Day 118-122: Berlin, Germany

Thursday, May 13, 2010: Rotterdam, Netherlands

Its hard to believe that its been two months since I boarded the bus in Rotterdam, Netherlands with my exchange pals, Bali and Mateja, to head to Berlin for a long weekend. This was our first trip solo, the three of us, going to another country. We had only been planning this trip for about a month, as we booked the bus tickets around the time my friend Maria from ASC was leaving Tilburg to head back to the U.K. But, as usual, we were eager to escape the confines of Verbs for the weekend and head to a new place full of adventure and new sights!

Our journey began with a train ride to Rotterdam. We met up and headed for Tilburg West to catch our evening train to this northern city in the Netherlands. Rotterdam is known for its tall, industrial buildings and port location. It is a big city, kind of like Atlanta with the buildings and such....of course in Dutchtopia, everything is smaller (and more European-esque!).

Once we got off at the Rotterdam train station, we had a bit of a time finding the way to the Eurolines bus stop. It was hidden behind all the construction fences that boarded the walkways exiting the train station. After asking several "officials" and making a few turn-arounds, we finally saw a sign and followed it to the bus stop. On the way, we stopped for a quick snack at the BK (Burger King!) and had ice cream and coffee before our long journey.

We waited a bit across the straat from the Rotterdam TNT (Post Office) for our bus to come. Finally, just at the time it was supposed to, the bus pulled up ready for us to board. The driver and his assistant helped us with our luggage and gave us baggage tags. We attempted to ask them some questions about the journey, but it appeared they only spoke German. Great. We three were the only ones getting on the bus in Rotterdam. We thought, 'Oh how nice, we'll have the bus all to ourselves'. WRONG! The bus departed Rotterdam and promptly stopped in Den Haag, Amsterdam, and Utrecht before finally heading to Germany!

At Amsterdam Amstel station, the bus filled up! I mean, it was packed! We no longer had our own seats or space to spread out. We had all chosen separate seats at first, so we each got a neighbor in the seat next to ours. Except Mateja, she did have the seat to herself! As it was getting late (probably around midnight) the bus silently and unanimously decided to go to sleep for the night, as the driver took us across the boarder to our German destination.

Friday, May 14, 2010: Berlin, Germany

At 2AM, we were suddenly woken up by the driver who turned on all the lights in the bus and opened the doors for the German police to come on. The police (who I swear were quite frightening and reminded me of the Nazis) walked up and down the aisle of the bus checking everyone's passports. Mateja and Bali's passports were scrutinized quite heavily, but mine was just glanced at. It was quite an intense

process, really, especially at 2 in the morning!

Our next stop was at 4 in the morning for a bathroom break. Bali slept through this, but Mateja and I ventured off the bus for a few minutes to stretch our legs, fill our water bottles and use the toilet. After debating whether or not to pay for the bathroom, we managed to get in (whether legally or illegally is another story) and used the restroom before heading back to the bus. At this point, I had decided I was not getting much rest this trip, with all the interruptions and uncomfortableness in between. I was thankful when the bus pulled into the Berlin bus station at 8AM, an hour-and-a-half earlier than we had anticipated!

The girls and I disembarked the vehicle (looking a little worse for the wear after spending all night on a bus!), glad to be standing again! We retrieved our luggage from the bottom of the bus and found our way inside the bus station to the counter where we asked about local bus transportation and Berlin public transit passes. We bought cards for each day that allowed us unlimited bus and metro travel. This was a great deal, as we used the public transit a ton in Berlin!

We took two buses according to the directions the hostel had e-mailed us to get to Jet Pak Eco Hostel. We had chosen to stay here due to its inexpensive price, good ratings and availability. We got off the second bus and followed our walking directions which took us down a long neighborhood street back into the woods. We followed a dirt trail until we came to the quaint, cozy wooden cottage that was Jet Pak. We rang the bell at the front door and were greeted by the friendly woman that runs the hostel and her son. They were so nice and helped us get all checked in and paid. Since our room was not ready, we asked the woman if there was somewhere we could rest for a few hours at the hostel before heading out for the day. She showed us to the common area where we each chose a couch and zonked out for about two hours. We really needed some rest after our restless night on the bus!

We got up shortly before noon and got changed and freshened up to hit the city! We checked with the woman at the desk about buses from the hostel to the city and she recommended taking X10 to the Zoo in order to get to where we wanted to meet the group for our free walking tour of the city. We took the bus and barely made it in time to catch up with the tour group that was meeting in front of Dunkin Donuts to take the metro over to East Berlin to the main tour starting point (in front of a Starbucks!).

