I enjoy writing postcards at laundromats, and have done this many times in the past. As I was doing it this morning it occurred to me that I had done a poor job of keeping track of postcards this trip. The only solution is to start from scratch, so keep your eyes on your mailboxes 🙂
Today was another long day in which we criss-crossed Berlin to see a variety of sights, starting with the Brandenburg Gate:
This is an icon of Germany, and has stood here for over 200 years. It’s much bigger than I expected, and very impressive. KLS says “I like how it has different carvings in each archway”
A short walk south of the gate brought us here:
This is the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, a controversial installation of over 2700 concrete blocks in memorium of the Jewish Holocaust victims.
Without commenting on the controversies, or even the appropriateness of the memorial, I have to say the maze itself is eerie and effective in making you feel isolated and even imprisoned (there are emergency underground exits). It’s not a place I will soon forget.
KLS says “It’s thought provoking”.
Five minutes north, back past the Brandenburg Gate, is the Reichstag building – the German Capital building:
The dome on the top is open to the public and is said to provide great views of Berlin but… it’s by appointment only and we didn’t book ahead. So we were only able to appreciate the building from a distance! KLS says “It’s just a building“.
After lunch (and two train rides) we arrived at the next destination:
This is the Victory Column, erected about 140 years ago to celebrate Gernan war victories. It can be climbed via an internal spiral staircase, but the line was long and in oppressive heat so we didn’t wait. KLS says of the column “They need better line management“.
Getting to the column (which stands on an island in a busy traffic intersection) requires navigating an underground tunnel which contained a nifty interactive light installation:
Of these lights KLS says “They were like, you know, retro high tech art“.
Some random transit shots…
The middle photo shows a typical sandwich/pastry shop common in train stations. Many delicious items have been purchased at stores such as these 🙂
The last attraction of the day deserves a blog post of its own, and therefore (probably!) will when I return. I speak of the ‘Computer Game Museum’, and it’s exhibit which promised to evolve us into Homo Lindebs Digitalis. I’ll leave you in suspense as to whether it worked but tease you with a single shot:
Berlin is great and I could spend many more days here, but tomorrow we travel west to a port city. I wonder what wonders we will see?