Berlin '11

[msw-berlin]

How marvelous it is to do nothing and then to relax from doing nothing

Ok let's see.  Monday we gave the zoo presentation and it went very well, the pictures are a lot of fun.  I'm having a really hard time remembering what we did in the afternoon though...oh!  right!  Neris and I skipped the 4th theater lecture because of the Jewish museum.  However, on our way there we got distracted with shopping and I now finally own a light coat (which should be very handy in Switzerland).  The bottom floor was very nicely done and the "void" spaces had a great feeling to them.  Espeially that one on the second floor where you step on metal faces.  However, the top floor was a little bit stupid and way too long.  It clearly had been created to be "kid friendly", but it attempted to tell all of Jewish history.  I especially felt the endless nature of this top floor because Neris read every single thing (about every little bitty sign or whatnot).  We ended up leaving around 8 or 8:30.  We got groceries and checked her internet so we finally got home around 9:30-10.  Jen was having a birthday party (21st, it started at 8:30), but we were too tired to go.  It was also cold and raining, apparently a very common weather for Berlin summers.  

Then Tuesday we went to the Deutschen Bundestag.  It was very hot waiting outside and the tour of the inside was dreadfully boring.  The dome was nice though, it made me feel like I'd kept my promise to dad.  After we got ice cream and went to a beach bar where I talked with Jen and Christopher until we went back sleepily to Sewanstr.  

Yesterday, I walked along Unter den Linden looking for gifts on my way to the green park in front of the Bundestag.  Turns out its Berlin's Fashion Week.  I got the little crossing men liquors for Jennifer and Cynthia and decided on buying a cheap bag from Aldi or Käsers if my stuff doesn't fit.  I then read in the park from 4-6:30.  It was a very hot day so I kept moving where I was on the grass-moving from shade to sun to shade and away from crazy people.  We met for the opera at 7:15.  Lady Macbeth is one of the strangest things I've ever seen.  Apparently sometimes it is done very crudely (as there is a lot of crude subject matter), but this bad moments of utter strangeness.  The best example of this were the three men who never sing but seem to manipulate things.  They had long red dreadlocks, long black leather trench coats with a slit up the back, knee pads, and black leather underwear with a giant cup.  During one set change, they snuck across the stage, hiding themselves by widening the trench coat and crouching low.  This allowed the audience to only see their leather butts and pale legs sticking out the slit in the back.  One very nice thing about this opera building is that the subtitles are displayed on the chair in front of you with the choice of German, English, or off.  We had pretty crappy seats but there weren't that many people there so we just moved to some very nice unoccupied ones.  Afterwards, Jakab and Joseph went drinking, but Neris and I went back to Sewanstr; it was 12:15 by the time we got back.  

So far it has been a very sleepy day.  Theoretically it's the last day of class which is strange to think about-yay packing lists!  I wish I were spending more time in Lenzburg since I'm gone three of the days with my Eurorail pass.

[msw-berlin]

10319 Berlin

Everyone else is working on their projects so I figure it is the perfect time to update this journal.  

Friday was actually a little bit sad as Neris and I unintentionally left during intermission of threepenny opera-which had a very beautiful staging.  We went back to Tierpark, got groceries, and went to bed.  

Saturday I woke up kind of early and cleaned the apartment, I couldn't deal with waiting for Neris to do her part.  I went to go meet Joseph at the bunker museum but on the way I realized I didn't know where it was nor did I have my phone with me.  I finally went into NH hotels and they told me where it was but that there were no more openings for this weekend.  When I went in, they said there was no reservation for Joseph Henry.  It turns out he reserved next Saturday instead but they let us go since we were there.  It turned out to be a pretty cool exhibit of space and light.  After we went to another museum whose exhibit, it turned out, was cannibalism.  He also had a very strange, personal collection that included a shrunken head from South America and a series of grotesque cartoons with exploding fingered women and babies being ejaculated on...it was actually disgusting.  Afterwards we parted ways: he and Jakab went to a concert while I went back and Neris and I had an early night so we would be up bright and early for the Unterwelt mauer tour.  

