Berlin

Originally we were going to catch a bus from Prague at 10 in the evening which would have meant an arrival time of around 5 in the morning but decided that we had had enough of night time travelling and opted for a bus at around 3, we were glad we made this decision as the journey ended up only taking about 5 and half hours and we arrived at a reasonable 8pm, it did mean an extra nights accommodation needed to be booked but it was worth it just to be able to get a solid nights sleep something we had got use to in Prague. Once arriving at the coach station we spent a good 20 minutes looking for the S-Bahn as our hostel was the total opposite side of the city, in the end we found the S-Bahn and realised that it was pretty much visible from the coach station and should never have taken us 20 minutes to find.



We found our hostel once we got off of the S-Bahn with no trouble whatsoever, it was called the Sunflower Hostel and not only did have a massive neon sunflower out side it but they also have leaflets with excellent maps on them too which made wandering the tower block estate less threatening. It was a really welcoming hostel and despite being in a 10 person dorm it was really really comfortable. The hostel also had it's own bar which proved to be a really handy place to hang out, next to the bar was the Internet cafe and the worlds quietest washing machines next to the worlds worst tumble driers, the Internet cafe also appeared to be the hang out place for all of the tower block estates kids but that just seemed to add to the atmosphere. That night we had a few drinks in the bar and finally realised that we had been playing backgammon to the wrong rules, since then the games have got a lot lot closer which means Nina enjoys them more and I find it all a lot more stressful and hard work than before.

Browsing through all of the leaflets that were at the hostel and also looking through the Lonely Planet we quickly realised that we had no where near enough time to do everything we wanted and that we would have to be pretty motivated to get to see a much as possible. If possible we would have changed the booking to stay for longer but as we had rooms booked in Rotterdam, Amsterdam and travel booked as well we decided we would have to make the most of the time we had and stick to the schedule. The first thing we did the following morning was purchase a Berlin Tourist card each for the cost of 19 euros, this was valid for 72 hours (pretty much the exact amount of time we had in Berlin) and not only did it allow free use of the transport system throughout central Berlin but it also entitled us to discounts of up to 40% and many of the main attractions. The first place we decided to head to was probably one of the most famous and that was Check Point Charley.

We found it with no problems what-so-ever, like most of the sights in Berlin it was just a short walk from a near by S-Bahn Station, we knew we were at the right place as soon as we saw the 'Check Point Charley Cafe', the 'Check Point Charley Restaurant', the shop, the ice cream vendor and I'm sure if we looked hard enough we could have seen the 'Check point Charley Public Conveniences. Further down the road it the white hut that sheltered the border police, to the right of that stands a sign which in English, German and Russians warns 'You are now leaving the American Sector'. Along side the hut stood to guys dressed up, one in the American Uniform and one in a Soviet uniform, the both hold the respective flags and for 1 Euro you could take a photo with them, we passed up that opportunity however the guy who stands under the sign and stamps your passport with Check Point Charley Border stamps was to good to pass up. Nina went first and in his best American accent the guy went about explaining whats what, asking what kind of name is Nina etc, all very funny, the humour was increased when he proceeded to mess up the stamps several times which now means Nina has about 10 Check Point Charley stamps scattered through her passport, when it came to my turn he was far to busy laughing at the passport photo to really get his full banter going but still it was fun and is probably about the best novelty gift for yourself that you can get in Berlin, unless you like fake bits of Berlin Wall or have a passion for Soviet style hats.

Asides from all the various Check Point Charley tourist attractions along the street there is also a really in depth informative museum, the museum itself has a great history, it started shortly after the wall was fist built and was simply a collection of details about murders on the border, escape attempts etc, at the time it was housed in two tiny rooms just on the right side of the border, from that it has grown and grown and now the museum is housed over 3 or 4 connected buildings and across two floors. One of the buildings used to be a key look out on the western side of the border where helpers would look out and assist those attempting to flee from the East. Some of the stories you get to here about in the museum are truly amazing and some truly horrifying the same can be said for the footage and the various artifacts they have. The museum not only focused on the wall though, there was quite a large exhibition on the man made famine created by the soviets in the Ukraine's in the early 1900's along side this was a smaller exhibition on Pablo Picasso and his works against the Spanish regime of the mid 1900's. We ended up spending around 3 and a half hours in the museum and like a lot of the places we have visited came out wanting to learn more and more. The whole Check Point Charley area is flooded with tourists and there are certainly more than enough street vendors looking to cash in this, however it is not over baring the area is obviously a very sensitive place for many people so you do not get hassled.

A short wander from Check Point Charley was the Topography of Terror exhibit which is situated on the old grounds of the Secret Police alongside which is a large stretch of the Berlin Wall. The exhibit itself details many of the atrocities carried out not only by the secret police but the Nazis n general including the slaughter of whole villages, the rounding up of random people to be hung publicly as a revenge for attempted rebellions etc, along with lots and lots of writing there are many many photos which certainly made this not one for the feint hearted. The exhibition is only temporarily located in the open air, many years ago they held a competition for someone to design a building that would go on the sight and would house the exhibit, a winner was chosen but due to many problem financial and logistical the government decided to scrap the project and run a new competition, so far the building if the exhibition centre had run in to millions of euros and the foundations have not even finished being laid yet, German efficiency hey???

