Berlin
'Twas an excellent long weekend in Berlin. Of course, being in the hotel room for the night by no later than 7:00pm isn't necessarily the preferred way to see a nightlife city like Berlin, but that's our new life so it's not like we really had a choice in the matter. The weather was mostly excellent, the hotel was top-notch (except for the hordes of smokers in the lobby), Baby was in good spirits and did great on the flights, Gretchen got a nice pedicure, we ate well...no complaints.
The thing about Berlin is that it's really not a terribly attractive city (World War II and 40 years of communism in the East took care of that), but it's dynamic and energetic and unlike so many European cities, many of the formative events took place either within our lifetimes or those of our parents so you can really feel it. Anyway, we saw some of the typical Berlin sights like the Brandenburg Gate, the TV tower, the bombed-out-in-WWII Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church, etc.
We thought it might be nice to spend a sunny Sunday at the Zoo (since almost all shops in Germany, like in Switzerland, are closed on Sundays). So we were riding on the U-Bahn in that direction and it dawned on us that almost everyone around us--adults and children--were dressed in costumes. By the time we got to our destination, it had become abundantly apparent that everyone was going to the Berlin Karneval parade. Since that meant that there were basically a million people in the general vicinity of where we wanted to spend a leisurely afternoon, we bailed on the Zoo and instead got lunch at a place with a view of the festivities.
We even managed to stop for a couple of kitschy photos for a stereotypically Bavarian restaurant (which, alas, we didn't eat at):
But more than anything else, we spent a lot of time just hanging out in our comfy hotel room...and that was just fine.
About the only disappointment was that we thought we almost had a brush with fame which, alas, was not to be. It turns out we happened to be there for the final weekend of the big Berlinale film festival, which was taking place all around our hotel. We noticed that there was someone sitting outside our room--which was right next to a suite--around the clock, so Gretchen finally asked what he was doing and he said he was working security. Aha! So who could it be in the suite next to us? Such intrigue! So when the festival was over and we were checking out, we asked who it had been...and it turns out it was just a jeweler who was loaning jewelry (hence the need for security) to celebrities. We thought we might be reading in People magazine about how so-and-so had many sleepless nights in Berlin because of a crying baby in the adjacent room...
The thing about Berlin is that it's really not a terribly attractive city (World War II and 40 years of communism in the East took care of that), but it's dynamic and energetic and unlike so many European cities, many of the formative events took place either within our lifetimes or those of our parents so you can really feel it. Anyway, we saw some of the typical Berlin sights like the Brandenburg Gate, the TV tower, the bombed-out-in-WWII Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church, etc.
We thought it might be nice to spend a sunny Sunday at the Zoo (since almost all shops in Germany, like in Switzerland, are closed on Sundays). So we were riding on the U-Bahn in that direction and it dawned on us that almost everyone around us--adults and children--were dressed in costumes. By the time we got to our destination, it had become abundantly apparent that everyone was going to the Berlin Karneval parade. Since that meant that there were basically a million people in the general vicinity of where we wanted to spend a leisurely afternoon, we bailed on the Zoo and instead got lunch at a place with a view of the festivities.
We even managed to stop for a couple of kitschy photos for a stereotypically Bavarian restaurant (which, alas, we didn't eat at):
But more than anything else, we spent a lot of time just hanging out in our comfy hotel room...and that was just fine.
About the only disappointment was that we thought we almost had a brush with fame which, alas, was not to be. It turns out we happened to be there for the final weekend of the big Berlinale film festival, which was taking place all around our hotel. We noticed that there was someone sitting outside our room--which was right next to a suite--around the clock, so Gretchen finally asked what he was doing and he said he was working security. Aha! So who could it be in the suite next to us? Such intrigue! So when the festival was over and we were checking out, we asked who it had been...and it turns out it was just a jeweler who was loaning jewelry (hence the need for security) to celebrities. We thought we might be reading in People magazine about how so-and-so had many sleepless nights in Berlin because of a crying baby in the adjacent room...
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