Early October - Berlin Wrap Up

Well here's the highlights of the last week and a half in Berlin: -

1. Catch up with locals
We had been given two sources of locals to get together with and on Wednesday night we met with Cara & James, who have been working and studying in Berlin for the last two years. In fact we only just caught them by a few days before they left. We were amazed that they lived only 4-mins walk from our homeswap apartment and we had a lovely time. Cara showed us around her favourite haunts of Friedrichschain including Cafe Asser, GoldFisch bar and a GDR bar. We finally finished around midnight with a quick peek at their soon to be ex-apartment. Cara and James also gave us heaps of suggestions for what to do in the remaining ten days and places to eat, shop. hang out and travel to. Thank guys - a real help.

On Saturday night, we caught up with Hana and Toby for a drink in Prenzlauer Berg (the other area everyone is talking about) and went to Rote Lotte, a pretty cool cafe/ bar where we spent a few lovely hours on a rainy Saturday night. Mark tried a Berlin specialty beer which included Green syrup in it. Like the Capirania the other night, I don't think we need to double up on the drink specialites at this stage!

2. Reichstag
We were given a tip off about the Reichstag being amazing but having to queue up for hours as its free and a great way to view the city on a fine day. The tip off was that if you book lunch you get in straight away and have a private elevator to the top! First class is what I say (I wish) so we enjoyed premier service and had a lovely meal in the Dachgarten Resturant at the top. I've copied a English version review but don't think it was as 'poor' as the Frommers Guide did. I had Deer calf ragout in elderberry sauce with diced apples and celery mash, whilst Mark had roast duck with dumplings and celery tabouli. http://www.frommers.com/destinations/berlin/D43300.html

Just as we exited the resturant (and lucky we'd taken a few pictures beforehand) the rains came. Therefore, we went to tip 3.



Inside Reichstag cylinder & External shot

3. Potsdamer Platz CineStar - English language films
As real cinefiles, it's been weird not seeing anything from three to eight movies a month, barring the flight over (which doesn't really count). We got to see Jim Jarmusch's latest film - Broken Flowers with Bill Murray (another stellar job after Lost in Translation) which also included Sharon Stone & Chloe Sevigny in a small part. http://brokenflowersmovie.com/home.html

4. Our Michelin starred restaurant trip for Germany
On Saturday the Max Mara coat finally came on as we went out to Margaux http://www.margaux-berlin.de/ right on the Unter Den Linden near Bradenburg Tor (equivalent location to Champs-Elysees). Although the menu was in German, our maitre d' was able to describe the dishes in quite good English and we had matching wines. It was a really spectacular meal and lasted 2.5 hours for three courses, an amuse-bouche (savoury before the meal) and a final amuse-bouche (sweet) at the end when we thought we couldn't fit another thing in.



Margaux entree

5. Tiergarten / Berlin Reunification Festival
The same day of the Margaux, we found out it was a 3-day celebration for the 16-yr anniversary of reunification of Berlin and so there was a large festival happening from Brandenburg Tor through the Tiergarten (massive internal parklands) so we strolled through this for about 45-mins after lunch before travelling home for a much-needed lie down.

6. To Market, to market to buy...

Sunday is market day (as is Saturday, Tuesday, Thursday or Friday, depending which market you are referring to) but really it's Sunday. We're talking flea market here. We explored our local flea market last week as mentioned and picked up a few good deals. So we started there again and got some interesting pieces and then went to about 3 more, including the very large Ostbahnhof antique and flea market with over 400 stalls. Didn't end up buying anything at any other markets but an enjoyable day's stroll.

7. Treptower Park

A great recommendation from Cara & James and so close to Friedrichschain is Treptower Park. Originally designed in 1870's but added to by Stalin's forces in 1947 as a monument to the 5000 Russian soldiers who died in Berlin / Germany in WW2. It's truly impressive and full of propoganda but really quite beautiful.

Views of Treptower Park & Stalin memorial

8. Museums - only 170 in Berlin (that shouldn't bee too difficult?)

Trying to pace ourselves, we saw Hamburger Hof (a beautiful old train station which has been converted into the Modern Art museum). It was pretty spectucular and so many different and well-known modern artists featured there (possibly even better than the Tate Modern in London). From there we walked 2kms to Tacheles, a run-down art precinct which has risen again amid grafitti, torn posters and the run down apartments which are rented to artists quite cheaply.

Interior of Hamburger Station Gallery & Artwork

Rear view of Tacheles beer garden

Next stop the daunting Pergamon Museum...

this was truly amazing with lots of very ancient archeological digs from the 2nd and 3rd century as well as excellent reconstructions in FULL SIZE of many ancient landscapes including Turkey, Morroco and Egypt. It's hard to describe but we spent over 2 hours walking around and were very overwhelmed. We had an audio guide again here and this was definitely a great addition and made us appreciate many elements from the history of the 'find', to the stories of the Berlin musueum and archeological teams to the restoration work.

Ishtar Gate and Greek mythology on city walls inside Pergamon

Byzantine city wall, Arabic

Following the Pergamon we went to the Alte National Galerie (Old National Gallery), which is your more traditional 19th century paintings and sculpture, quite beautiful and again with the audio guide, very helpful. We were pleased to see many works from Karl Schinkel who was responsible for much of the NeoClassical architecture in Berlin that survived the War. He was a painter of considerable skill as well as an architect and sculptor! Some people are just too clever.

And finally, last night we went to the Berlin 2004/2005 Web Shorts festival at the Sony Centre. We saw over 50 shorts over 4 hours (two different sessions) and they were spectacular. The first session was a reprise of the 2001-2003 Webcuts highlights and the cinema was fairly empty so we thought --- isn't this supposed to be the happening capital in Europe? By the second session, the 2004-2005, the place was packed to the gills (so much so, that I realised a few people sitting next/ around me still needed a wash). We had a great time and saw so many different types of 3D and computer animation, some really cute, some very abstract, some truly innovative and all amazing. The winners were from America (1st) and Germany (2nd & 3rd). It seems like their prizes were pretty impressive from what the audience reaction was. The did a mix of German and English announcements. It was also being webcasted LIVE over the Internet and they got the winner on the phone from America. http://www.webcuts.org/2005/

We're seeing another three museums on Friday (German Technology Museum, Bauhaus archives and Kunstgewerbemuseum) before we head off to Copenhagen via Schwerin, Wismar, Lubeck and Kiel in Northern Germany.

German Technical Museum (boats, planes, trains & automobiles) & Mark is in heaven

20th C stools at Kunstgewerbemuseum & 80's dining suite

Bauhaus Museum & more tables/chairs from Bauhaus era

Berlin has been a fantastic city and although we wouldn't want to live here (dirty streets with too much dog poo, grumpy Germans and no idea of the language), we could easily spend another 2 weeks exploring all of the museums, art, different shopping, food areas and nightlife (We even missed the circus!).

Oh yes and I was a bit hasty with my last email entry - the weather turned gorgeous - a late Indian summer as they'd say in the States and we had 5 days of 20 degrees. Sorry for jumping to conclusions.