We arrived at our tour starting point and happened to run into one of Bali's friends from Singapore who was also studying abroad in the Netherlands (in Maastricht). Small world! We segregated into smaller tour groups, as there were so many people there for the free tour! Basically how it works is there is a guide that spends about 3-4 hours walking you around the city and explaining history, monuments and sights as well as answering any questions. At the end of the tour, you are allowed to tip the guide for his or her service. Its a really nice thing, as its a great and inexpensive way to see a city!

Avril (from Ireland) was our tour guide. She took us all over the city, from the Brandenburg Gate, to the Holocaust Memorial, to Hitler's Bunker, to Museum Island. We saw just about everything in just under 4 hours! It was so interesting, and I really learned a lot. One of my favorite (although emotionally challenging) parts of the tour was seeing the remainders of the Berlin Wall. It was not quite as tall or threatening as I had expected, but it was such a neat piece of history to see in person.

About halfway through the tour, we stopped at a local espresso bar for snacks and coffee. It was pretty chilly outside (although midway through May!) so we each got a cup of warm coffee and something to eat since we hadn't really had lunch. We wound around until we got back near where we had started. We thanked Avril and gave her a tip before heading out on our own to explore the city.

Once we left the group, we walked past a small market, and being the shoppers that we are, we decided to stop and take a look. We saw some really nice and interesting things. It was fun to go to a market in Berlin and note the differences between it and some of the past markets we had been to. After finishing up at the market, we did some more shopping in the main city area and stopped at the Dunkin Donuts so that I could get a picture with the place of my former employment!

After roaming around and shopping, we were all quite hungry! We began searching for an inexpensive place to eat that we could all agree upon, and came across a small Vietnamese hole-in-the-wall restaurant. We chose to stop here for some supper and were sure glad we did! I had a delicious dish of fried rice, and the girls really enjoyed their yummy meals as well. With our bellies full, we headed back to the hostel for the evening to get some proper rest and move into our room.

We arrived back at the hostel to find that we had roommates! Everyone was friendly, and we all got ready for bed. We were surprised at the shower situation in the hostel....the doors to the showers were quite translucent and there was no curtain or door to cover them! It was basically like taking a shower totally exposed to anyone who walked into the bathroom! Just a bit awkward! We did our best to use our towels as a shade while we quickly showered and got ready for bed. We checked our mail on the internet and headed to bed for the night!


Saturday, May 15, 2010: Berlin, Germany

The next morning we meant to wake up early to get a good start on the day, however, the weather had other plans for us. When we saw the drizzling rain outside our window in the room, we decided to sleep in a bit and catch up on some of the rest we had missed the previous day. Once we got up, we had a small, but enjoyable breakfast at the hostel consisting of cereal, coffee and toast with all kinds of spread. We were just thankful that breakfast was included, as we had not read that it was on the internet and thought that we would have to get our own. Bali graciously braided my hair and we headed out for the day, again taking the  bus.

Our first stop was within walking distance, just down the main street a few blocks. We found our way out of the woods surrounding the hostel and managed ourselves around the puddles, past the McDonald's to the Allied Forces Museum. This was a really intriguing tribute to the American, Soviet, French and British forces that occupied Berlin and Germany during the tense years of war and division. We roamed the musuem for quite a while, taking note of many of the artifacts and maps that the museum had on display.

After we had our fill, we boarded the bus 115 to get on M-29 which took us to one of the main shopping districts. Since it was raining and quite cold outside, we didn't mind the amount of time we were spending on the buses this morning. Plus, it was a great inexpensive way to see the city from the top of the double-decker bus. We lounged and enjoyed the ride, watching the Berlin sights pass by us and noting things we wanted to go back and see.

We arrived at the stop the woman at the hostel had told us to get off at and began looking for somewhere to eat! In just a few minutes, we came across a little restaurant that had a nice menu and good prices. We decided to eat here and headed inside. We thawed out and looked over the menu before placing our order. I had a delicious pasta, fungi tortellini, complete with yummy mushrooms and a delicious sauce. I also ordered a Berliner Weisse, which is a special kind of beer unique to Berlin itself! It was really nice, considering I am not a big beer drinker. We had heard about it the day before on our tour from Avril. She said it was a good thing to try while in Berlin. And it was definitely worthwhile! We paid (after an issue with Mateja dropping her coin in her drink) and headed out to enjoy the rest of the afternoon.

After lunch we did some shopping in Orangeplaats and followed our map around to Oberbaumbrucke, a really cool bridge that we had circled earlier to visit. We had to hop on the metro a stop or two to get down to the bridge, as it was such a long walk and super cold outside. The bridge was really fascinating, and quite a neat thing to see!

We rounded the corner heading back the way we came and came across the East Side Gallery. This consists of remnants of the former wall that divided the city for so many years and was finally torn down in 1989 during the Velvet Revolution. This portion of the wall has become a preserved piece, as various artists have depicted scenes on words on large chunks of the wall. We walked down the whole thing just in awe of the amazing work on the wall running parallel to us. I think I took at least fifty pictures of the thing, as each work of art had its own story and was very unique.

