Berlin!

Last weekend I made a weekend trip to Berlin with Lauren, a friend from Bryn Mawr who is also interested in architecture. We took a night bus from Copenhagen to Berlin (about a 7 hr drive including a ferry ride) on Friday night and then a bus back from Berlin Monday morning. We stayed at a hostel that was right next to Museum Island and most of the main historical sites.

First, here's a brief list of what we did:

Saturday:

1. Walked from our hostel to Unter den Linden (the main street with lots of historical sites) to the Reichstag. The line to go up to the top of the dome was an hour long so we left.
2. We walked around the Friedrich Strasse U-bahn stop and got hot chocolate and pastries at a cafe and planned the rest of the day.
3. Walked down to Potsdamer Platz, on the way we saw the Holocaust Memorial
4. Walked from Potsdamer Platz to Checkpoint Charlie.
5. Walked from Checkpoint Charlie to the Jewish Museum and went in.
6. Walked up to Gendarmarkt.
7. Walked over to NikolaiVertil and Alexander Platz on the way back to the hostel.
8. Dinner at a cute little cafe on the Gendarmarkt.
9. Back to the hostel, shower and bed at 10.

Sunday:
1. Walked from the hostel to the Reichstag (we left at 7:30 so that we could arrive at 8 and avoid the long lines). Went up the Reichstag dome which was very cool and we got a great view of the city.
2. Breakfast at Cafe Einstein, a pretty nice cafe on the Unter den Linden.
3. Walked over to Museum Island to look at the Altes Musuem, the Berliner Dom and the Pergamon (we didn't go in any due to time restraints).
4. Went to a neat flea market by Museum Island where I bought a pair of leather gloves that were much warmer than the gloves I had earlier.
5. Took the U-Bahn over to Charlottenberg Schloss and went inside and walked around the gardens. It was starting to snow so we didn't walk around too long.
6. Walked down to Kurferstendamm (the main shopping street in West Berlin) which was a pretty long walk and we stopped at a Döner Kebap place for lunch on the way which is a kind of Turkish sandwich (they have something almost the same in Copenhagen, called Schwarma).
7. Walked up the Kurferstendamm to the Kaiser Wilhelm Gedächtniskirche, a partly bombed out church in West Berlin.
8. Then we walked over to the Bauhaus Museum of Art and Design (designed by Walter Gropius) which we were too late to go in but looked at the outside and then over to the Neue Nationalgaleri (designed by Mies van der Rohe) which was temporarily closed.
9. Walked over to an area around the Nollendorfplatz. On the way we stopped at a neat Turkish restaurant to get some food for the bus ride back to Copenhagen.
10. Dinner at a good Indian restaurant and a bit of a rest after a long day.
11. Took the U-Bahn back to Unter den Linden and the Reichstag and went up to the top of the dome again at night. It was neat to see everything lit up and the Brandenberg Gate was really pretty all lit up.

As you can see from these lists, we had very busy days and were walking almost the entire time. I calculated and on Saturday we were probably walking for 9-10 hrs and on Sunday for around 11 hrs. Needless to say, we were very tired each night but we pretty much saw everything we wanted to which was good.

Second, here's things I noticed/thought about Berlin:

1.We spent all of Saturday and the first part of Sunday in East Berlin since that is where most of the historical and tourist attractions are and I could really feel the Soviet influence on that part of the city. There were no trees on the side of the streets, there were many more buildings that were basically concrete blocks and the area just had a harsher, less warm feeling than West Berlin. Also, there were still several empty area that I assumed had never been rebuilt from WWII or had been destroyed during the cold war. Also, even though we walked around East Berlin quite a bit, we never saw any major shopping area but maybe we just weren't in the right places. We spent most of Sunday in West Berlin and really felt the different character of the city. The atmosphere seemed a bit warmer and there were many more trees on the streets, more cobblestone on the streets and sidewalks and older buildings.

2. The most interesting thing about Berlin was thinking that only 20 years ago, it was split into two cities separated by a wall. It must have been very strange to live in Berlin back when it was divided and the division is still apparent today.

3. One thing that was especially interesting/funny was the use of the old Soviet walk/don't walk signals in East Berlin and the fact that the symbols have been turned into tons of different souvernier products. It's kind of ironic that a symbol of communism has been adopted by the very capitalistic tourist industry, which was very successful, especially for me (I bought a bag with the symbols on it).

4. I ate pretty well in Berlin since it wasn't too expensive. Notable meals include dinner at a small cafe on the Gendarmarkt. I had a Currywurst (bratwurst with ketchup and curry) which was REALLY good, potato salad (the first time I've ever had it...it was okay), a beer and an apple cake. Also, breakfast on Sunday at Cafe Einstein. I had hot chocoloate, the really rich European kind and scrambled eggs and bread. Lunch ...Döner Kebap, which was very good and finally dinner again at an Indian restuarant recommended to me by a friend who studied abroad in Berlin last semester.

Berlin and Copenhagen:

1. Berlin is a huge city, especially in comparison with Copenhagen. We could ride the U-Bahn for 20 minutes easily and still be within the city limits whereas in Copenhagen, that would take you well into the suburbs.

2. Berlin is CHEAP! Maybe its just because I'm living in Copenhagen now which is a very expensive city but I was really suprised by how affordable things were in Berlin. Restaurants weren't very expensive and one night I got a pretty good dinner, beer and dessert for only 11 euros and most restaurants seemed to have dinner entrees from between 8-12 euros. In Copenhagen, its really hard to go out to dinner for less than 100 DKK ($17) and most places are more around 120 DKK ($20). It was also nice to be in a country in which the currency was roughly on the same scale at the US. I still find myself converting Danish currency for some things because the scale is so different from the US (roughly 6 DKK per 1 USD).

3. Germans are much less fashionable than the Danish. I also saw a lot of dyed hair, mostly females dying their hair red or pink...not many people dye their hair in Denmark.

4. There are a lot more modern buildings in Berlin than Copenhagen, which makes since considering it was heavily bombed during WWII and Copenhagen hasn't been burnt or bombed since 1807. I really like a lot of the new buildings in Berlin and I liked how they built modern buildings that were just a modern take on the older archtecture. It also helped that a lot of the newer building's were built out of stone, which is a much warmer material than concrete.

5. The modern German buildings were a lot different from those that I have seen in Denmark and Copenhagen. I'm not really sure exactly what is different, but the German buildings seem a bit harsher and not as soft. But it was interesting that we could both definatley tell the difference.

All in all I really enjoyed going to Berlin and even though I was only there for a short time I think I got a pretty good sense of the city, although I definatly want to go back sometime and explore the city at a more leisurely pace.