Pfingstenpause (an excuse to Vacation) Part IX

Saturday
I meet Jenna in Nollendorf platz for the ginormous Saturday morning market crowding the entire market square. We buy some Strawberries and some Chinese noodles for lunch and head off to Potsdamer Platz for a sight of the remaining Mauer (wall), the business area of town, and the impressive Sony Center. Next to the Gedächtnis Kirche (a ½ destroyed church standing from WWII).

Shortly thereafter I return to my hostel and meet two new roommates, two Swedish girls my age, Annie and Carolin who were beginning their one month travels around Europe. We chat and decide to go together to the shopping district of the city near Ka-De-We (a department store that apparently celebrated its 100th B-Day on June 1st). We find cheap dinner at a buffet. Unfortunately the area was very pricey and the girls opted to dine out, pushing off shopping until the next day, Sunday. After our first drink we realized there were no cheap places so we head back near our hostel for Oranienburgerstrasse where there are lines of restaurants. The first bar tried for a real international flair, which was ruined by the loud football game in the background. Here the girls tried their first German beer. Next bar was Japanese, then an Indian bar where Annie and I had the strongest Coffee to make it out to the disco that night.

Next foreshadows our adventure. We follow a text message from Jenna to go to this German Disco in East Berlin called “Matrix”. We just make it there at midnight, trying to beat the deadline for no cover charge but are too late. We wait in line like an actual club; we pay a 6 Euro cover charge, and then try to find a good dance floor but our options were limited to old, hard-beating hip-hop or epileptic techno. Jenna and Tom seemed to be enjoying the hip-hop as we found them dancing together in an elevated cage. We decide to leave at 1:15 a.m. and head back to the train station. We hop on to start our train adventure; wrong direction, hop off, wrong direction, hop off, etc. etc. In total we took 8 different trains for 2 ½ hours until 3:45 a.m. when we could have just spent 14 minutes to get from the club to our hostel. What an adventure.

Where else but Berlin. Wait, wait...there's more coming soon in Potsdam...

Later Days,
Rick