Berlin - East Meets West
Trip Start
Mar 03, 2005
1
44
235
Trip End
Ongoing
Berlin,
Germany
Saturday, June 25, 2005
Leipzig is part of the old East Germany, and is thus in the midst of catching up on the last 60 years or so. They have the older architecture in place, but currently construction runs the streets as they are putting in new public transport systems and buildings everywhere.
One thing they do have plenty of is churches. You name the denomination, they´ve got it. The Nikolaikirche is the biggest and best, and was the starting demonstration point for public gatherings to push to end communism in this part of East Germany. Leipzig also has a Stasi Museum, with memorabilia on the GDR´s most infamous secret police force.
The train takes me into Berlin, and the incredible network of public transport takes me to the East Berlin part of the city. There is still an obvious difference between East and West Berlin. The streets in the east still feature standard grey apartment blocks. Some have been spruced up a little on the outside, to a more lighter and pleasant beige. Everything is neat and clean in the East, but feels like it is still catching up with the West.
I had been in Berlin for two hours and had flicked through some tourist brochures. I decided to do what all 21 year olds should do when the are in one of Europe´s most partiestest of towns (that´s a made up word) - I went on an organised pub crawl. Recalling that I am actually 32, and not 21, I wondered it as going to be a good idea.
I was immediately introduced to four Australians - Scott, Pearly, Di and Dee (for Denise), all from Melbourne. All were straight out of University, or going back for more once their holiday was over. Hey what is this stuff we are drinking, oh Apple Schnapps shots, mmmm its actually pretty nice....
They are a free-spirited bunch. It was interesting to chat to them about all the subjects they had done at Uni that I had failed, as they too had attended Commerce at Melbourne University. Actually ´attended´ is probably not the correct word when it comes to my uncompleted University career.
After one pub, the young English tour guide with the cockney accent and propensity to yell "woo-hoo ok people 4 minutes and we go to the next pub, are you with me or against me!", took us via a park towards the next venue. In one of the cultural highlights of this great adventure across the globe, which has taken me so far to the edge of Tibet, to great Ancient temples in Cambodia, to romantic cocktail consumption on terraces of palaces in India, the young English tour guide stood on a park bench in order to supply laybacks of more Apple Schnapps to all of those who were "with him".
I was with him. His aim was terrible. I am now wearing a new cologne, ´Apple Number 5´, down my chin and front of my shirt and am expecting a 75 year old lady named Granny Smith to try to pick me up at the next venue due to my new perfumed delights.
The German beers flow, and they are a brilliant bunch to hang out with. They are all 21. They are all impressed that I have actually had a real job. They are all confused when I say I had been working for over 10 years - just how old was I? I tell them to guess. No lower than 25, no higher than 28. I love them all dearly. There jaws drop when I say 32. You can see the maths ticking over in their minds - "I was starting primary school when he was in his last year at secondary school...."
Off to another pub we go.
They are all 21, meaning they all have that "hug and scream for no reason" thing going on, every few minutes. They verbalise that they think I´m cool, but I know the rest of the sentence reads "...for a 32 year old." I still love them all dearly. Its an Apple Schnapps kind of love. I may well suck that spillage out of my shirt.
In a great victory for all 32 year olds around the world (you know who you are, stand up with my colleagues), the 21 year old Australians went home overly tipsy before me. I called them pikers, and have continued to do so over the email since. Some of them will be in Prague when I am there, so we will catch up again for more Apple Schnapps, because even in the cold light of day via email a few days later, they still think I´m cool. I still love them all dearly.
After leaving the last club (when did we leave the pubs and end up in clubs?) I wandered out into the street. It was hours after the light had gone down in Germany in summer, which is around 11pm. It was getting closer to daylight, which is around 3am this time of year in Berlin. I decided to walk home. Given my poor sense of direction, and beer and Apple Schnapps consumption, this wasn´t a great idea. After a good twenty minutes of ´lost time´, I asked for assistance and was pointed to the relevant train home. Reality was that I wasn´t actually drunk. At 32, my theory is that you need to drink more alcohol than you used to get drunk, so I felt relatively fine. The train runs all night here in Berlin in Summer, so all was looking good. I even stopped of at McDonald´s for a "Royale With Cheese", ´Pulp Fiction´ style, on the walk back towards my hostel. I think the last time I had a Quarter Pounder was when I was 21. It seemed appropriate.
After a left turn from Torstrasse into Novalistrasse, towards number 5 where I was staying, I heard voices from a balcony above asking for help. Two Australian girls, Andrea and Kate, had locked themselves into their apartment from the inside. Only Australians could screw up a lock and door concept, and being the chivalrous fella that I am, I saved them.
I stopped in for a chat. "How old are you?" I asked. They were both 19, and on a Uni break. "How old are you?" they asked.
I said 21.
They didn´t believe me, but we still agreed to tour around some of the sights of Berlin the next day. I made it home in daylight at 3.30am.
