Berlin

For the past several days, Guy and I have been traipsing about the city of Berlin, Germany. From Utrecht to Berlin it takes about six and a half hours by train to get there, assuming all goes smoothly. On the way there it was just that; smooth, easy, fun even. 

Berlin was much different from what I was expecting pre-arrival. Having done very little research before our adventure, this is not terribly surprising. For one, the city is gigantic. It is about 554 square miles, compared to New York's 302, and LA's 501. However, even though it is nearly two times as large as the biggest apple, its population is less than half. This means that one of my first impressions of the city was that it feels very empty. Guy and I did a (very) significant amount of walking during our time there and it didn't seem to matter what location, nor what time of day it was, there were the same amount of people walking around. There was the same lack of bustle at 4am as there was at 4pm. Not to say the streets were deserted, just that they definitely lacked a certain energy that I'm used to. Additionally, all the buildings were similar to ones you'd see in other European cities, that is, if you scaled them up to be about five times as large. Absolutely massive architecture. 

It also appears to be the street art capital of the world. The graffiti in Berlin was of significantly higher quality that I've otherwise seen. We were informed that it is in fact still illegal to graffiti in the city, but if it looks nice, the police will look the other way. I think this is an excellent stance to take, it adds a certain tasteful grunge quality to the city that it wouldn't otherwise have. 

Now for some highlights.

"Jews Resting"

On the first day, Guy and I hit up the Jewish museum. I've been to a few different Jewish museums in the past and they all have a slightly different vibe. This museum walks visitors through the (long) history of Jewish persecution in Europe, dating back much further than WW2 and the Holocaust. What I found particularly interesting was that they had a whole section that was basically a crash course on what it means to be Jewish from a cultural perspective. I found myself immersed in an exhibit that essentially bottled up the first 13 years of my Jewish experiences, complete with interactive audio recordings of both the "alef-bet" song and the prayers that I said at my Bat Mitzvah. It was a bit surreal to view something so personal to me through the lens of an outsider. Since Guy and I are already (ahem) experts on that particular subject, we decided our time would be better spent really becoming one with the exhibit. Near the end of the "how to Jew" section there was an explanation of how god created the earth in 7 days. The visitor makes there way through 6 bead curtains until they come upon the last section, which rightly included a bench, because of course on the 7th day, god rested. Well, you don't need to tell us twice. We sat right down and became the living artifact "Jews Resting", to be observed in our natural state. 

Speaking of rest, there was one night in particular when there was a significant loss of it. My pal Claire got us on "the list" to a nice club (thanks Claire) so Guy and I headed to check out Berlin's famous techno scene. I always wondered what it would be like to be one of those people who tell the bouncer that they're on "the list", and yes it is just as powerful as it seems. One thing I'm not a huge fan of is that in Europe, parties and dancing start at midnight at the earliest (see my earlier post "Rave Review" for more complaints on this subject). At home, I can go out with my friends at nine, have a good time, and be back sleeping by one. Not so in this case. The DJ went on at one, so Guy and I pregammed with a nice 4 hour nap/pre-sleep, which I have to say, worked brilliantly (apologies to the esteemed Dr. Kennedy). It was only after everyone else in our hostel room had gone to sleep (lame), Guy and I made our escape out onto the town. 

After the thrilling "list" experience, we found ourselves in one of the best techno clubs in Berlin. As with most places in Berlin (and Germany in general) smoking is a totally fine thing to do indoors. The combination of all the smoke, plus strobe lights, and music so loud you can't think, very much transported me to another world very soon upon entering. Even though techno isn't really my thing, like how I felt about free jazz (see post "what is music?"), it is such an experience to be there in the club dancing on a carpet of broken glass with a hundred strangers at 3am. Even better that I got to share it with my brother. The best part of the experience however was that we could get all the way across town, no problem via public transportation without really even having to think about it. Oregon could never.

Continue the saga with my next post, "Berlout".

"Fraternal Kiss" at The Berlin Wall