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And so I said, “that’s a lovely airplane you have there, but you should see my fluggesellschaft!” Oh, those Germans! Fluggesellschaft is actually just a fancy German way of saying airplane, and I mention it because I just returned from the Rhineland and boy are my arms tired!

So, I flew in late Thrursday night with Gill after her last class. We left from Stansted airport and arrived at Berlin?s Shöenfeld airport shortly thereafter; the flight is just over an hour. After snatching a few Euros from our dear old friend, the ATM (DAS TELLER! In German. Just kidding) we hopped into a cab to our wonderful hostel where the other seven members (the ID kids) were waiting. The neighborhood was a “bit dodgy” as my design professor would say and we had to traverse a huge dark courtyard and stairwell to get into BaxPax—the premiere youth hostel franchise of Europe.

So, after slowly wading through the passed out drug dealers and prostitutes strewn about the stairwell, we were greeted by the BaxPax reception/lounge, which was spectacular. At one end of the room, you have your twenty-four hour concierge/bar/DJ desk, which plays music and serves alcohol at all hours of the day. At the opposite end you have couches, a pool table with an ambiguous stain in the middle of it and several TVs playing a rich tapestry of South Park, Beavis and Butthead (oh, that takes me back!), The Simpsons and CNN World. This area, at all times of day and night, is populated vastly by college-aged young adults as well as slightly older and shadier people who speak English with perfect diction and implacable accents. The walls of this room are all painted with a huge mural of Berlin landmarks in shades of peach that match the tungsten lighting.

After checking in and picking up our sheets we made our way to the twelve-person suite that we had booked in advance. The room was clean, organized and had six bunk beds. Unfortunately for the latecomers, Gill and myself, we had to sleep in the last two available beds (one of which was the remaining half of a stranger’s bunk). And who graciously took the bunk which later turned out to be shared with a middle-aged married (or the rough equivalent to whatever they do in his country) dude? This guy [I'm pointing both thumbs at my chest]! But it turned out to be ok; we did not see much of each other. After some lovely late night Indian food around the corner from our lodgings, we hit the hay—9AM wakeup call tomorrow!

The next day (FRI) was packed with many wonderful things. We began our day with a quick stop at a German café, which couldn’t hold a candle to the British or French cafés I have frequented. We ordered our food and I, in a vain attempt to order a sandwich, apparently requested a backyard (as Billy Crystal put it in Forget Paris). So the whole group had to eat their takeout food while I sat at a table and ate my morning salad. Needless to say, I was on carb-patrol until we got to our first stop, The Bauhaus Archive.

It was very cool seeing all sorts of original work from the megastars that we learned about in art history: Paul Klee, Wassily “the weasel” Kandinsky, Mies van der Rohe, Walter Gropius, Laszo Moholy-Nagy, et al. I even got a picture of the “Chicago Bauhaus” sign before being berated by a vertically-challenged, seventy year-old German woman that had already coached me on what I could and couldn’t do with my devil camera.

Ha! Take that you evil hag! We left with just enough time to get some famous German bratwurst before going on our walking Berlin tour—which was awesome!

We walked several miles through Berlin learning about her history through a very cool tour guide who was a British student living in Germany. The whole group was about thirty people and everyone was riveted on the guide the entire time—he was very funny and knowledgeable. We saw everything from the Berlin wall to the in-progress Jewish holocaust memorial (in an unfortunate twist of events our guide said that the company contracted to provide the anti-graffiti coating was the original manufacturer of Zyklon B, but that they were the only company who could do this sort of thing so they kept the contract). We saw the Reichstag (Germany’s parliament) and the library (Humbolt University) where Einstein worked until he figured he?d better get his little buns over to America. As I said, the tour was wonderful and at the end our guide even offered us a discount on his nightlife tour of Berlin clubs (which I joked to the women, would probably end up at his apartment). We had a lovely German dinner (which I left briefly in the middle of to run down the road and take pictures of the old Jewish synagogue, on Erev Yom Kipur no less, which was close by).

All in all it was a great day. The walking was a little strenusuous but nothing to compare with my guilt stricken fast-a-thon the next day (SAT).

Once again we woke up at 9AM, and once again I was the last one to actually “get out of bed.” After sitting with the group and having my un-breakfast we all went to a shopping district that we had skipped through the previous day. But on this day it was food market—lucky me! Since I never made a formal announcement to the group about my intent to fast, I was approached my members of the group individually with large pieces of food in their hands telling me that I had to get “one of these.” The items varied between gourmet cheese, fresh fruit and pieces of pie that would choke a donkey. Oh, and let?s not forget the sample booths! It’s a funny thing, these samples. When food is free it doesn’t really matter how many calories are in it or what important Jewish holiday may or may not be on the current day. It was hard for me to get my head around the fact that I couldn’t eat samples—I can still smell them.

Since I had eaten pretty late the night before, I figured I could make up for it by waiting till my 11PM flight touched down at London to have my little break-fast. Even though I didn?t eat on Saturday, I did manage to shop a little with the group. I bought a wooden postcard to mail to my family and I even mused about buying a kitsch metal coat rack that had silver antlers coming out (I didn’t know they could do that!) to accept your jacket. We ended the day at the Sony entertainment center that was like a shopping square with movie, IMAX, etc. We watched a movie about Hitler’s last hours in his bunker told through the eyes of a secretary that stayed with him almost till the end. Everyone seemed pretty nuts in the movie and it seemed like a generally unhappy place to be at the end of the war. We left several minutes early to catch our flight and everything after that went incredibly smoothly. I had finished by book on the flight over, so I decided to buy The Da Vinci Code, one of the only books in English I could find, at the airport bookstore. Needless to say I finished it in a couple of days—I highly recommend it, it is so choice.

So, all in all, it was an excellent trip and I would recommend anyone in the area to stop by. Before this post gets even more out of hand, I’ll just quickly fill you in on my British happening these last few days. I?ve seen Much Ado About Nothing and Bombshells with my theater class and I visited The Tower of London and Westminster Abbey with my architecture class (Da Vinci Code brethren: I found Sir Isaac Newton’s tomb, and it was glorious!). I?m still working my way through all of the Pret à Manger sandwiches (I would live at the place if they’d just let me) and I’m going to Leeds castle tomorrow (FRI 10/1)! I have more to write but this is getting way too long. I’ll try to decrease the dead-time between posts, I promise!

Love,

Frau Becker