Fruhstuck is one of my favourite German words that I can remember learning. It means Breakfast. The Germans sure know how to do it. Coffee, juice, cereal, rolls, Pumpernickel bread, cheeses, meats, salads, yoghurt....
After Fruhy (er, Breaky) I met up with Andrea and Kate to wander the sights. They had no guide book and were happy to follow me round town, as long as we saw some Hitler sights they said. OK then.
Brandenburg Gate is a spectacular sight, that was stuck behind the Berlin Wall for almost 30 years, in no man´s land. Wander down Unter Der Linden, turn left at the gate, and you are at the Reichstag, home of German Parliament. Its all very German here in Germany.
The guidebook indicates that Hitler´s Bunker is not marked as a tourist attraction but you can go to see it. If you can find it. Apparently he married Eva Braun here, and finished his life off here. Probably in that order I´d imagine. I wonder if he lost his testicle here... I recall the tune "Hitler, has only got one ball", which is a great piece of general knowledge that I have always remembered. A wander round the general area does not reveal the bunker. It merely reveals three Australians looking for some morbid bit of construction near Potsdamer Platz that the locals would preferably like to forget about.
Heading towards Checkpoint Charlie, the lyric from Elvis Costello´s "Oliver´s Army" going round and round my brain, we passed one of the last remaining sections of the Berlin Wall , complete with an old watch tower. A reminder of the past from the 60s to 90s, it stands next to the old SS and Gestapo Headquarters, a reminder of the past from the 40s. The SS and Gestapo headquarters has ben restored into a museum. They have however left all bullet holes and pock marks on the outside of the building, a reminder of WWII and the final assault by Russian Soldiers running up the street from the south to end the war.
The Berlin Wall is mostly gone, except for some small sections, and a cobblestone marking on all areas where it once stood, complete with brass plaques indicating its location on the ground. Now days, most of the wall´s path is on the edge of streets. Its common to find the plaques and cobblestone with cars parked over them. The markings are now straddled by one set of tyres on the East-side and one set of tyres on the West-side, by parked Mercedes Benz and BMW´s.
"There was a Checkpoint Charlie, he didn´t crack a smile..."
Actually there is now. Some idiot dressed in a Russian Army outfit tries to get in your photos and charge 1 Euro, as you try to take a photo of the infamous checkpoint between the old east and west of Berlin. After looking at the memorial for those who died trying to escape over the Wall, we headed into the Checkpoint Charlie Museum. It´s displays show the method of escapes to the West over the year from 1961 to 1989, and also the methods of madness employed to keep them from leaving the East.
By this stage the Australians girls are tired. I think there been too much Cold War for them to handle and not enough WWII action, so we head back towards our hotels, and wish each other well for the rest of our travels. I tell them to be careful of further locks.
There is a lot to see in Berlin, so I attempt to see more at night, but manage to get off at the wrong train station, and get thoroughly lost. My final day in Berlin means I have a lot of ground to cover.
In an attempt to cover all religious denominations in this journey. I walked to the Neue Synagogue in Berlin´s east. The building was mostly destroyed in the bombings of 1945. In the subsequent separation of east from west, the majority of the remaining Jewish community in Berlin, which in reality was not many due to the holocaust and fear of returning to this city, resided on the wrong side of the Wall for the synagogue to be rebuilt. Its restoration has only just now been completed.
I hopped off the train back at Unter Den Linden near Brandenburg Gate and headed in the opposite direction, towards Museum Island. The area was destroyed by the War, but has been thoroughly rebuilt or fixed with similar architecture. There are immaculate museums, opera halls and churches. It is now one of my favourite streets in the world. You wander past the Deutsche Guggenheim, wander in to the Neue Wache (a memorial to all those who have suffered or died from WWII through to the fall of the Wall), past St Hedwige Kathedrale, Deutsches History Museum, Deutscher Dom, amongst others.
The subway took me to the Olympia Stadium, home of the 1936 Olympics and remarkably unsuccessful local Berlin football club in the Bundeslige, Hertha BSC. As a sportsfan, it is still an interesting place to visit. The German´s are clever - they have managed to build an almost indoor stadium, where the sun actually hits the grass, thus keeping it alive. If only we cold be so clever back home in Melbourne.
The Kaise Wilhelm Geblachtnis is an old church that has been kept in the same condition as 1945 as a reminder of the horrors of the bombings. It remains partially bombed out, with photos of the area after the Allies were finished with the area. The Eastside Gallery is the largest remaining section of the Wall, and contains murals from artists who painted freedom messages after the collapse of the East. It runs right next to the river, where sand has been deposited creating a beautiful fake beach. Its a weird place to sit and sunbake, drinking a local brew - fake beach, river, shadows of the Berlin Wall next to you.
In the end I had spent more time in the old East Berlin than the West. Being a product of the West, I am not sure if there is any irony in that.
