What can I say. Berlin was on the top of my list of places to visit whilst in Germany for many reasons but there are 2 that top the list. 1. Cabaret (I know - it definitely gives away my age) and 2. Nick Cave.
We even had it on friendly and wise advice today that if you can't have fun in Berlin then it is completely your fault. I blame food poisoning or some other such terrible affliction that has gotten its claws into GB - who at home is never sick - in the whole 9 years that I have known him has taken exactly 2 sick days off work. It is getting so bad that I am considering taking him to the hospital over here. I will give it another day - and then drastic measures will need to be taken.
So, with my high expectations of perhaps even pushing our relationship to its limits in the capital of Germany, it turns out that it is not going to be the raging party stop of our trip. Will have to leave that to Leipzig or Munich I am guessing.
What are we doing instead - I am torturing GB's constitution by booking us onto walking tours of the city - which only last 4hrs and then it is to somewhere warmer. There is a big difference in the clothes you need to have for standing still and walking in the snow for hours on end to the clothes required for going from one place of warmth to another. Turns out that my new goose down jacket is great and even hot in circumstances of walking 10 mins from one establishment to another but after 3 hours in the cold conditions of the beginning of winter in North Berlin, it could have done with a few more feathers.
Today we visited a concentration camp. Sachsenhausen. We went with the same guide that took our general tour of what I would call the "tourist highlights" of Berlin - What you want to see from a cultural point of view at a really high level. Rob from Manchester who fell in love with Berlin and decided to leave the safe haven of his journalistic career to come to Berlin and write the defining novel of the 20th century. It is my understanding that whilst continuing the noble pursuit of novel writing, bread and butter was required and the tour gig facilitated such. So, we had a very smart english man with a passion for the city and a gift for historical knowledge and statistics give us the short version of the history of Berlin for the past 2 days. I think at the camp today he really shone as an example of tolerance.
We are in a group of 35 people from all over the world that have decided for varying reasons to visit a concentration camp. It was a very strange day. In the first instance I want to berate the people on the tour that seemed to be there just to tick something off their list of things to do in Berlin without really taking in their surroundings. These people posed in group shots with large smiles on their faces in the front of buildings of torture and extermination of fellow humans - it just seems to weird. I could maybe have seen some reason behind it if they were photographers doing something arty with the haunting landscape before them. But it was a complete tourist shot - like they were in front of the Eiffel Tour or something. Rob was informative and at times emotional, which I liked. Not some fact giver who didn't have opinions. I learnt a little about the Nazi movement and a lot about human behaviour.
Even though I have mentioned before how ever present the war here is in Germany - I have felt it greater here in Berlin. Perhaps because of the separation and occupation of East Germany - something that is still felt today in such fundamental things has the public transport system. You can see in the significant and historically important buildings the new and old sandstone/bricks etc clearly defining what was damaged and rebuilt. Bullet holes still in building façades. Being from a country that has not seen this kind of war or destruction, I find it hard to comprehend sometimes.
Tomorrow we are off to a soccer match between Berlin and Frankfurt. And I hope to drag GB's sick arse to a Jazz club afterwards.
NB: the photos are a bit out of whack...
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| Brandenburg Gate obscured by the Christmas tree |
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| The memorial for murdered Jews |
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| Brandenburg Gate, the Christmas tree and us. |
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| This market in Berlin (which has approx 50 of them) is supposed to be the classiest. You even have to buy a ticket for entry into this one. It was ok. |
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| meat |
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| I liked that they put candles all around the snowed on statue |
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| The memorial for murdered Jews - it was very moving to be here and to walk among the columns |
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| The Berliner Dom |
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| Outside of the apartment we had in Berlin |
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| GB at Brandenburg Gate |
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