Screwed by Foreign Holidays...Again

Through the great and benevolent university that is NYU, I spent the last weekend in Berlin. Let me first say that I really enjoy traveling by charter bus. Sure trains are nice but I feel you get a much better chance to experience a country by bus. You also get to see foreign rest stops. It seems only Americans fill theirs with Roy Rogers and Bob's Big Boy. (Italy had near gourmet restaurants) I could go on and share the explanations I've come up with but you are probably more interested in my take on Berlin.

We left Friday morning and made it to Berlin in the early afternoon. After checking in to our rooms, we had a guided tour of Jewish Berlin. We saw the site of the first synagogue, a few memorials, and the rebuilding done by Berlin's current population. It left me feeling rather bizarre, I mean the Holocaust is by no means ancient history. Don't get me wrong I liked Berlin, but I do not want to live there. This was certainly not the opinion of our tour guide, an LA native who had lived in Berlin for 9 years. She was certainly well informed and good natured, she just had a terrible sense of humor and she chose to bring her son along with her. (Hes 5, and named Jonatan, but she calls him Tantan)
That night I went with my room (Dave, Barry, and Dan) as well as Joe, Jared, Alex, and Sarah to a traditional German restaurant. I bravely tried the Hoppel Poppel, coincidentally the only thing on the menu I could pronounce, which was described as being two meats, friend potatos, onions, and eggs prepared in one pan. My blatant disregard for complete knowledge of what I'm eating was rewarded again. The meat was in small chunks as were the potatos and it was all cooked into a giant dinner omelette type thing. I still don't know which meats they were but I don't care (I'm pretty confident they were some form of pork or beef)

Enough on that, Saturday morning started with a trip to the Jewish Musuem (Jewish history being an intentional theme, and one of the reasons I chose Berlin over Vienna or Salzburg) It was designed by the same man who is designing the 9/11 memorial. It had a powerful tower that was an isolating structure made to simulate in some small way life in a concentration camp and it was very moving. As was the memorial garden which feature slanting rows of large pillars. The museum also had a good collection which detailed the history and contributions of Jewish people in Berlin and Germany at large.
We went touring again, with our favorite tour guide and Tantan, to see such highlights as Checkpoint Charlie, and still existing streches of the Berlin Wall. We ended at the Reichstag, the Parliamentary building, and we were able to climbs its glass dome to have a terrific view of the city. Nearby there was bit of a carnival to celeberate the official reunification of East and West Berlin on October 3, 1990. We had some good brats, went on a ferris wheel, and listened to some bad bands performs such classics as "She works hard for her money"

I should say that both nights included consumption of Wodka Gorbachow (w is v in German) and quests for cool bars and clubs each night. I should also mention that with Joe and Jared, we discovered two awesome playgrounds. The latter of which was particularly exciting as it included a small zip line.
Anyway, Sunday morning we went off to see the Wannsee Villa where Hitler and other party members developed the "final solution" for the Jews. It was in a beautiful lakefront neighborhood with winding streets that I'm sure the bus driver enjoyed. Well we walk up to Wannsee and wouldn't you know its closed. Why? Berlin Reunification Day. If any of you remember the title of this post, you'll say didn't you say "again"? Yes I did, earlier in the summer, July 6, to be precise I went to the Czech Embassy in New York to get my visa and it was closed. Why? Jan Hus Day. Its a bad streak, and I intend to be quite cautious on November 5.
We did however get to go to Potsdam, site of the conference which decided the fate of Germany in 1945. We did not have a tour guide but thanks a few pages of info and my vast tour guide experience I was able to show most of the group around, and we all learned some pretty interesting stuff. For example did you know that Stalin was the only head of state to make it to Yalta and all of Potsdam? FDR was dead by then, and Truman was there and Churchill lost an election to Atlee which caused a break in the conference for two days.

I could go on but this post has been long enough, let just say I made it safely back to Prague last night, and learned that the Giants after beating Green Bay are now 3-1.

If anyone is curious, November 5 is Guy Fawkes Day. It is a commemoration of Guy Fawkes who intended to blow up Parliament and King James I in 1605. He intended it be part of an uprising by angry English Catholics.