After we finished at the gallery, we were just about out of energy for the day. Cold, tired and wet, we made our way to the large train station across the street and boarded the metro to wherever it would take us. We decided to get off at Alexanderplatz, another prominent area in Berlin that feature some great shopping. Although it was swarming with tourists, we made our way through the area to the large indoor shopping mall, which felt like heaven as we entered! It was so nice to be out of the cold and rain! We ambled around inside the shopping center for a bit, which felt quite like being in a mall in America, and stopped at the food plaza for dinner. We each got a bite to eat at the Mexican place...I had a quesadilla, which made me super eager for Taco Bell once I got back to the states!

We made our way back outside into the cold and headed down towards the train station, stopping along the way for our evening cup of Joe. We decided to stop at Dunkin Donuts so that the girls could try their coffee, as we had not had the chance to do so the day before. Bali and I sipped coffee and I enjoyed a maple frosted. The girls also wrote out postcards to friends and family to mail...I was rubbing off on them!

We decided to squeeze in one final sight-seeing opportunity for the evening before heading back to the hostel, as it was only about 9 o'clock at this point. We headed down to the Reichstag, which we had been told to make sure we saw while in Berlin. We queued up, but were not in line too long before we were told by one of the workers that due to our placement in the long line, we would most likely not get in that night.

Disappointed, we decided to vacate our place in line and come back the next morning. We headed back to the bus stop for our journey home, which should have been two bus rides long, but ended up being four, since one of the buses randomly stopped somewhere we had not anticipated and closed it service for the evening. Typical! We made it back and hit the sack for the night, after another tiring day!

Sunday, May 16, 2010: Berlin, Germany

On our final day in Berlin, we decided to squeeze in everything we had not done so far. This meant an early morning and quick breakfast at the hostel before heading straight to the bus stop to hit the city. We went first to the Reichstag again, where we had to get in the long queue again and wait patiently for our turn to get inside. We chatted and messed about with my Ipod while in line before finally being let in. It was well worth the wait, as we ascended a round ramp all the way up the dome, giving us an incredible view of the city. We were able to see many of the sites that we had seen already on foot from this vantage point. We enjoyed the top for a bit before heading back down.

Just around the corner through the Brandenburg Gate, we came to another Dunkin Donuts and stopped here for a mid-morning snack and coffee. This time, Mateja tried a coffee and I had a nice chocolate kreme donut with my iced coffee (call me crazy for drinking iced coffee on a cold day if you insist!). We enjoyed our small taste of America before heading out to brave the cold again. The weather was actually better than it had been the day before, so we were more willing to be outdoors!

We hopped on the S-bahn to a particular market on the other side of town that Bali had read about and heard about from the woman at the hostel. It turned out to be rather disappointing, as it was mostly second-hand things people were selling from their homes (a.k.a. junk!), but the adventure of finding it and the things we saw along the way made up for its lack of appeal. We walked through some of the surrounding town to another market, the Aktano Market.

Afterward, we headed down a few blocks to find this place called the Winebag, where we were told that we could sample various kinds of wine. We did find the place we were looking for, but it was not so about the wine. Turned out, they only had certain times for wine tasting, that did not include when we were there! So we headed back across the road to a small restaurant selling pizza squares for some lunch. We enjoyed a yummy Italian meal and each got a small box to take some of our leftover pizza with us for a snack later on the bus.

We boarded the S-bahn again to visit the Tiergarten Market, which turned out to be interesting, selling buttons, dishware, and a multitude of other household items. Bali picked up some pretty clasps before we were on our way back to the metro. We headed back to the hostel via the Zoo where we stopped in the main shopping area and went to Movenpick for an ice cream cone (since according to Arlette, it is not holiday without at least one ice cream!). We then boarded a bus and reached the hostel in time to retrieve our luggage and head straight back where we had come from to get back to the Berlin Eurolines bus stop (ZOB).

We waited in the lobby for a bit before it was time to board the bus that would take us back to Rotterdam. It was another restless night on the way back, where Mateja and I shared a seat and studied together for a bit for our upcoming Dutch exam.

Altogether, the trip to Berlin was great! Although the weather was less than desirable, we managed to have a great time and see so many things! I was amazed by the history of the city and thankful that we went on the guided tour our first day to familiarize ourselves with the landscape and also to remind us of the story behind the place we inhabited for three days. It was an eye-opening trip, as this was one of the few places I went in what might be considered Eastern Europe. Quite different than the Netherlands,  although quite a great city. I would love to go back and visit someday, especially with my travel buddies, Bali and Mateja!