Curmudgeon in Berlin

Day Five - The "New Berlin"

2008-05-19T06:52:00.000-06:00

This was what I will call our big "we are just a bunch of tourists" day. In the morning we got a tour of Potsdamer Platz which had been a pretty desolate area right along the wall (it may be a little early for this, but most of the places we saw were right on the edge of the wall, for some reason the changes as a result of this very weird period must be interesting) and has since been built up as a "world-class" city - skyscrapers, expensive restaurants, expensive stores and movie theaters. From there, we walked along the Topography of Terror, the remnants of a building that had been used as a major headquarters of the Third Reich that has since been outfitted with a museum type set-up with information about WWII etc. We were going to go through the Brandenburg Gate, but the Dalai Lama was speaking there at the same time (we didn't get there soon enough to hear anything though) so it was a little crowded to really be able to see it. Then we wandered to the Reichstag (which over there were the anti-Tibet protesters, pretty interesting). The Reichstag is the parliament building with the glass dome on top, so you can climb into the glass dome and look into the main hall of the parliament (transparency in government) and get a nice panoramic view of the city. We went to an "authentic" German restaurant for dinner, had a nice discussion and a number of shots, and I finally met the green fairy, which is not worth all the fuss by the way.

Day Four - Meet the class

2008-05-18T11:11:00.000-06:00

After searching the neighborhood for anywhere that would serve breakfast before 10:00 a.m. (since check-out for the hostel was at 11) I gathered everything and paid someone to drive me across town. Even though everyone says there is a fantastic public transportation system, I didn't want to figure it out while hauling all my stuff. Unfortunately, check-in at the next hostel was 2:00 p.m. and I had about two hours to kill before everyone else showed up. When they did get in and the first room was available, everyone made a mad dash for a place to sleep, allowing me four more hours to kill. Once everyone had slept for a few hours we trekked across town to meet the students who we were "teamed" with. Basically, we come over here and they help us get a perspective on Berlin and we get lectures from their professors, and in a few months they will come to Denver to do the same type of study. Now this is a pretty accurate reflection of my definition of hell, being in a stuffy room in the middle of an unfamiliar city (so I can't extricate myself from the situation) with twelve people who I don't know even though for all important purposes we are a group and twelve-fourteen people who I don't know, don't know whether I will see again, and randomly throughout the night start speaking a language I don't understand. This is great, fabulous, what the hell have I gotten myself into? When the professors noticed that I was sitting away from the blabbering crowd in a sort of dumbfounded stupor, they suggested that we head back to the hostel. Even better, now I am the anti-social party-pooper...oh, nothing new.

Day Three - Out in the big city

2008-05-17T15:07:00.000-06:00

I decided that with only one day left before I had to meet the rest of the group, I had better get out and see the town. I got up at a decent time and wandered Kurfurstendamm, a major commercial street next to the zoo. The zoo was great, very open and just perfect to wander around. After that I went to the city park area behind the zoo. Oh, then I went to a museum detailing the history of Berlin, which seemed like a pretty smart precursor to looking at the politics in the area. A nice relaxing day, good food, nice walk (about 12 hours of walking) even if I did get caught after dark over six blocks away from the hostel in a torrential downpour.

Day Two - More sleep

2008-05-16T14:13:00.000-06:00

Uh, I slept some more...most the day. Well, to make excuses, the build up to the trip and getting ready to leave work and everything else had pretty well zapped every bit of energy I didn't have. I did take a couple of hours to wander around the neighborhood, get lunch and figure out streets etc. It was weird staying in a hostel though, I'm so used to hotels that not having my own space was a little uncomfortable. I shared the room with two girls on a tour around Europe who were from...Texas. They were great though, even though we didn't see each other much. As far as hostels go, based on my limited experiance in hostels - twice in high school with that crazy :) group, it was pretty nice, clean and accessible. And, as far as cities go, I was in a great neigborhood, not very many tourist-y things to see, but on the west side of Berlin and I felt very safe. So far a great trip.

First Day - Sleep

2008-05-15T13:31:00.000-06:00

I got about two hours of sleep on the 8 hour flight over the "big water" so when I got to the hostel mid-day on Thursday I called N then went straight to sleep for about 8 hours. Then I got up and had the most amazing dinner at some hole in the wall on a nearby side street, already loving the German cusine! And thankfully I had no trouble sleeping at night also.

Flight recap

2008-05-14T05:40:00.000-06:00

Everything started well for the trip, until about the time I got to the local airport. Joining me on my flight was a paranoid, crazy ex from about 10 years ago; apparently he has sprung out of prison, yippee. Then, some guy sat in my window seat, the seat that I had specifically selected when I bought my tickets. Otherwise, pretty uneventful trip. Oh, I barely made my flight in Frankfurt, was wandering in big circles around the airport despite having been given instructions a number of times (a dialogue consisting of pointing can be fairly difficult to follow). Oh, and I got about two hours of sleep by the time I got to Berlin the next day early afternoon (local time). I can't handle that kind of sleep schedule anymore.

