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So I recently got back from an enjoyable but exhausting week-long trip to Berlin.
Until just now, the last time I was in Germany - West Germany, that is - was 1972. I had an international student card. I spent June and July studying German at the Goethe Institut in Schwäbisch Hall, a short train ride from Stuttgart. I was billeted with a family who owned and operated a pub and restaurant. I shared a room there with another Goethe Institut student who was from Finland.
This time, I was able to take advantage of pensioners' rates on my hotel room and some local attractions. I bought a 6-day Welcome Card, entitling me to unlimited transportation on the U-Bahn, the S-Bahn and Berlin's whole vast public transit network, as well as significant discounts (usually 25%, sometimes more) on admission to various points of interest, like museums. I swear, they have a museum for almost everything!
General impressions? Berlin, at least the central area where I spent nearly all my time, is very bicycle-friendly and pedestrian-friendly, although there as here, there's lots of construction underway. The weather was glorious - it didn't rain once! There were plenty of outdoor patios. As far as what I consumed on those patios, I'd have to say I didn't have a lot of traditional German food (or at least, what I think of as such), though I did drink German beer. I ate Italian (lots of gelato places too), I ate Vietnamese, I ate Mexican. At the Mexican place, I actually drank a tequila sunrise - something I no longer see on the menus of Mexican restaurants over here, though it was a staple of my undergraduate student days. I will say that the Germans take their chocolate very seriously! My hotel was just a couple of blocks from Rausch chocolates (both an extensive store and a restaurant with patio) and everything I got from there was excellent, including their dark chocolate liqueur!
Many Berlin-folk seem to be smokers, something which surprised me a little, as so much of Europe (if not the world) is going smoke-free. They also don't seem to be morning people - many of the major attractions didn't open till noon or even 2PM. It was very easy to find postcards but very difficult to find places to buy stamps for them or to mail them.
I signed up for two guided walks, one in English and the other in German. The English one was on Christopher Isherwood, and led by Brendan Nash, who has himself written several books. I enjoyed that walk very much. The meeting point was the U-Bahn station at Nollendorfplatz, Saturday morning at 11AM. And afterwards, I was able to browse the stalls of the Wintermarkt where I bought bread, cheese, a few second-hand books and a very nice handmade jacket. I had a latish lunch on the patio at Vamos, which is where I enjoyed the aforementioned tequila sunrise. The market people packed up at 4PM and I moved on too - to the zoo, where I managed to see the pandas, the big cats and a few other random animals before closing time.
The next day, I went on the Courage walk, organized by the Literaturhaus. Courage was a feminist newspaper of the 1970s, which only lasted a couple of years although a subsequent paper, Emma, is apparently still going strong to this day. We did get to leaf through a copy of Courage and that was very interesting. Overall, though, I found the walk a bit disappointing. I felt the guide cast his net too wide and we spent a large part of the time just looking at the Gedenktafeln for people along Fasanenstrasse - people who seemed to be really only tangentially relevant to the whole feminist press ventures that were what interested me.
I'll talk more about my Berlin stay (and a side trip to Leipzig) in my next post, but I think this is enough for one day.
Until just now, the last time I was in Germany - West Germany, that is - was 1972. I had an international student card. I spent June and July studying German at the Goethe Institut in Schwäbisch Hall, a short train ride from Stuttgart. I was billeted with a family who owned and operated a pub and restaurant. I shared a room there with another Goethe Institut student who was from Finland.
This time, I was able to take advantage of pensioners' rates on my hotel room and some local attractions. I bought a 6-day Welcome Card, entitling me to unlimited transportation on the U-Bahn, the S-Bahn and Berlin's whole vast public transit network, as well as significant discounts (usually 25%, sometimes more) on admission to various points of interest, like museums. I swear, they have a museum for almost everything!
General impressions? Berlin, at least the central area where I spent nearly all my time, is very bicycle-friendly and pedestrian-friendly, although there as here, there's lots of construction underway. The weather was glorious - it didn't rain once! There were plenty of outdoor patios. As far as what I consumed on those patios, I'd have to say I didn't have a lot of traditional German food (or at least, what I think of as such), though I did drink German beer. I ate Italian (lots of gelato places too), I ate Vietnamese, I ate Mexican. At the Mexican place, I actually drank a tequila sunrise - something I no longer see on the menus of Mexican restaurants over here, though it was a staple of my undergraduate student days. I will say that the Germans take their chocolate very seriously! My hotel was just a couple of blocks from Rausch chocolates (both an extensive store and a restaurant with patio) and everything I got from there was excellent, including their dark chocolate liqueur!
Many Berlin-folk seem to be smokers, something which surprised me a little, as so much of Europe (if not the world) is going smoke-free. They also don't seem to be morning people - many of the major attractions didn't open till noon or even 2PM. It was very easy to find postcards but very difficult to find places to buy stamps for them or to mail them.
I signed up for two guided walks, one in English and the other in German. The English one was on Christopher Isherwood, and led by Brendan Nash, who has himself written several books. I enjoyed that walk very much. The meeting point was the U-Bahn station at Nollendorfplatz, Saturday morning at 11AM. And afterwards, I was able to browse the stalls of the Wintermarkt where I bought bread, cheese, a few second-hand books and a very nice handmade jacket. I had a latish lunch on the patio at Vamos, which is where I enjoyed the aforementioned tequila sunrise. The market people packed up at 4PM and I moved on too - to the zoo, where I managed to see the pandas, the big cats and a few other random animals before closing time.
The next day, I went on the Courage walk, organized by the Literaturhaus. Courage was a feminist newspaper of the 1970s, which only lasted a couple of years although a subsequent paper, Emma, is apparently still going strong to this day. We did get to leaf through a copy of Courage and that was very interesting. Overall, though, I found the walk a bit disappointing. I felt the guide cast his net too wide and we spent a large part of the time just looking at the Gedenktafeln for people along Fasanenstrasse - people who seemed to be really only tangentially relevant to the whole feminist press ventures that were what interested me.
I'll talk more about my Berlin stay (and a side trip to Leipzig) in my next post, but I think this is enough for one day.
