First week (Easter Holiday) in my friend's place was so fast that I even had to give up Hamburg, and went directly to the East, Berlin, a key city of Germany, a central point of culture, history and nation, but also a colorful, cool city of young arts, street culture (graffiti), modern architecture.
In Berlin, I didn't pack up with other friends in hostel, as usual, I was quite busy with my own plan, 'running' around the whole city centre, and explored as many as I could by my own eyes, ears, and heart. To me, the most impressive and lovely part of Berlin, was definitely Berlin Wall, which I didn't mean some famous parts, but the whole, no matter east or west.
There are too many site-seeings in Berlin for a new-comer, you might be escape some points but the wide street in the city centre which leads everyone to Brandenburg Gate, is definitely must-check. It was such a find day when I went through the street, which was as most of European capital cities, was packed by tourists and luxury brand boutiques. The closer I was to Brandenburg Gate, the wider the street is. It was almost 2pm which I was welcomed by the strongest European sunlight going through the huge magnificent stone-gate!
Memorial in Tiergarten
The city, and the country didn't abandon their history, and I was so impressive and appreciated to their attitude to the past. To me, it's everywhere memory and respect. Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, open in 2005, close to Brandenburg Gate, was another stop I had in my first day in Berlin. The up-and-down blocks might be a 'playground' of kids and young people, but I felt something heavy and sad when I was watching them in the same angle of sunset lights. I caught the last few hours to visit the underground museum there, which I also would recommend to everyone for a visit, to learn the history and to know how Germans respect the past. Of course, coming back from the underground, I would prefer the last bright-day hour of Berlin, and enjoy the casual walk through the blocks.
Berlin Wall, is another fame of Berlin. Actually you cannot say somewhere is exact the Wall, it is a large stretch going through the city centre (west Berlin) to the east nearby the river Spree. To be simple, I was trying to follow the fading wall-feet on the ground which was like an ugly scar. By watching the paintings and wordings on the Berlin Wall, it was subtly showing something different regarding to the different attitudes, age-generation, thoughts and willings to me, a random stranger to Berlin.
In the city centre (the west), it was obviously more tourism-intensive, which had some anti-war symbols; just three blocks far, a quiet road extending from Checkpoint Charlie, was such a plain, old and massive Berlin Wall, which to me, was more like real Berlin Wall, showing the struggling time of Berliners, especially the easters, who were suffering by the cold war and after-time of 2nd War. Standing aside the river Spree (the east part), it was already turned to a street-art/graffiti gallery, which belonged to young generation who had a lot of thoughts towards the government, the society and the world. Of course, I won't take every graffiti seriously, coz some of them are really bullshit :D
Just mentioned Checkpoint Charlie, in fact, if you don't read something about it before and go for it directly, you will be disappointed so much, because it is just a normal checkpoint station with some sand bags as a recall of history and a big picture of solder Russia. Well, luckily I was visiting underground museum in early time of the day, and the real Checkpoint Charlie was much far more than what it is now in Berlin city, and everything about shooting those poor people who wanted to cross the isolated area was horribly true.
First night in Berlin, I was fall in love with the modern face of this city. After all lights up, the night covered those historical buildings but just left the sharp cosmopolitan lights brighter and fancier. The hard lines, cubics, ironic structures were everywhere in the city, and every building was in its style which I could not tell clearly but showed in limited photos.
Deutscher Dom
(Inside of Deutscher Dom)
Gendarmenmarkt
The next day I started from another side of Berlin (more in east) which has a lot of museums and grand plazas. The first one and the longest time I spent throughout the day, was Gendarmenmarkt, which was a quite nice place with 18-century & 19-century buildings. The most beautiful one to me, was Deutscher Dom. I was visiting every floor by the twisting-up stone stairs, and the warm orange lights gave such an intensive beauty and shadow to this old Church. Each floor has some different chambers in purely white and displaying different theme of Berlin culture and history. The interesting part is the inside-structure of the Dom, which was quite easy to make you lost :P
Keeping on moving, the crowds would appear and never disappeared :)
Well, I went through a lot Berliner's street-arts, open book/album-market (if you could read German, or lucky enough to find one or two English books, that would be a cool deal!) and passed by Neue Wache, which is another memorial of Berlin.
When my feet was almost done I recognized the middle-break point, Lustgarten, where Berliner Dom and Altes Museum are. I didn't have time to check out both of them which is quite pity, well, I did have a glimpse of Berliner Dom at the entrance for its gorgeous glorious golden ceiling/dom, and the happy birds 'shouting' flying through the huge & high corridor were that day's surprise.
Why I skip those two, because I planned my time to DDR (DDR Museum), which is just opposite the back side of Berliner Dom, facing to the river and located one floor under the ground level. It was not like my imagination as I heart so much recommendation from my friends about DDR. Just kidding, I was so attracted by Pretzel, on the street :D
Ok, buy ticket and enter into the museum, it was the smallest museum I had visited throughout the whole Europe trip, even smaller than sexy museum or torturing museum... but it was informative and interesting. They used a lot blocks and boxes to hide the information and smartly make every visitor go for knowledge positively. It was all about the normal life and living details of Berliners in 'dark time' which I could have the simple understanding of how people were struggling about their lives but still craving and making better things.
The end of Berlin-east trip was simply covered till TV tower, which to me, was much less attractive to Berlin's historic landmarks, beautiful gardens and parks, or cooli modern architecture.
Of course, Berlin is not that simple as what I have written here!!! I also had two cool nights in my hostel there, especially the exciting night talk and German beer night with some senior backpackers in the hostel lobby, where I was told the crazy electronic/house-music party in Berlin, the overnight-running subways in the weekends, the unbelievable & crazy drunk-party in the subway trains overnight!!! I would like to go back for another longer stay in this charming city and probably try once time Berlin's party :))))
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