That was this morning!  It happened to be with the same man who leader the flak tower tour.  I think I enjoy his tours because he is so good at telling stories.  This was a longer two hour tour so afterwards we all came back and Jakab and I slowly started to work on our zoo presentation.  I think it might be too short but the pictures will certainly be entertaining as we have included photos of Neris and Joseph at the zoos.  Hopefully we wont actually have to present this in front of the entire group-I would much rather do our Ei or Threepenny opera skits.  As we worked, people have been slowly accumulating in the living room.  Luckily a large group just left to get dinner so its finally a little bit peaceful here.  Unfortunately I have finished my books for now (although I keep forgetting about Sherlock Holmes) and finished writing all my postcards.  I have no idea what I'm going to get people for souvenirs...sometimes I understand why Alex got me that stupid heart bear.  I wonder i he would have any recommendations...things to ask earlier in the trip.  I still haven't gone to the Jewish Museum which is the main place I've known I've wanted to go to.  Hopefully this will be remedied tomorrow if Neris' and David's surveys don't take too long to complete.  

[msw-berlin]

At night take Bus N50

Conclusions: I am terrible at writing consistently.  I am definitely going to forget some things as it has been over a week since I last wrote anything here...oops.  In my defense, this is the first lecture I've had since then.  That was the lecture before the visit to the Pergamon.  Jakab and I went on a fast tour and then judged people from the steps (jenim dumpers, foax Asian couple).  

Then Thursday was the bike tour.  Two bikes crashed within the first five minutes.  It is also not much fun to ride in such a large group of people of people as we were never going fast enough nor long enough to get our balance.  We picked up the tour guide and he took us to a construction site that used to be a soccer field.  It took us a while to realize we'd lost half the group at the first red light, and by the time they got there, it had started to pour (but the guide didn't seem to notice and kept talking with waterproof little pictures).  

Friday we went to the train station and bought tickets for the next day as well as our various trips home.  (I think).  We then met the group at Alexanderplatz to go to a Stazi prison,, which was actually a very interesting depressing building.  Afterwards, Jakab, Joseph, and I went out to eat and ended up getting happy hour cocktails.  Mine was way too strong and Jakab got a "Swimming Pool" which pretty much tasted like coconut.  

Saturday we left the apartments at 6:40am (so we had an early night Friday) and we saw Novia (in sweatpants and flats) with an older guy (in a Metallica sweatshirt).  She was the topic of conversation many times throughout the day.  We had to take the slow local trains because the others bought a happy weekend pass so we got to Dresden around 11.  The Fraukirche was closed so we took lots of fun photos of each other and the outside architecture on our way to a quaint lunch place (well off the beaten path).  We went to a large museum and Emily, Jakab, and I played the fire game while we sat a lot.  We then went to another part of Dresden for coffee but we stayed there for so long that it became cocktails and dinner as well.  After going home, we rejoined at midnight to attempt to get into Bergheim.  We forgot that the gay-pride parade happened that day and the main party was happening in Bergheim so only Emily and Joseph got in.  The rest of us went home feeling a little down.  

Sunday we went to Mauerpark and I got a very pretty watch-necklace with an owl decal.  

Monday was the art workshop, which pretty much means they gave us art supplies and we went home and drew instead of studying.  

Tuesday was the test which was ok (67%).  

Wednesday was the group picnic.  Joseph and I bought California "Golden Gate" wine.  I wore my hat.  After the picnic, Jakab, Neris, and I went to the zoo as Jakab and I are presenting on the zoos as our final project.  

Thursday we went on a "unterwelt" tour of one of the blown up tours that would shoot down planes bombing Berlin during WWII.  It was such a good tour that Neris and I are planning on going on another on Sunday.  