BTW, I will be posting pictures at: http://berlinlog.site.shutterfly.com/

Now I'm even less ready

2008-05-10T17:08:00.002-06:00

Recap of the pre-class in Denver:

First, the drive was long, very long, and I spent almost as much in gas as I would have on an airline ticket. Second, meeting the people in the class and discussing urban politics made me see myself as I really am: old country bumpkin -

Allow me to elaborate, I never really thought that D-town was all that backwoods, particularly with how people in the county complain about it being so "urban." Well, I had a few hours to wander around downtown and become hopelessly lost. After this, I drove around and intentionally become lost and I realized that I feel a lot more vulnerable lost on foot that in a vehicle, this bodes poorly for my prospects in Berlin. Furthermore, the lecture was about the various issues at hand when dealing with urban issues, and everyone was contributing by comparing the various issues with certain areas in Denver, and my embarrassing body of knowledge is pretty well limited to the impacts on small business when Walmart moves in. To top it off, while there are two students who are twice my age, most of the students are younger than me. In fact, there are even one or two who will be able to take advantage of Germany's lower drinking age. I suspect this would not seem all that bad except they were acting like stereo-typical rich, hot, young things, ug.

Now I am developing a high level of terror about this whole thing. Oh why did I sign up for this madness?

Getting ready for Denver

2008-04-28T22:22:00.002-06:00

I am so completely overwhelmed right now. If you don't want to hear about it, stop reading right here.

Tonight N and I had our nerdy event and got home late, tomorrow it sounds like we will be going out (Tombo, the short notice was a little inconvenient), Wednesday is another nerdy thing that I really feel compelled to drag N to, Thursday is Nit Night (which I could skip, but really need to keep up relations with the girls) and Friday morning I leave for Denver for class Saturday morning, and I have read NONE of the over 250 pages of articles that we were supposed to start on. Oh, and I am swamped at work trying to catch up from being perpetually behind for a year, getting up to speed for leaving in three weeks for three weeks and maybe even getting on top of things, all the better to pass it over to someone new in the next six weeks or so. On the side, I'd really like to set up my new office and TRY to figure out some idea of what I will be getting myself into. Funny thing, I didn't do diddly this weekend. I pretty well collapsed and could not build sufficient motivation to do anything beyond what could arguably be construed as enjoyable, not good.

Uh, N just reminded me that I have early morning exercise class tomorrow, so ich gehe Bett.

Uh, nevermind

2008-04-02T19:47:00.002-06:00

Only have to go to Denver once, so, carpooling will be the way to go. Oh, and I guess I need to start working on homework, ug.

Unreasonable?

2008-03-26T08:49:00.009-06:00

I am thinking I might be making a few too many decisions based on little practicality and excessive fear/excitement. The excitement is outlined in the previous post, taking an extra WEEK to a) do whatever I darn well please thank you very much, and b) save a few hundred bucks (which honestly balances out with the lodging) to stay an extra 5 days.

As for unreasonable fear, before Berlin the class will meet in Denver on two separate weekends, one right after the other. There is another student from this area that would like to carpool and does not want to fly. I am fine to drive once, but I want to fly once for the following reasons: a) so excited that Frontier has joined the ranks locally and they have discounted rates to Denver through June; b) while I truly enjoy the seven hour drive once in a while, not two weekends in a row; and c) I want to make sure I can fly. Two really big concerns for people with a history of randomly collapsing lungs are scuba diving and flying (and apparently being in Colorado because of the elevation, but whatever). When we were in Mexico, N and I decided that we wanted to go scuba diving, but they would not let me with my history, even though I had surgery to paste the sucker back in place. Apparently flying is not supposed to cause these things to happen, it only makes it a lot worse if present, but since no one has ANY idea what does cause them, I am hesitant to believe that anyone absolutely knows what does not cause them, ya know. My doc said that smoking doesn't cause it, but it appears to happen more often to smokers. Also, some people can experience a collapse but have no symptoms. Also, I was told I had about a 10% chance of having a second one, and did about two weeks later. It is a very scary and very out-of-the-blue thing to have happen, and I would hate to be nervous for the duration of a 14 hour flight, I would much rather build up confidence on two 1-hour flights. Irrational fear, maybe. Do I care, maybe not.

Better than expected

2008-03-18T19:18:00.002-06:00

For those of you who sign in and wait with bated breath to find out what happens next in my big journey, you may have noticed that the ticker at the top of the page has jumped forward three days. No, I'm not trying to make time move faster and yes the ticker can count right, I'm really leaving three days early! When I got the final cost on the plane ticket, quite a bit higher than expected, I decided I had better keep checking prices. Thank god because I found a flight leaving three days earlier and getting back two days later than originally planed and than the rest of the group. Not only that, but I will pay less than anyone else in the group even though I am the only one not starting from Denver, how screwed up is that? Oh yeah, Yippee!

Honestly I am a little nervous about being in a foreign country by myself for three days before the rest of the group shows up, but people have done the same for forever. This certainly classifies as the most adventurous endeavor I have embarked on in a very long time and I think it will be a blast.

It's on!

2008-03-08T18:16:00.002-07:00

I'm going to Germany! My last class for a Masters and the only study abroad opportunity I've had. Now I just have a few details to take care of in the next two months like booking flights, catching up at work, getting ahead in reading assignments and learning German. Here we go...