a fantastic lunch near Checkpoint Charlie, then later got the "finest" gelato, met up with Ryan after work, saw the Jewish Synagog and the Tacheles, had a cider in a beer garden (apparently, pronounced "see-der") with Simon and Sarah (K&R's friends, who were were to have dinner with the next night), then had pizza in the park, while watching the crazy bottle man talk to his stuffed cat. :) In true "old people fashion", we went home and watched the new episodes of the Daily Show, Colbert and The Office before turning in. At 11PM. Ah, I love it. :)

Second day, Katy and I went back to the Reichstag, the German Parliament building. It was a long line to get in, but quite worth it - you get whisked up to the top floor via elevator, then deposited on the rooftop next to the large glass dome that oversits the Parliamentary room. Again, bright sunshine and warm weather, this time warming my now bright red skin. Once inside the dome, you follow the ramp around right up to the top, where you can look straight down into the main room of the Parliament - the people looking straight in at the transparent government, while the government looks up to be constantly reminded that they are beneath the people, not above them. A truly lovely image. We climbed back down, and settled quite comfortably at a local cafe, where I had my first currywurst - wurst covered in a spicy, ketchup-like sauce... quite delicious and immensely satisfying in the way that a barbecue in the middle of summer can leave you pleasantly satiated, warm, sleepy, and purring in contentment. We met up with Ryan (who had been up ridiculously early for a ridiculously long bike ride - crazy bloke!), and went on a boat tour of Berlin, floating lazily down the river, beer in hand, as we watched the sites float by, listened to the speakers crackle with German and English, and enjoyed the warm sunlight. (Well, the second half of the journey had us sitting in front of a family with a little girl who wouldn't stop getting up, grabbing my seat (and, as well, my back or my hair), kicking my seat, and - according to Katy's German - constantly either complaining or demanding something from her parents. (grumble) We passed through the Tiergardens on our way back to our bus, where we headed home (after picking up dessert), then to Simon and Sarah's for dinner. At first mention, I had a rather striking image of Bridget Jones, going to her Smug Married friend's house for a dinner party - of all Smug Marrieds (Only this time, they'd be Smug Married Germans). Happily, both were absolutely delightful - Sarah was actually from Minnesota and met Simon when they were both living in DC. We talked for hours about odd German language foibles, crazy times in undergrad, The West Wing (Simon's a big fan! I knew he was cool!), living internationally, England/US/Germany, etc. We ended up leaving around 1AM and it was a testament to how quickly I had fallen back into my more "normal" living arrangement that, arriving home around 1:30, I was absolutely exhausted. (Despite this being the point most of the guys here would come knocking, to see if I wanted to watch a movie or go out to a house party) Making this late hour even more late was the fact that the next day was...

Palm Sunday! The three of us trundled off to the American Church of Berlin - oddly enough, *this* was my biggest culture shock of the trip. :) Although I believe the church was supposed to be non-denominational, we were given Lutheran hymn books and recited the dear old catechism. We went outside with our palm fronds to greet the Saviour and sang our first hymn walking back down the central nave. Nearly everyone spoke with an American accent, and with that unmistakeable "American Christian" way of speaking, smiling, walking, making small talk, having cookies and coffee laid out afterwards, etc. There was just something so bizarre - after spending so much time in England, where it's pretty unmistakably "C-o-E", and then to have the mindset of "I'm in Germany, I'm in Germany", to go three days of having to have Katy order for me, stammering out my little "bitte" and "danke" whenever I could, to suddenly be thrust back into that completely familiar and so absolutely itself environment - it was quite a culture shock. :) Lovely church with lovely people, but it absolutely threw me for a loop. Afterwards, we went to see the Topography of Terror exhibit (former site of the SS Headquarters). Once finished, we still had about an hour or so of museums and such being open, but Katy and I decided, instead, to simply stop for a snack at a cafe near the Brandenburg Tor and just enjoy the last of the sunshine and talk for a bit. We grabbed the bus home, made dinner, and - as my plane to Dusseldorf would be heading out bright and early, went to bed early as well. 

Impressions of Berlin? Our tour guide summed it up best - he exhorted us to come back to Berlin as soon and as often as we could, as the city was shifting and changing day by day. It was amazing to see the surfeit of history - and such *recent* history as well (Katy said she kept getting teased by old Berliners by her fascination with the bullet holes and bombed out buildings that are everywhere) - especially in Seattle, though definitely within the States in general, we just don't really have these massive evidences of war lying about on every doorstep. The times when war has come home, it's generally been in examples like 9/11 or Pearl Harbour - where we're hit, and SHOCKED that we can be hit, then resume the war happening somewhere *not* on our shores. The openness and honesty about WWII and the division of Berlin under communism was amazing to see - and quite heartbreaking to see how raw the scars still are. It is illegal to do the Nazi salute, or even to draw a swastika - it's a major news item now that The Producers is coming to Berlin for the first time. There's been a hail of controversy surrounding it; all the advertising for the show features flags with - not swastikas - but pretzels. :) And yet, despite all this history, this shadow of a dark and troubled past still lurking about the city, there is such an amazingly fresh, young voice taking over Berlin. Katy and Ryan joked that they lived in the "cool" part of the city - where all the stereotypical European youths run around with mohawks, tight jeans, and piercings. It is amazing to see that this city has managed to come out from its past, while still being able to display it - saying, "yes, this is what happened - it was terrible, we aren't trying to whitewash it, we aren't trying to deny it, this is what happened" - they recognize their past without being destroyed by it. The evidence is still there on every street corner (they've gone through the records and, in front of any house still standing that at one point was home to someone who died in the concentration camps, they've put a gold brick in the sidewalk in front of that house with the persons' name, date they lived there, and what camp they died at), yet this information hasn't killed the city's spirit, which is remarkably strong and quite young. 

Okay. Well, having gotten this far, I have just been invaded by Ciaran and Lars, looking to pay a game of Risk. On the one hand, it's only 10:30... on the other hand, they want to do World Conquest... hmm...