Tonight we are going to threepenny opera.  I'm excited.  I should also take better notes on highlights of each day so this can be slightly less depressing and I can fit no more than two days onto one page...  Well damn, now I need to find something else to do for the next half hour of lecture...

[msw-berlin]

What are you some kind of animal?!

Well clearly I'm doing a terrible job of keeping up with journal entries so I wrote a list of the things I've done the past few days in the hopes that I wont neglect anything.  

Friday (the 17th I think) was filled with the play (which I wrote about briefly).  After the play we went to Joseph and Jakab's for tea, but there were so many people there that we left early.  

On Saturday we went to Potsdam.  The tour was mainly via bus with occasional stops: a beautiful palace, a park with a windmill, and a government information building.  The palace had a wonderful room called the "grotto" room because it felt like part of an underwater palace.  We had lunch and ice cream at the train station as it kept sporadically raining.  That night Joseph and Jakab came over (separately as Joseph came originally to do his laundry and Jakab came because he thought Joseph and ditched him) and everyone learned how to play "Up the River, Down the River".  

Sunday Neris went to spend time with her Turkish friend (even though it was raining terribly) so I cleaned around the apartment while I waited for Jakab and Joseph to wake up.  When there was nothing left to clean, I borrowed Neris' sneakers and went for a run.  There is actually a very nice park near us and I enjoyed running without a sense of monotony I'm used to when running.  Finally the boys woke up and we eventually decided on going to the Tierpark for fear of bad weather.  The park is quite nice (although €9 to enter!).  Unfortunately a great deal of the animals were deer of some variation or another.  While looking for lunch, we happened upon a Schloss in the middle of the zoo where apparently opera oncerts are held.  I ended up making tortellini at their apartment and we all had dinner together after which I taught them hearts which they thoroughly enjoyed.  We ended the night by watching Arrested Development during which Neris came home.  

Monday was a rather depressing day.  During class my pen broke so I got ink everywhere so I could not update this journal during the extremely boring lecture.  We tried to see a museum in Hitler's bunker but it is only open on weekends.  We wanted to by a ticket to an underground adventure but we got there at 4:05 and the office closed at 4:00.  At least we were successful at FriedrichStr. in that I got the next two books in the magician's guild series and Joseph got stamps and sent his postcards.  When we met back up with Neris and her new Turkish friend, she wanted to go to Humboldt for internet so we decided to stop at the Guggenheim museum but it is reopening in July.  Although my internet worked at Humboldt, Neris' computer was out of batteries so she went looking for a plug.  The rest of us went home and I took off my nails before the boys came over to play cards.  And finally we are to yesterday (i'm writing this during the Pergamon Museum lecture).  

Yesterday (tuesday) had a rough start as I had silenced my alarm by accident.  I only had time to grab a baguette before high tailing it to the U-bahn.  For lunch we went to a falafel place (so more bread for me).  Jen, Jakab, and I went shopping on FriedrichStr. which mainly amounted to us shopping at H&M.  However we did find one shop that had dirndls in the window.  The saleswoman watched us carefully as we were saddened by the outdoorsy clothes that we found but we went upstairs in the hopes that the dirndls would be there.  Luckily for us, they were.  This saleswoman also watched us suspiciously but only because (as it turned out) she was afraid we would take pictures in them and she clearly loved them.  They were so beautiful and so out of my price range (€60 for the blouse and €219 for the cheapest dress and apron set).  The saleswoman tied our aprons for us: Jen's on the single side and mine on the taken/married side (since I had a male friend...?  a gay male friend?).  Afterwards we went back to Sewanstr. and I read my book for hours.  Neris convinced me not to go out to Fete dela Musik but now I regret not going.  

Amazingly, this has not taken a full hour to write, alas, I am five minutes short.  This woman is a little boring; I like the regular teacher more.  We went on a park scavenger hunt today, and we will have a test on tuesday-I have a lot of vocabulary to learn before then (stupid prepositions).  May the museum be interesting today.  Bicycling tomorrow!  Everyone is falling asleep...

