Then we were joined by Johannes who was our
local guide and he was fantastic. Full
of enthusiasm and knowledge and just a really super excited guy. He said that Ronald Regan (Mr. Gorbechav tear
down this wall!) was very popular in Berlin but that JFK was almost a hero
because he did so much for them. He said
the Kennedy’s famous saying – Ich ben ein Berliner actually means I am a jelly
donut but they appreciated that he tried and his face is everywhere in the
Eastern area of Berlin. And by no
coincidence the souvenir stands.
First of all we went to the Reichstag and we walked to the
center of all the German government buildings.
It was so nice – the citizens of Berlin were playing and spending time
with their families – one father was pretending to be a bridge so that his
young children could crawl underneath them and another couple was playing
volleyball. Makes you realize that life
is not all that different wherever you go.
There are very few parts of Berlin which have not been touched by the
war. And the area has also fallen on
hard economic times which makes recovery even worse. The area has 20% unemployment.
After that we drove down the Unter den Linden
(which was a beautiful street lined on both sides by linden trees) and it was
beautiful. Then we went to the
Brandenberg Gate which is the icon for Berlin.
All of the buildings surrounding the gate are new and ¾ of the figure on
top of the gate is also new. It made me
sad that wars can cause such unhappiness and misery that even 30 years after
the Berlin Wall came down it is still hard for that society to get going
again. We drove by many old but decrepit
churches and buildings.
Then we drove by Checkpoint Charlie which reminded me so
much of the Cold War it made me shiver. We
drove by the Topography of Terror which is where they have erected monuments to
the Jews which died during the war. They
have names on all the pillars and there are a lot of them. Again, really sad.
Then we went to Potsdam Square to the Sony Center for
lunch. I had Weinerschnitzel and
potatoes and lemon – memories Janet? Tom
had what was described as a bacon and onion tart which turned out to be a thin
crust pizza which was very good but I had visions of cow tongue and pureed
spinach which is what my dad got when he ordered the special of the day when we
were in Germany as younger kids.
After lunch we drove a super rich area of town which is
where the US Ambassador to Germany lives and visited the Allied Museum. This is a museum which the German people have
erected to show their appreciation to the Americans and the British for the
Berlin Air Lift during the war. We got
to see the “candy plane” which is a plane that the soldiers would load with
candy and the candy would rain down o the city of Berlin and the children and
run and laugh and try to catch the candy and the plane would tip its wings up
and down to salute them.
Then we went down the Champs Elysee of Berlin and we went to
a supermarket in the area that had Cartier and Bulgari and Mercedes-Benz and
Bentley and other super high end stores.
Tom and I looked around and then waited for the bus to come back and
pick us up.
Finally we drove out to see the Charlottenburg Palace but by
then it was getting dark and we were tired and ready to head back to the ship
especially considering that it was 3 hours back to the ship. Well imagine our surprise when we got back to
the ship and the area around the gangplank was decorated with balloons and most
of the crew was outside with drinks and clapped and welcomed us back to the
ship. And then they made us an amazing
German buffet on the pool deck – where it was REALLY cold – with suckling pig
(yes, the entire pig), spaetzle and some bratwurst and some other sausage which
they said was different but it tasted the same to me. So it was an exciting ending to a very
interesting and sobering day.
So tomorrow – Copenhagen and Malmo.
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