It was getting on a bit by the time we had finished at the Topography of terror so we decided to grab some food (which is pretty affordable in Berlin) and go for a wander, there were still plenty of museums to go to but several hours of information receiving was enough for one day and whilst it was all very interesting we were feeling somewhat numb. That evening we got back to the hostel feeling absolutely shattered but decided to take advantage of the laundry service and have a few beers I headed of to bed relatively early and left Nina chatting to a Latvian girl, a Polish street artist and another guy who could have been dutch but I'm not sure, all i knew was he was the same guy that had been serving beer all evening so we liked him. The following morning I was woken by a very pale Nina who informed me she didn't get to bed until 5am and feels knackered, never the less she was determined to make the most of the day, this point had been raised several times since and usually goes along the lines of 'You spent a whole day recovering in bed in Slovenia whilst I had to walk around Berlin all day'.

The first place we headed to was the Jewish museum which talks about the Jews of Germany before, during and after the war, once again some of the documents that they had were fascinating. The museum is in a purpose built building which was designed by an artist who had it in mind that the building should represent the journey Jewish people have had to go on. The building there for is made of jagged hall ways, only very small slit windows, uneven ceilings and floors. Both internally and externally the building looks unlike anything else I've seen before and once you understand what the artist was trying to achieve you can be nothing but impressed. We ended up spending around 4 hours in the museum, some of it was bit too heavy and this we only skimmed over but if any one wants or needs to learn more about Jewish culture and history this has to be the place to come.

From the Jewish museum we headed over to the Brandenburg Gate where there was a silent demonstration in support of the Burmese Monks and the Reichtag which you can actually enter if you fancy queuing for 3 hours, we didn't. Instead we moved on to the DDR museum, this was slightly more lighthearted, not in subject but in approach. It was very hands on and appealed to every age group, the museum basically is set up like a house from the old East side and explains about the various contrasts between living standards, entertainment, education etc. It is really cheap to get in and is a much more bearable size compared to many of the massive museums we've been to. The best part of the museum is being able to sit in a Trabi and take a drive along a project screen showing Eastern Germany, pretty sure that despite the fact they were renowned for being unreliable and impossible to fix they were probably still better to drive than my banger.

After spending an hour or so in the museums we decided to head over to the Fernsehturm (T.V tower) which you can see from pretty much anywhere in Berlin, every big city has it's tower and the T.V tower is Berlins. It was built in the mid 60s and stands at 368 meters (including the antenna) at around 200 meters there is a viewing platform and just above that is a rotating restaurant. We decided to go up it to look at the views over Berlin as the sun set our budget wouldn't stretch to a meal at the restaurant but we did enjoy and overpriced cocktail. The view showed us that Berlin is certainly a city where it's history in the attraction rather than its beauty, which is somewhat lacking, that being said though the City does have a nice feel about it and is nice wander around at night time. Unsurprisingly Nina sloped of to bed very early that night and left me watching football and indulging in a few quiet beers.

The following day was a our last in Berlin so we got up early enough to grab some breakfast at the hostel and then headed to the bus station to drop of our bags at the left luggage area before heading back to Berlin to catch a few last sights. We headed straight to the Berlin Wall Memorial. The memorial itself I found really interesting although Nina was initially a bit underwhelmed, it basically comprises of a stretch of the wall which you can look over from a viewing platform nearby, on the other side of the wall is the 'Death Strip' within which is an old radio transmitter, there is then another border wall. There is a large metal wall at both ends so the it is not possible to enter the 'Death Strip' you can simply peer through cracks in the wall, view it from the platform and walk around it but that's it, I think it acts as a perfect reminder/memorial.

Also at the memorial sight is The Church of Reconciliation whose simple structure is built on the same spot where the original church which was built in 1885 stood, when the wall went up the church found itself on the death strip and in 1985 it was blown up by the GDR who had become frustrated with western tourists taking photos from west Germany of the chapel in the 'death strip'. There is also an excellent mini breakdown of key wall events on the stair well up to the viewing platform however many of you will be disappointed as Nina was to find no reference to the Hoffs performance on the wall!!! After a bit more wondering around it was time to head towards the station taking a brief stop at the Sony centre to stare at a few public transport employees that were on strike, this did encourage us to get a move on as we did not know how there antics were effect the S-Bahns running. We got to the station at about 4:30pm which which was pretty good considering our coach was due to leave at 5pm, however shortly after arriving a sign flashed up in German which had us reaching for the phrase book, after a while we were able establish that the coach had been delayed by 50 minutes, for us that put the final nail in the coffin as far a German efficiency goes.