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Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church

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    • TravelerThe Northern Finale
      Day 5

      Berlin — Mitte

      May 25 in Germany ⋅ ⛅ 75 °F

      I took a bus tour of Berlin today and then hopped off at Checkpoint Charlie. It’s a strange historical site. One couple was in line to take their Christmas card photo. Others were buying communist memorabilia. There’s a memorial nearby which solemnly tells the story of hundreds who died trying to escape to freedom. A block away there’s an escape room to attract tourists. An escape room. One of the preserved sections of the wall had the word “madness” in graffiti that someone had written on the East Berlin side long ago. Imagine being liberated from the Nazi regime and then to find yourself on the communist side of that wall. One elderly man was speaking to a group of tourists. “We hated the wall in Berlin. It separated us from our friends and family. To us it was like a prison wall.” He looked like he would have been high school age when the wall went up. It must be so hard for him to explain how important this was to people who barely remember the Cold War. I thought back to when I was teaching European geography in 1989. One student asked why West and East Germany were both colored in pink on the globe even though they were separate countries. My explanation was that our globes were 20 years old. They were from a time when people believed Germany might reunite so the map makers must have been hopeful it would one day happen, but chances of that happening seemed very slim. A month later the wall came down, and within a year Germany was reunified. I remember that student bringing me a clipping from the paper the day it was announced that East and West Germany were now one. He happily reported that he had told his parents, “Mr. Pisa’s globe was right!”Read more

    • TravelerEuro Beer & Magnet Tour
      Day 43

      What a Pain in the Neck!

      May 8, 2023 in Germany ⋅ ☀️ 19 °C

      Turns out our decision to take a hop on, hop off bus day in Berlin was positively prescient.
      Christine rolled over and cricked her neck first thing….walking all day would be out of the question, but some powerful Ibuprofen got us to the Big Bus stop.

      Berlin Cathedral, Museum Island, Brandenburg Gate, Reichstag on the outbound, & we stepped off past the Zoo to visit the Kaiser Wilhelm Church.
      Damaged beyond repair in WWII, it was retained as a memorial, with a very modern replacement immediately next door.
      I had seen it a few times on work trips, staying in hotels nearby….but there was a new poignant piece about the terrorist truck incident from 2016, killing 13 people at the Christmas market I had strolled through only days before….

      Checkpoint Charlie was the main stop for the return leg. Plenty to see at the point where the Soviet and US tanks faced off during one tense point of the Cold War, & a lot of sad stories of the oppression and the infamous Berlin Wall….evidence of which we found many times around the formerly blockaded City 👀

      Back at Alexanderplatz, we hopped on to the Blue tour route. Interesting to head through the former East Germany, some different architectural styled flats and plenty of art on the East Side Gallery: conserved graffiti on the remaining parts of the Wall.

      A trip back to hop off at the Reichstag and wander past the memorial of the murder of the European Sinti and Roma persecuted as “gypsies”. More sad, and brave, tales.
      Pictures at the Brandenburg Gate, & a look at the stark columns forming the memorial to the Holocaust. Moving stuff 😔

      We also learned the pink pipes all across the city were not art, or carrying gas, but are to take ground water from the many building projects to the River Spree 🤪

      The last bus back, then some dinner from the Vegan Pirates before taking a final S-Bahn home, & a beer in the bar back at the Social Hub 👍      Read more

    • Shazzij Travel LogDanube Cycle
      Day 37

      Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gedächtniskirche - Berlin

      July 21, 2016 in Germany ⋅ 🌙 23 °C

      The Protestant Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church (in German: Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gedächtniskirche, but mostly just known as Gedächtniskirche is located in Berlin on the Kurfürstendamm.

      The original church on the site was built in the 1890s. It was badly damaged in a bombing raid in 1943. The present building, which consists of a church with an attached foyer and a separate belfry with an attached chapel, was built between 1959 and 1963. The damaged spire of the old church has been retained and its ground floor has been made into a memorial hall.

      The Memorial Church today is a famous landmark of western Berlin, and is nicknamed by Berliners "der Hohle Zahn", meaning "The Hollow Tooth".

