Churches on Monday

Marienkirche

The second oldest church in Berlin it was built in 1270 and unfortunately we weren't able to enter it due to restoration work that was going on just during this week! It was a great looking church from the outside and of course like everything else in Berlin it has been mostly rebuilt due to WWII.





Nicholaikirche
This is the oldest church in Berlin and was only 200 or so feet from the Spree and was said to be placed there because it was the narrowest and most passable place along the Spree. When the church was built Berlin had a sister city across the river and this served for both places. I found the inside of the rebuilt church to be quite bright with the flashy colors used on the roof and it was now a museum and didn't entice me. The outside was what i liked the most for some reason.







Friedrichswerdersche
This was a simple plain church on the outside and was simply huge with these simple windows on the outside of it, but once i was inside i noticed the colors of the stained glass all around and loved this Gothic style of the staircases and window arches. This is how i explain the German people... Simple on the outside and elaborate on the inside and never knowing what you will find on the inside.




Then we traveled back to Bebelplatz and saw the huge pantheon like dome of St. Hedwig's Cathedral which of course had been rebuilt again after the war and changed... I find that when they did this it doesn't have that great old majestic feel of a really old building. It takes away of the awe knowing that 99% of this building was rebuilt less than 50 years ago. But it was extremely nice on the inside and still an active church with a man still playing the organ for the followers.

And the last building of the day was... yet another rebuilt Concert Hall. This place was huge and just screamed royalty with the huge lions on the front steps overlooking the platz perched in between two nearly identical churches. This was now an orchestra hall but was originally intended for theater performances with seating for about 2000 people. It was furnished well but was all done with wall paper and fake marble on the inside everywhere... Again it takes away the awe factor with a building so great and majestic on the outside and the interior is fake. But thats just my opinion... it still was beautiful. I enjoyed the colors with green shades and marble seemed nice.

Saturday and Sunday.

Well my Saturday i slept in for a while and then we met up at a mall out of town a little bit and we had some lunch and spotted a really interesting Micheal Jackson memorial kind of thing made out of sand and in the middle of this mall!



After that i bought a few things and headed back to the apartment where i met up with my roommates and headed out for the night and found some cool German beach/river bars but didn't stay out too late.

And Sunday i woke up early and headed out riding on the trains and was passing through a train station as saw a giant flea market which was right up my ally! So i hopped off the train and headed in. It was full of old stuff kind of like a garage sale; full of old "silver" silverware and tons of old stamps, money, postcards, signs, pipes, rings, necklaces, trinkets, real war memorabilia, brass and just anything you could think of!




After that i found my way to a local VW dealership that was open on a Sunday. But inside i found all the cool european models of VW's that they dont offer us in the states :( and most excitedly i found old VW's!!! so i got my picture taken with an old split window bus and wandered around there for a while...




Later on that day i met up with the our teachers and watched the Germany vs. Australia fußball game at the restaurant and had a few beers there while cheering on Germany! It was fun, every time Germany scored they would shoot fireworks and loud popping things that sounded like canons off!

Berlin, 10-11/06/2010

We all met at our normal meeting place on the corner and headed to the Hauptbanhof(Berlin’s major train station) and we were meet with a very detailed model of the train station.
Then we split for lunch and I had my first Döner Kepab, a turkish sandwich with shaved chicked meat and fries, with a vegetable and a salad all rolled into one, quite tasty and fairly cheap too.
After that we made our way to the river and walked along the banks of the Spree viewing the major government buildings. We stopped and saw Police/Fire station which was covered in these window shades of green and red and all the colors in between. I found the windows and curved corner glass to be pretty neat and very different.





Then we headed around the Spree some more to the Reichstag. This area is kind of like Germany’s white house and congress place. Very clean and proper.







The next day we started just half a block from our apartments and viewed the British Embassy and continued around the corner to the American embassy, French embassy and the DG bank. All the time the Huge Brandenburg Gate was at the end of the block with a presence of this old 200+ year old gate.



We then made our way closer the apartment and viewed the Holocaust Memorial, the one that we can see from our windows! It is this huge landscape of perfectly straight blocks all of different heights with the ground floor also being wavy and uneven, but a really cool place to hangout for everyone.



Next on the list was the Philarmonie, a huge orchestra house built in the 1960’s(heart of the cold war) and filled with strange and really awesome shapes and made to look like a ship almost. Or for it to have ship like features. There where these huge columns of concrete that looked like wood and all the handrails and staircases looked like they belonged on a cruise ship.





Then we made our way to Linkstaße which is this huge group of buildings made for housing and some offices, with a neat small mall in the middle of the block. With many restaurants and shopping stores there is no need for these people to travel much of anywhere else… kind of neat but you never leave home this way. I don’t think it’s a great idea.
Then off to an art exhibit. On the ground level it was a huge empty glass building with only two staircases leading down, It was misleading at first but then we went down the stairs and found some great art pieces. I am not much on art but most of the pieces that I found interesting were from the 1930’s and confiscated by the nazi’s and classified as “degenerate art”.

first morning

I snapped a few pictures out of our apartment windows of the streets and we have a beautiful view of a Holocaust memorial site.

Flying's Eve

Well today the day before we fly, i have already packed and double checked for all my belongings and I am sure that i will have everything I will need for the trip.

But i did buy a new SD card for my camera, and these are a few pics i snapped today before i left... nothing like a few of my German cars to get us in the mood!

5-19-10

Just created my blog for the Berlin trip! its less than 3 weeks away... im happy!