In the Dresden Neustadt train station, we enjoyed an excellent photo exhibit in the Vorhalle while waiting for our train to Berlin. It included photos of the landscapes and castles we had just seen -- what fun! Then we boarded an EC to Berlin. When we finally arrived at the Berliner Hauptbahnhof, there was the usual flailing about, trying to find the place where we could buy our Welcome Card which provides free rides on public transit and discounts most tourist sites. Finally, we scored our cards and were ready to be tourists!
We took the tram to our hotel, the Hotel Oderberger in Prenzlauer Berg. James had picked a high end hotel with a large Olympic-sized pool and a sauna though you have to pay a small fee for both. The Hotel Oderberger is situated in the historic Stadtbad Oderberger building in the Prenzlauer Berg district. Designed by architect Ludwig Hoffmann, the public bathhouse opened in 1902. After closing in 1986 due to structural issues, it underwent extensive renovations and reopened as Hotel Oderberger Berlin in 2016.
Prenzlauer Berg is a very edgy part of Berlin and full of young singles and families, quite different from the staid Charlottenburg where we lived for 6 months 9 years ago. It's also a fairly political area, not quite as radical as Kreuzberg, but there are quite a few left-leaning bookstores and lots of vintage clothes shops.
Our room was located downstairs and was spacious, partly because it was ADA compliant. The bathroom was positively huge! The architects of the building renovation included aspects of the old Stadtbad (public pool) in the hotel's decor, and there was also interesting street art visible right across from the hotel's restaurant!
The weather was sunny when we arrived in Berlin, so after checking into the hotel and depositing our luggage, we headed toward the Spree river (initially in the wrong direction) and took a reduced price boat tour. It was a perfect day for a boat tour, and a great way to become familiar with Berlin again. After the boat tour, we visited the DDR Museum, a new museum that is fairly hands on, with many interesting exhibits and information about the history of the DDR including exhibits on what the everyday life of people in the DDR was like. It was only slightly troubling that quite a few things that look like "OMG, really, they had this?" were actually just what everyone had in the 50s and 60s in Germany. The wallpaper, the pots in the sample kitchen, all looked like what Renate's family had in their West German house. The exhibits had obviously been designed by younger folks who were unfamiliar with the everyday life of Germans, East or West, in the 50s and 60s.
After the museum, we walked back to the hotel which took about a half hour, and then we had a rest. Dinner in the evening was with our friend Stefan, at a nice Italian restaurant a few blocks from the hotel.
Sept 24
The next day it rained on and off, so we donned our rain jackets and hiking pants for the day playing tourist. We took the tram to the Museumsinsel and started in the Museum für Deutsche Geschichte (Museum for German History) where we visited the Roads Not Taken exhibit, which examines some pivotal moments in German history from 1848-1989 and contrasts Reality and Possibility: what could have happened if certain decisions hadn't been made or certain actions hadn't been taken. Next, we walked to Alexander Platz (aka Alex) with the intention of having lunch in the Fernsehturm, but that turned out to be ridiculously difficult so we left and had a nice plate of falafel and soup at a restaurant near the Neptunbrunnen (photo below).
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| James at the Neptunbrunnen |
Our lunch was too much for us to eat so when a beggar came by asking for money, Renate gave him 2 falafel and James added some rolls. Surprisingly, he was quite happy to take the food! Because buying new shoes was on the top of Renate's list of things to do in Berlin, we headed across Alex to two shoe stores. On our way across Alex, we stopped for a photo opp at a colorful representative of the ubiquitous Berliner bears. Here's Renate posing with the bear (yes, it's raining again).
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| Renate with Berliner Bär |
From the shoe stores, we walked to another shopping center and got totally soaked in the process. Fortunately our hiking pants dried quickly. But the walk was worth it. Renate found an interesting book, Zwischen Welten by Juli Zeh, a well known German author, at a bookstore in the shopping center.
With the reading material emergency resolved, we walked to the Alte Gemäldegalerie on the Museumsinsel, where we continued our hunt for Caspar David Friedrich paintings. The Alte Gemäldegalerie has an overwhelming amount of interesting art , one of those situations where you end up a bit dizzy from so many impressions. As we left, we realized that we were both bit tired but also amazed at how much we had seen in just one day! We returned to Prenzlauer Berg by tram, and had a great early supper at an Indian restaurant just down the street from the hotel.
Sept 25
Sept 25 started with the a slice of bread starting to smoke in the toaster and the fire alarm going off in the restaurant. Unmoved, we enjoyed our delicious breakfast of müsli, fruit, breads, jams, cheese, tea, etc. etc. while watching the efforts of the restaurant staff trying to extract the charcoal toast and to stop the alarm.
After breakfast, we headed out again to the departure point of the Free Tour of Alternative Berlin. This tour avoids the highly visited tourist sites like Checkpoint Charlie and instead visits the more offbeat places, and there are plenty of those in Berlin! We started with some street art in Mitte (former East Berlin) and then took a tram to the Hackischer Markt, with its many interesting art pieces. Cameron, our guide, told some interesting stories about Berlin street art. For example, in contrast to other European capitals, there are few surveillance cameras in Berlin, so it's easier to spray and not get caught. Also, while the fine for spray paint street art can be very high, the fine for a paste-up is only 25 euros.
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| Street Art in Hackischer Markt |
After Mitte, we took the U-Bahn to Kreuzberg, still the center of alternative culture in Berlin. We learned that almost all the businesses in Kreuzberg are owned by locals. We also heard about the music scene (first punk, then techno), the general mix of culture (many folks of Turkish origin live there), and the Hausbesetzer (squatters). Cameron seemed a bit naive about how violent some of the early Hausbesetzers were -- what the Baader-Meinhof gang did was no joke. But it was interesting to get a young person's perspective. A wonderful oddity was a tree house, built by a Turkish man on East German soil that ended up on on the West German side of the wall due to an error in the wall's routing during construction. He dug and planted a vegetable patch and built a small house. After reunification there was such a groundswell of support for him that he got to keep the place and later, his son inherited the property. Here's a Wikipedia page in German (or French, or Italian).
