Berlin day 2

The pictures are of the Berlin memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, and the Topography of Terror.  

After enjoying breakfast, (which included a short visit from Clark Griswold – inquiring as to whether or not we had gone to a techno bar or not) we headed out to see Berlin.  We had planned on going on a “Third Reich Tour” to see all the places connected to Hitler and the German Third Reich.  We were determined to see some really cool (maybe dorky) historical things while we were in Germany.  This tour would take us to a number of places and seemed to be pretty legitimate.  The meeting place was at the Starbucks near the Brandenburg Gate.  Hmph.  Starbucks.  We of course enjoyed a beverage and a trip to their bathroom as it was free and almost time for our tour.  We headed out into the Brandenburg courtyard – where the American Embassy is located – strange… and milled around for a little while.  Vivvi got out her info from the lonely planet book she had and started to read about the gate.  I don’t remember exactly what she was reading, but she asked me a question, I didn’t know the answer, and out of now where, a guy stepped in and said “you know that’s wrong what you just read” enter the scene: Cal.  Cal is a licensed tour guide for Berlin.  He talked with us for a while, claiming that he comes out to show off his city to tourists, free of charge.  We could give him what we thought the tour was worth.  He said that if we were interested, we should meet him at a particular gift shop at 1:00.  That was exactly the time the Third Reich tour was supposed to leave… what to do?!?  We discussed, (while looking at the Christmas tree, the Menorah and the faux American and Soviet soldiers posing in front of the gate) and decided that just before 1, we’d check the crowd for the Third Reich tour and then make a decision.  Neither one of us are big into large tours, we like the more intimate if at all possible.  We spotted a large group of people near the Starbucks, and decided that we’d seek out Cal for the afternoon.  We weren’t sure what we were getting into, but he told us that he could customize our tour if we wanted and do many of the things that were on the Third Reich Tour – so off we went!  He gave us the history of Berlin, of many of the buildings, took us to various segments of the Berlin wall, and pointed out the best museums.  He showed us where Hitler’s bunker was, where the SS headquarters were, and brought us to the memorial to The Murdered Jews of Europe in the center of town.  The memorial was quite interesting.  It was multiple slabs of slate?  I don’t remember the material; that were at different heights throughout this open area.  The ground it was on rose and fell and as you moved into the middle of the memorial, the slabs got taller.  In the center, the slabs were at least 4 feet taller than I am.  It was interesting.  We walked and saw many of the areas of Berlin, ending near Checkpoint Charlie.  We stopped in a gift shop (as many of you know, I’m a gift shop junkie- especially in historical places) and I bought the token “piece of the wall.”  Cal was very concerned that it wasn’t real or authentic, but it’s really not that important to me if it’s authentic.  It can still give an idea to the kids of what it was like.  They enjoy the tangibles.  I also have a chunk of wire from the DMZ in South Korea… yeah, sure it is.  It doesn’t matter – if the kids explore and are curious about it, that’s all I ask.  I also found an “Ich Bin Ein Berliner” t-shirt.  I love stupid history t-shirts.  If only anyone here found it to be either interesting or funny… hmph.  He took us to the site where the books were burned by the Nazis, and pointed out the memorial which might have been overlooked otherwise.  Cal gave us more thorough of a tour than I could have ever imagined.  He took Vivvi and I all over the city, and was very conscious of what we wanted to see in our short time in Berlin.  At the end of our time, he told us to pass on the good things we learned about Berlin – which I will, and then escorted us to a good German restaurant near our hostel.  I think we gave him 40 Euros or something, which was more than the Third Reich Tour would be, but we had a personalized afternoon that went all through Berlin.  It was fantastic. 

The next day, we headed over to one of the biggest synagogues in Berlin.  It was one of the hard hit buildings on “Kristallnacht” (November 9, 1938 when the Nazis destroyed businesses owned by Jews, and many synagogues in Germany).  We toured the synagogue which is mainly a museum now.  It was interesting as they had left some of the different areas damaged from the original attacks so you could see how devastating the effects were.  We continued on and returned to some of the sites we saw the day before to take pictures and stop at other shops.  We also visited the site of the former SS headquarters.  It was left to the basement floor walls and room dividers, most of it in a shambles, but it was an interesting way to have an outdoor museum.  It was called the “Topography of Terror.”  It was really neat to read about all the things that had happened there, and there was something powerful about it being outdoors.  We had lunch at one of the German beer houses, it was DELICIOUS!  We checked out some more of the Christmas markets and had a relaxing afternoon walk back to our hostel… that is, until I went on a mission to find my guide book.  There HAD to be one on Germany in the country of Germany right?  We stopped at a department store that advertised “books” near the front door.  Well, as soon as Vivvi and I walked in, we knew that there wasn’t going to be a guide book inside here.  We forged on through this Saks type store – with cameras and backpacks in tow- to finally find the selection of books.  It consisted of about 5 fashion magazines and some extremely expensive coffee table books.  Hmph.  We backtracked through the store and decided to call it a day.  We headed back to the hostel, and gathered our things for our late trip to the Berlin train station.  We were taking an overnight train to Munich.