Scott: Let me handle this, I speak better German. Hello!
Truck Driver: Hello!
Scott: [in German] My German is ill, but I can understand on you if the speaking is slowly.
Truck Driver: [in German] German! I have been driving for 14 hours straight and I haven't slept in three days and I am wired on schnapps, benzedrine, and those little chocolate covered peanuts.
Cooper: What did he say?
Scott: He said he's driving, something...
Scott: [in German] Do you know where is Berlin?
Truck Driver: [in German] Berlin? Yes, I know it well. I stabbed a woman in a bar in Berlin. But I am going nowhere near Berlin.
Scott: Berlin!
Truck Driver: [in German] Berlin! I also sexually assaulted a horse in Berlin.
Scott: He's going to Berlin.
Jamie: Awesome.
Truck Driver: [in German] Nowhere near Berlin.
Scott: All right, come on, let's go.
[the group get in the back of the truck]
Truck Driver: [to self, in German] I'll drive this truck off a cliff before I ever go back to Berlin.
-Eurotrip
So, I left it a bit without explaining what was so great about Berlin. Before I start, I have to admit that part of the reason I wanted to go to Berlin is because of that scene from the movie Eurotrip (YouTube link).
I don't know if this is true of everywhere in Berlin, but every restaurant we went to have little superscript numbers on each menu item explaining any potential allergens it might contain. I should have taken a photo, but it's such a great idea. OK, maybe I'm biased, and London did have some restaurants say that an allergy menu could be provided on request. I don't know about any of the French or Italian cities we went to, because my French and Italian isn't good enough.
Also, one thing that Germans are fairly famous for is the Nazis and their involvement in WW2. It feels like Berlin is a city that says, "We're sorry" all over the place. We went on a walking tour of Berlin and got to see a bunch of attractions.
This is a statue in Neue Wache, which was created by an artist who lost her grandson during WW2. It's called Mother and Her Dead Son, and it's supposed to symbolise the pain in doing everything you can to protect someone you love, only it's too late, because they're already dead. Even though the statue is indoors, there's a hole in the ceiling so that it's exposed to the elements, which is meant to represent all the suffering during the war.
This is a monument to the book burning that took place during the war. The book shelves are supposed to be able to hold all the books that were burned at that time. 20,000, I think the number is.
As sad as it is to say, the memorial to the murdered Jews of Europe was one of the most impressive things we saw in Berlin. You can't see all the blocks in that photo, but each block is supposed to represent 1000 Jews that were killed in the Holocaust.
On a happier note, the hotel we stayed at was awesome. A couple of the nights we were there, we had a pianist playing in the lobby. Holy crap. So fancy! Was very nice. We were too cheap to pay for Wifi in our hotel room, so we often went down to the lobby to use the free Wifi. Not really the ideal place to be watching Netflix though, as we were watching House at the time, and some scenes can be quite gruesome. They had a gym as well, so we could make a feeble attempt to try and work off some of the fat we had accumulated in London and Paris. Though we gave up on the last night though, as we decided to try giant 1L beers, and this giant meat platter. Walking back to the hotel (3 minutes away) was a huge struggle.
I also really preferred the clothes in Berlin over the fashion of London and Paris. I did go to Europe with the intention of upgrading my wardrobe, but in the end, didn't buy all that much. We had the misfortune of having 2 public holidays out of the four days we were in Berlin, and they seem to take their public holidays pretty seriously. There was a large shopping centre near our hotel, and all the shops were closed. It was kinda weird, the centre itself was open (not sure why), but every single store was closed. It looked like it was just me and some other confused tourists walking around this ghost town. It's a pity that I didn't get to buy anything, but not a huge loss, not like I can't get similar clothes in Australia.
By far the best thing about Berlin is currywurst. I thought it was a joke at first, we saw a store selling it at the station and I just wrote it off as some stupid fad. But after seeing it again on the way to the hotel, I thought that this must be one of those essential German things that you have to try, so I became determined to have some. So. Delicious.
It's basically sausage with tomato sauce and curry, served with chips. I don't know why it's so amazing, but it is. Just a pile of deliciousness. It's one of the things I want to try making back here.
Although it's an Austrian dish, Berlin is where we discovered Kaiserschmarrn, which is a caramelised pancake, that is broken up into pieces, and we had it served with vanilla ice cream. Also on my list of things to learn how to make.
We didn't get into any bar fights or brawls, everyone seemed really nice in Berlin. Oh! Another thing I forgot to take a photo of. Rather than horse pulled carts, they had a bed-cart, which was pulled by bike. So you can take a tour of Berlin while lying in a bed. We saw one pass us, but there were people in it, so I didn't want to take a photo of them. Another awesome idea.
Oh! And the streets were laid out in grid-style. Which I'm learning from Cities:Skylines is not actually ideal for good traffic management, but there didn't seem to be much of a traffic issue where we were. I love grid layouts, just so nice and neat, and you don't accidentally get turned around because the street you're on curves around in a weird way.
To be honest, I wouldn't mind living in Berlin. I'd probably get super fat from eating currywurst all day long, but I can live with that. MrFodder also really enjoyed being there. The only downside is that neither of us speak German, but it's such a cool sounding language that I wouldn't mind learning that, too. However, not speaking German really wasn't that much of an issue as a tourist. Pretty much everyone we talked to spoke English, and pretty fluent English as well.
Last thing, I promise! Our tour guide talked about how a lot of the buildings in Berlin got their names. And she said they're all pretty straight forward. If you try to guess the name by giving a physical description of it, you'll probably guess correctly. There's a little island called Museum Island, because there are a bunch of museums on it. There is also the Old Gallery, and the New Gallery. I think there was the Red City Hall and the Orange City Hall, or something like that. The naming scheme sounds like something I'd come up with in my town.