From Kreuzberg, we returned to Mitte to finish the tour and say good-bye. The group was an interesting mix of different ages and backgrounds, and Cameron was fun and knew a lot, so we rewarded him with a nice tip, because the guides don't get paid a salary. We had a lot left on our agenda for the day, and the next stop was the Fernsehturm. The weather was pretty good, so we paid the rather steep fee and took the elevator up. From there, amazing views all around! Here's a screenshot from Wikipedia that shows the Turm and the Rotes Rathaus -- you can see how tall it really is!
After the Fernsehturm visit, we returned to the shoe store and Renate finally bought a pair: mission accomplished! Then we took the U-Bahn to Brandenburger Tor. As we exited the station, rain started pouring down, and we got thoroughly soaked. Furthermore, because the Berlin Marathon was scheduled for the weekend, a stage dominated the area around the Tor.
So we returned to the U-Bahn and headed back to the Museumsinsel, where we visited the nearby Humboldt Forum. The Humboldt Forum is a museum and research organization housed in a former castle. Named after Alexander and Wilhelm von Humboldt, two brothers who lived in the late 18th and early 19th century in Berlin, the Humboldt Forum was under construction when we spent 6 months in Berlin in 2015, so it was at the top of our list to visit on this trip. We started by watching the overview video that showed the history of the building, and then we visited the museum cafeteria because we hadn't had any lunch. We bought excellent salads, a croissant for James, and Kalter Hund (cold dog) for Renate. James insisted that Renate must have some Kalter Hund, a cake made from Leibnitz cookies and chocolate ganache, that her father used to make for her birthday.
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| Kalter Hund at the Humboldt Forum |
Fortified, we started our tour in the basement, which featured slick interactive displays about the historical background of the building, based on the remains of walls and other features and artifacts. It was fascinating to see the history of the castle -- and somehow hard to envision that it continue to change again and again.
The 20th century was especially turbulent. The castle was completely destroyed during WWII. On the site, the DDR (communist East German government) first built a parade ground, and then the Palast der Republik (Palace of the Republic), which housed the DDR legislature, the Volkskammer (People's Chamber). After reunification, there were lengthy debates about next steps, but eventually the decision was made to tear down the existing building, partly because it was thoroughly contaminated with asbestos. Instead, the plan was to create a new building with a facade that replicated that of the old castle, combined with more modern elements. In the picture below taken inside the courtyard, you can see the combination of the Baroque and the modern.
The Humboldt Forum now houses a large ethnographic museum, partly drawing from Alexander von Humboldt's collection, and a large Asian Art museum (both free) plus special exhibits (for a fee), conference rooms, research labs, etc. We already knew we want to see more, but after a full day, we decided to ride the tram back to the hotel, have a rest, and go out for a nice dinner.
An Interlude on Berliner Art
One of the coolest things about Berlin is the art that is just about everywhere. In addition to the street art, many shops and other facilities have art incorporated into their space in interesting ways which, in any other city, would be predictable or not adorned. For example, below is photo of a marking indicating an all gender bathroom that is also accessible for people with disabilities.
The shop windows also serve as a canvases. The picture below of the face on a shop window reminded James of the gargoyle face over the gate to the Festung in Kӧnigstein, but fast forwarded by 5 centuries.
Even apartment building exterior walls can serve as a gigantic canvas for artists. The picture below of street art on an apartment building shows a person diving in slow motion off the top and performing acrobatics on the way down, only to land on their feet at the bottom -- perhaps a metaphor for Berlin itself? This kind of painting requires a considerable amount of time, effort, and equipment (like scaffolding) to make, and isn't something that can be done in an evening while someone watches for the police like many smaller examples of street art.
Sept 26
The plan for the day was to return to our old haunts in Charlottenburg from 2016. The weather wasn't as awful as expected, so we decided to walk more. But first, James sat for a true Berliner hair cut, which seems fairly similar to his usual Supercuts special, but looks a lot more stylish. Unfortunately, he had to pay cash -- Germany can be weird that way. Next, we took the tram and S-Bahn to Charlottenburg. Here's one of the S-Bahn stations.
As we exited the S-Bahn station in Charlottenburg, the memories came flooding back. The S-Bahn bridge, the health food store -- we even walked past our former home on Mommsenstrasse. Then we walked up the Kudamm and, yes, the extra fancy stores are all still there.
At the end, we stopped at the Gedächtniskirche, and looked at both the old church and the new church with it's stunning modernistic stained glass windows. The timing was excellent, as it started raining again just as we were leaving the Gedächtniskirche in the direction of the zoo. So, we decided to end our walk down memory lane, and rode the S-Bahn to the Hackischer Markt for a very nice lunch, and then returned to the Humboldt Forum, where we visited the Asian art museum.
The exhibits provided lots of cultural background, true to Alexander von Humbolt's lifelong fascination with ethnography and many trips of exploration. One could come every day for a week, and there would still be more to explore. We hadn't even had time to visit the Ethnographic Museum! But eventually we left, because we had been planning to use the sauna in the hotel and wanted to warm up before dinner. Because we didn't get the room cleaned every day, the hotel gave us a discount. So, back we went, and the sauna truly didn't disappoint -- the perfect thing to do on a cool and rainy day. After the sauna, we headed out for dinner, then back to the hotel for a krimi, and bed.
The next day, we were off to Hamburg and, 2 days later, we were already on the plane heading home and cherishing the memories of our wonderful adventure!
