santana

santana is playin in our hostel lobby. the music here has been diverse. from hard had metal to peter paul and mary, and pretty much everything in between. oh, berlin!

berlin. our first real day in berlin we rose at a reasonable hour, not too early and not too late, and breakfasted here in the hostel lobby. not half bad for three euro. then a wander to alexanderplatz, a fairly busy and hip part of berlin. we grocery shopped and wandered. natalya found shoes for her mom. it was lovely. we sat and snacked while watching a man make giant bubbles in the middle of hackeshermarket. those same bubbles were chased and popped by two small small boys with that small small boy sort of unbalanced run.

at three we stood at the appropriate place to go on a walking tour. our guide was heather. we loved heather. HEATHER! WE LOVE YOU! heather was and is a young girl from pennsylvania with a masters in german history who has fallen in love with berlin, and now lives here in between masters and phd years. she is rosy-cheeked and has a mouth that reminds me of alison pelensky's. the tour was somewhere around 3 and a half hours, and we saw many important berlin sights including checkpoint charlie, the wall, the reichtstad, etc. heather was wonderful and knew lots. natalya and i spent a lot of time up front with her while we walked asking her questions about moving to europe, property in berlin, her favorite berliner habits, etc. can't say it enough. heather was great. we asked her, near the end of the tour, where she would recommend we eat, and she told us of her favorite restaurant which happened to be very near our home base. perfect! we were right tuckered and hungry by the time we sat down in the cute litte (fairly packed) restaurant. our waitress was small and had very finely toned arms. we ordered two pints. we ordered two entrees, both heather's suggestions, and shared the two. the food arrived. we didn't say much for about 4 minutes. then the food was gone, and we could talk again. it. was. awesome. we were full. oooof. still, we figured we hadn't done much eating out, so we had best do it right. so we ordered a coffee panacotta and a bottle of sparklin wine. we left so full we could hardly breathe. back at the hostel we decided to have one more beer before bed. we chatted and laughed, and when i went to the washroom natalya got us jagermeiser shots. Oh! Jokes!

we were attempting to take a self protrait photo of us with the shots, a girl came along and offered to take it for us, and ould we like to join her at her table. she gestures to the table behind us with many a young person with beer. we do join them. they are mostly canadians. a few australians. let's see how many names i can remember!

lindsey. boy. from clagary. living in montreal. very nice fellow.
mike. from montreal. with his girfriend. who's name i can't remember.
brett and brennan. australians. funny boys. a bit young and uncouth, but harmless. brett is being stalked by a young german girl. he is terrified. it is funny.
chris. oh, dear young thing! british. very nice fellow too. he and brett tried to explain cricket to me.
kirk. toronto i think? or something like that.
erin. girl. australian. kind eyes and smile.

that's all of them i think. we hung out and drank and laughed, and agan were fast friends in the way you are in a hostel. a group of them are sitting just to my right as i right this. brett has just run away to hide as the german girl is wandering about. funny.

next day! again a reasonable get up. not too early not too late. two boys from australian have taken up the empty beds in our room, and we meet them at breakfast, and they decide to join us on our trek out to the concentration camp north of the city. they are tim and adam. tim makes swimming pools and adam makes jewelery. he is apprentacing and everything. they are friendly and nice and we are happy to have them along on the 45 minute s bahn ride. there are many jokes.

we also encounter a british couple who have seen more of both canada and australia than the four of us combined. they help us not miss our train switch. we like them.

it is hot and blustery when we reach the camp. we are thirsty and tired. which seems appropriate, and feel guilty even thinking about complaining about it. we get the personal audio guides and spend the next few hours walking the grounds and looking and thinking. it is a difficult experience, but a good one. i am glad and quite exhausted when we leave.

after a rest and a clean up we head for the deustche oper berlin. a newish work is being performed. sung in german. subtitled in german.

where do i begin to explain this opera? well. first off. i haven't got even the smallest incling as to what it was about. sometimes i would come up with something that seemed rather reasonable, but then theyd throw in something completely insane, and i'd be lost again. it was certainly visually stunning though. breakdown:

NO! i only have 5 minutes of internet left. this will have to wait!!!!!!