BERLIN, GERMANY
June 8-10, 2008
DAY 1 (14)
We met up with the man we met at the bar last night, and he was kind enough to drive us to the Harlem train station this morning. Otherwise, we would have had to leave 4 hours earlier to walk back the same path we had done the night before. But at the end of the day, it wouldn’t have mattered much. Our train from Amsterdam to Berlin was cancelled due to another strike (come on Europe, can’t you wait until the summer is over?), so we took a train to some other city in the Netherlands to wait for our departure of a 4:00 pm train to Berlin.
We made it to our hostel at 10:00pm after our arrival was scheduled at 5:00, but we didn’t have any problems with the staff. The place was actually amazing. It happened to be owned by a Brazilian couple who had been living in Berlin for over a decade and they were extremely welcoming and helpful. We shared a 6 bed room with 2 other girls, and despite the communal shower, it had great water pressure and we had an amazing night of sleep. Much, much needed after our long adventure the day before! Best part was, we got a $8 deal per night. Wish I remembered the name of the hostel.
DAY 2 (15)
We took it pretty easy today. We officially “hit the wall” and needed a break from the crazy pace. We're exhausted and home sick, and this fight with the boys is keeping us down a bit. In all honesty, all I want right now is to take a two day nap in my own bed. Everyone we meet says this is normal; that the two week mark really hits you. But they also say that if we get through the next couple of days we'll get out pace back and can happily continue on our way. Let's hope they're right.
After the tour we went home for a quick nap and some internet time before signing up for the Berlin pub crawl. It was pretty lame, especially because we didn’t want to spend more than the cover price and drank only the complimentary drinks they gave us- cheap vodka shots and terrible local beer. Yuck. So needless to say, we weren’t drunk and everyone around us was wasted, so we decided to cut out early after catching part of the EuroCup game at a local pub. A waste of a night, but we could still really use the sleep at this point.
DAY 3 (16)
We decided to take a tour to Sansachaanz today, the closest concentration camp to Berlin, before getting on the train to Switzerland. It was amazing to do the tour and learn about the Nazi control over the inmates and all sorts of terrible torture, killing methods and work duties they forced these harmless men to do. Unbelievable experience to be in a place like that and feel the pain of the people who once were forced to work and die there. It’s one thing to learn about it from books, but actually being there is a whole other story. I was very touched, and extremely sensitive throughout the experience. How could you not be?
Lib and I made one last walk to the Berlin wall to check out all the artwork that has been painted throughout the years and the rubble that it now lies as. It was a beautiful experience. The sense of freedom and happiness is overwhelming when seeing the pieces of the wall finally brought down. We had a great dinner and gelato by the side of the canal and made it back to the hostel to pack and get one final good night sleep before we head to Switzerland tomorrow, a day early, to check out Luzerne.
