Berlin - Day 1

On the turning away…

Today I woke up at 5:15 to go finish packing and get ready for the long train ride to Berlin.  It was very early in the morning so I packed myself a sandwich consisting of bread, two slices of cheese, and three slices of meat, and an apple for breakfast.  I left my host family’s flat at around 5:30 and got to the train station in Markt Schwaben at around 5:50.  We then proceeded to take the train to the Munich HBF and then the train from there to Berlin.  The train ride to Berlin took about 5 hours and was pretty boring. Everyone was partnered up with a seat buddy except for Aaron.  It was interesting to watch a few of my fellow students to accidentally walk in or get walked in on in the bathroom as they did not figure out how to lock the door.  After a while, Chris, Willow, and I took a short trip to the food car to burn some time.  It was interesting walking past the German teenagers on the train as they were a lot louder and stared at us as we walked past.  Chris and Willow bought some coffee while I bought an ice-cream bar. We then leaned against the wall and talked for a while as we consumed our items.  I got bored sitting on the down after another hour or so and ended up spending the remaining train ride standing behind Chris and Mr. Mobini’s seats.  We had some very interesting conversations.  After we got off of the train, we went to food court to have lunch.  Then we got on the S-Bahn and walked to the hostel.

The hostel’s name is the Hostel Odyssey. It has a very charming yet vigilant atmosphere to it. There are statues in the main lobby, one of which is of the grim reaper. There is also a chalk board with some information about things to do for each of the days of the week.  After getting settled in, we started our walking tour of Berlin.  I must say that West Berlin is a much nicer area than East Berlin.  One of the more notable landmarks was the Brandenburg Gates, which was very grand.

My favorite was visiting the Holocaust Memorial.  It was very trippy as the ground and sides of the cement pillars were all slightly warped. We also visited parts of the Berlin Wall and Checkpoint Charlie. For dinner we stopped at an Italian restaurant. I had pasta with bread. It was a very long day.     – Connor Wise

Today started at five O’ clock. Waking up to half sunrise I lazily walk into the bathroom and get ready for a day of adventure. My host mother, Nadine, made me sandwiches for the trip and we drove to the nearby train station where we said our goodbyes to our hosts. As they drove off, Mr. Mobini asks for our color copy IDs and I did not have mine. It seems I left mine at home and with a half sarcastic look he hands me my passport. From the entrance we walk onto the platform where we wait for our Munich train.

After boarding and reaching the Munich ostbahnof we took a small break and then we boarded our train to Berlin. The fast, ESP, train would take us straight to Berlin with only a few stops on way. After a relaxing five and half hours and some embarrassing moments of people walking in on each other in the bathroom we reached our destination: Berlin. My first impression was that it was bigger than Munich, more graffiti, and it has bigger buildings. Then we took a lunch break where an interesting lady came up to me and asked for money, fortunately a worker came up and told her to leave. My first impression of Berlin: great. After the break Mr. Mobini showed us the main train station and then we boarded trains that led us into East Berlin. From the station we walked to our hostel: Hostel Odyssee.

We started at the Alexander Platz where we saw the tower and we headed to a church close by. Then we went to the Bibelplatz where we saw the memorial of the book burning the Nazis did during their reign. From there we walked to the Berlin cathedral, which was beautiful. Afterwards we walked down the main street to the Brandenburg Gates, crossed the place where the Berlin wall used to stand. Then we went to the main parliament building of Munich. My favorite part of today’s trip was the Holocaust Memorial, it was simple and grey, but at the same time very beautiful.

It completely represented the Holocaust in full. Afterwards we took a dinner break and later we went to see the remnants of the Berlin Wall. After a failed attempt to see the cathedral, which stood after the bombings of both the world wars, we came back to the Hostel Odyssee. Now I am blogging about the great day I had! -Karanjot Gill