[msw-berlin]

Password: gwq+u5dl

Waiting for Godot was a really well done play.  they spoke very quickly so I understood very little but the acting (especially of the older man) was superb.

[msw-berlin]

Cell Phone Number: 0151 43527877

So I've been very bad at keeping up with the journal entries as I've been so tired at night.  let's see if I can remember everything (I'm writing during the Waiting for Godot seminar).  Well, Wednesday we went grocery shopping again (in fact we've gone grocery shopping everyday).  The afternoon activity was a campus tour so we had lunch at the mensa.  The lady was quite grumpy at having to deal with all the foreigners who didn't know how to use the card system-she had to sell us all cards we didn't understand the purpose of.  The tour itself was very boring but showed us the computers and library.  Although Neris, Joseph, and I got a coffee first, we decided to try our hands at finally checking the internet.  It didn't work.  We're still not sure why the user codes didn't work but even the computer help guy had no idea how to help us.  Neris and I were very tired so we went home and watched Osmosis Jones.  (Wir haben Osmosis Jones gesehen, weil wir so müde aren).  Then yesterday (the 16th) was a very long day.  It was our first day with "free time".  First we went to the bookstore where I got another magician book and the first Harry Potter in German.  Then we went back to the mensa because the meeting point for a beach volleyball trip was the main foyer.  Beach volleyball was a bit of a flop so we got groceries and took Jakab to the cell phone store.  Oh!  I forgot about the cell phone store!  Neris and I finally got around to getting cellphones/sim cards.  We picked a random station that we knew was in the turkish part of the city.  We found a donner shop and she asked them (in Turkish) where the cheapest/best place to buy cell phones would be.  He directed us to a great store where I got a cellphone and sim card for €21.  It was a great deal so we told Jakab about it, but when we went back to the store with him there was a German working there instead of a Turkish guy so it was not as good an experience.  On our way back to Sewanstr. we ran into Matt who invited us to go with them to a bar later in the night.  First we went the wrong way on the train because night train schedules are so strange.  Then we started walking aimlessly in the hope of finding something (and it started sprinkling).  We happened upon one of the great clubs in Berlin (matrix), but the line was really long so we believed the people net door that it was another entrance.  The club (not matrix) was almost entirely empty except for a group of creepy guys who watched our group.  Also, our first drinks were almost straight orange juice with just a touch of vodka...it was terrible.  But then things picked up and I had a great time.  Getting home was another adventure but we managed to catch the last S-bahn at 1:32 and then the last bus-->we were left just across the street from our beloved homes.  I also now have a towel of a sort-a bathrobe from Aldi.  Ah well, it will suffice.  Hopefully tonight will be fun too-no clubs though.

[msw-berlin]

username: wlanuser 164

I forgot to write last night as it was a busy, fun day.  Meeting everyone was slightly stressful-it's hard for me to talk to people who don't know English as my German isn't that good.  Luckily, I didn't actually have to take the language placement test-it was the same test I took online so a group of us were able to have lunch break from 11:30-2.  As expected, I'm in the easiest level of classes.  The class is a strange mixture of too easy and way over my head.  Mainly, I know the grammar but I know very little useful vocabulary.  Neris and I went shopping again after class for cheese and ham (which we had for dinner while watching some strange surfing cartoon).  Before that though, we went on another boat tour.  It was fun chatting with everyone, although there are very clearly language divisions amongst people.  I'm mainly close to the English speakers... After dinner we (Neris and I) went and visited Joseph and Jakab and we had some tea.  It was quite fun although we left at midnight which was a little bit too late since we have to wake upat 7:30 this morning.  They live on a floor without an elevator so we used the stairs to leave but we went down too many and found overselves trapped in the basement.  Then as we walked back to our apartment building, four people came out of the woods with beers. They were perfectly harmless but we were laughing and nervous already.  All in all, a pretty good first day if I do say so myself (and I do!).

