28/08/02 Berlin, Germany (Phill)
So I did make it to Berlin. I arrived on the train at 7 in the morning and had until 2pm to meet Christine. I did my typical aimless-wandering until I found things I wanted to look at. I walked through a georgous park that sits right in the heart of Berlin, all the way to Checkpoint Charlie. CC was the first thing I wanted to see. It dawns from the end of World War II when Berlin was split into 4 zones each controlled by a different nation. Checkpoint Charlie, no prizes for guessing, was controlled by the Americans. The checkpoint is still there along with a good museum on the history of the wall. Most of the wall is actually gone, but theres still 500m or so of it that hasn´t yet been sold to the tourists and stands. I even managed to find a Schlotzski´s Deli for lunch! Hey, come on, they have free refills, I havn´t seen that in months.
I did a few other museums in my stay, notably the Jewish museum. The nights I hung out with Christine and Kathrin (also met her in Germany). I really had a good time, I swere student apartments are the same all over the world. Slightly messy but totally communal. Last night before we went to an Irish Pub, I did the girl´s english homework for them. It was on Animal Farm which I quite liked!
I managed to get some work done too, ie- I arranged my onward transport. I managed to totally score with a flight on SAS to Oslo. I was actually planning on skipping Copenhagen cause I´m short on time and I ddin´t think it was worth 80 dollars just for a train ticket there when I already knew there was only a days worth of stuff I wanted to see. But I managed to get my flights so that although it was Berlin to Oslo, I flew through Copenhagen. When you fly through another airport en route, you always have 24 hours before your connection is considered a stopover (and you pay for two air tickets). Luckily there was a flight landing in Copenhagen at 2pm and a flight leaving the next day at 1pm for Oslo. Free stopever!
Posted by Admin at August 29, 2002 11:33 AM