saturday night in east berlin

I love Berlin. I love everything about it that I have seen so far. Im pretty sure I love the stuff I havent seen yet too. I been humming the tune to Kreuzberg the whole time.

I left Amsterdam with a heavy heart. Not because I particularly missed Amsterdam, but because I left my beautiful, compact and absorbant micro-fibre towel at the Hostel. I have since replaced it, but the idea of my faithful towel lying abandoned in some dingy hallway in Holland breaks my heart.

I started perking up once the bus got onto the Autobahn. Unfortunately the highway now has a speedlimit, and I agree with Richard Hammond that a speedlimit on the Autobahn eliminates the purpose of having Germany. However rumour has it that if your car has German registration you can still do warp 9 without getting a ticket, and that was definately happening. The fastest cars I saw were all late model BMW Wagons. Anything that looked remotely sporty would ease along at a leisurely 130 or so, but these Wagons would go snapping by at something like 200. They looked awesome too, like Batmans hearse. I want one.

Anyway our Hostel was right next to the Berlin TV tower and Alexanderplatz. This is where I fell in love with Berlin. The (former) eastern half of the city has this really eerie vibe, like a ghost town. The massive promenade of Unter den Linden totally fills your field of view. There are no skyscrapers, few cars and its all very quiet. Ive never been an architecture/city planning buff, but I love the work of whoever set all that up (possibly Hitler).

My first purchase was a fluffy Russian hat, complete with ear flaps and Red Star badge. I've wanted one ever since I saw Matty Jones with his, and there was a certain irony about wearing it for photo ops in front of important buildings.

Took a bike tour the next day and got a better handle on the history of the place. The best part of the tour was the fact that the bike had oldschool brakes where you lock the pedals backwards to stop the rear wheel. Me and this Pommie dude went a bit mad in the park and had some slide competitions. We also got rained on. Again.

That night we did a pub-crawl. I think it would be wise to limit my intake of pub-crawls to once a lifetime, but they are an excellent way of meeting people. Katie came around again from wherever she was staying so I hung around with her, a kid called Tom and some Aussie guys who knew every quotable movie/music line that I did.

I think the first bar was a soviet bomb shelter or something. The rest was history. The drinks were cheap and there were free shots every hour. Unfortunately most of the free shots were Apple Schnapps, which tastes like all the bad parts of Tequila and Chartruese but isnt remotely as potent.

There were 5 bars in total (so the brochure tells me) and we'd stop in between for Jaegermeister. To save on plastic cups, the Jaeger was dished out directly into your mouth. Everyone got into a circle and took a kneel, and the guides walked around pouring it in. Classy.

Anyway, brilliant night, I think I took about 80 photos (S1 normanby style). Found myself safe in bed the next morning with all my valuables intact. Turns out most of the people I was partying with were staying in my room as well.

Spent today reading the history of the Berlin Wall at Checkpoint Charlie, as well as the Topography of Terror museum. Today is also the first time Ive been in shorts since about 3 days into my trip.

Michelle is arriving sometime tonight, so I'll probably get dinner with her, then its off to Prague. I will miss this place.