[msw-berlin]

U-Bahn Station: Tierpark

Today was a very long day.  This morning, mom and I went for breakfast in Charlottenberg.  It was a beautiful cafe in the backyard of an old villa and a darling little girl (about one year) was sitting next to us.  Unfortunately we were quite a long walk from Schloss Charlottenberg, long enough that we stopped for cold drinks.  The Schloss was nice if a bit long and boring so I eye-flirted with one of the museum guards.  Imagine my surpirse when he found me at the end of the tour and slipped his phone number into my hand (not that I have a telephone with which to call him anyways).  Once we got back to the hotel it was time for my departure and I packed up all my stuff and headed to the Tierpark.  My lovely roommate was at the apartment which was good because I got the key stuck in the lock.  We then headed out to get essential groceries (like soap for dishes, toilet paper, and cereal).  She was supposed to meet her friend at the fair at 6:30 but we left the store at 6:35.  We finally made it down at 8:20, but all the little shops were closing up and the parties were gone because of work in the morning.  Fun/handy things we have in common: don't like beer, never smoked-don't want to, only nuetragena face products, same toothbrush (different colors).  All in all, a good day.  Unfortunately, my feet are too sore for me to be worried about tomorrow.

[msw-berlin]

App. 1441 Sewanstraße

Today we went and checked into the program and my apartment.  The German was a little bit overwhelming but the subway trip was pretty easy.  My roommate arrived while we were getting started.  She's from Turkey and she learned German for nine years..and then hasn't practiced it college...but still.  She's 20 and in med school (the timing of upper level schools is different here).  I think we will get along quite well-luckily for me she is also fluent in English.  The apartment has two bedrooms that look in to a little park, a warm bathroom, and a tiny kitchen that shares a countertop with the nice living room (we even got a tv!).  There's also a balcony-she was surprised that it has a sort of netting all around it to keep the birds from getting in.  Hopefully at some point we'll take some chairs out there-especially if the nice weather holds!  She also has exciting plans to go to Hamburg or Amsterdam some weekend-it would be fun and I do need to use my Europass.  Then we parted ways and mom and I checked out Alexanderplatz, had a nice lunch, and went to a truly terrible museum-even she thought the art was bad.  At least I have a student discount.  We meandered through a quaint street fair but there wasn't anything worth buying except for some stunning coats that I would never have occasion to wear.  I should probably find internet soon so I can tell people I'm alive.  I think mom only texted Cynthia yesterday.  Hopefully we aren't causing too much worry.  Seeing the apartment and talking with her made me a lot less nervous about the days to come.

[msw-berlin]

This belongs to Morgen Warner

Today was our second day in Berlin (mom and mine).  We slept in late (well 6 o'clock for me but we didn't leave till 10) because of our long day yesterday.  We had hoped to go into the main government building's dome as it is a fun glass structure with a sort of spiral leading up inside it, but we found out upon arrive that you have to get a reservation 2-4 days in advance although Tuesday is already booked because of the holiday on Monday.  It really is too bad that mom's only trip to Berlin has two days of closed museums and such.  But we were not disheartened so we ventured across the river to the Hamburger Bahnhof which has become a modern art gallery.  I don't particularly enjoy modern art but the spaces were quite beautiful, especially the main hall that was filled with circles (a piece called Berlin Circles I believe).  We had lunch at the museum's cafe.  Unfortunately we ate inside but when we came back for desert we sat outside and discovered it was on the river-very nice until it began to drizzle on us after appearing to be a beautiful summer day.  Almost the complete opposite of yesterdays weather.  I can't seem to find my camera...hopefully it will reappear.  Hopefully I remember to keep writing, even if it is the most droll account of this trip, I am so bad at continuing journaling and the like.  Ah well.