      The walls of the New Church are made of a concrete honeycomb containing 21,292 stained glass inlays. The glass, designed by Gabriel Loire, was inspired by the colours of the glass in Chartres Cathedral. The predominant colour is blue, with small areas of ruby red, emerald green and yellow.      Read more

    • skip's retirement travelGermany
      Day 5

      WW II Berlin

      August 17, 2021 in Germany ⋅ ☁️ 15 °C

      Most of Berlin was leveled by the bombing during the war. So not much is left. The 1st picture is of the bell tower of the Kaiser Wilhelm Church. The rest of the building was destroyed. The tower remains as a reminder.
      The 2nd picture is a beautiful villa overlooking the lake that has a dark history. This is the site of the Wansee Conference where Heydrich laid out the plans for the "Final Solution" for exterminating the Jewish population.
      The last picture shows the foundation walls of the former Gestapo headquarters. I'm told that Stalin ordered all vestiges of the Nazis be destroyed. So, what the bombers missed, the Soviet army eliminated. Hence, not much remains.      Read more

    • TravelerBerlijn
      Day 4

      Dag 4, West Berlijn

      May 5, 2022 in Germany ⋅ ⛅ 13 °C

      Het is nat buiten als ik wakker word, maar al snel laat het zonnetje zich weer zien! Na het ontbijt pakken we, wederom, de fiets en vertrekken we naar west Berlijn. We fietsen langs de ambassades en de Tiergarten. De eerste stop is bij de Gedächtniskirche. Het enige gebouw wat nog staat na de 2e wereldoorlog. Kapot geschoten, dat dan weer wel.... maar best mooi. We fietsen de Kurfürstendam op, de 3e allee van Berlijn. Hier vindt je de 'grote' merken en modehuizen, best leuk om te zien. We drinken even koffie en gaan langs de andere kant van de Ku-dam weer terug. Lunchen doen we bij KaDeWe.... dat hebben we geweten 😂 (duur!)
      Snel even rondgekeken en vervolgens richting het oosten weer. We gaan vanavond naar een voorstelling van Blue Men Group en dan zit het er morgen alweer op....      Read more

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    • TravelerBerlin ... Verrückt
      Day 3

      Bikinihaus vs. Monkeybar

      August 20, 2016 in Germany ⋅ ⛅ 24 °C

      In der Monkeybar lassen wir unseren ereignisreichen Tag ausklingen . Mit Blick auf den Zoo sitzen wir gemütlich im grünen über den Dächern Berlins. .. coolio 😎😘

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    • TravelerBali
      Day 1

      Aufbruch

      July 28, 2018 in Germany ⋅ ⛅ 29 °C

      Wir starteten in Mannheim mit dem Zug nach Berlin... erster Klasse, weil es da ein Sparangebot gab, was billiger war als der Normalpreis in der zweiten Klasse. Erste Klasse reisen ist toll... der Sitzplatz ist reserviert, die Plätze sehr komfortabel, wir haben gutes W-Lan und erst mal jede Menge Zeit zum Entspannen. In Berlin wohnten wir für eine Nacht im Holiday Inn Berlin City West ... kein schönes Hotel, sehr in die Jahre gekommen und niemals vier Sterne, aber für eine Nacht war es ok. Wir besuchten am Nachmittag die Berliner Innenstadt und kamen mitten in der Parade des Christopher Street Days: Menschenmengen... viel zu gucken ... viel Alkohol... viel laute Musik.

      Am frühen Morgen ging es dann zum Flughafen Berlin Tegel: unterirdisch. Wir haben noch nie und nirgendwo einen solch schlechten Flughafen gesehen: klein und unübersichtlich (das muss man erstmal hinkriegen), unverschämte Preise für Getränke und Frühstück, wenig Sitzplätze in den Gates... wenn man sich überlegt, dass hier Deutschlands Staatsgäste ankommen, ist das echt peinlich... es sei dann, sie haben noch irgendwo ein Fake-Terminal für gute Aussenwirkung.

      Der Flug mit Scoot Air war super. Scoot ist eine Tochtergesellschaft der Singapur Airline, die Billigvariante sozusagen. Die Flüge waren extrem preiswert, aber alles zusätzliche kostet extra, vom Gepäck über Sitzplatz Reservierung über Verpflegung... aber wenn man alles zusammen rechnet, sind wir doch in der Hauptreisezeit recht günstig (750.- € inkl. Gepäck und Sitzplatzreservierung pro Person hin und zurück) geflogen. Das Flugzeug war der Dreamliner von Boeing, den kannten wir schon von unserem Flug nach Aruba. Durch die Sitzplatzreservierung hatten wir Sitze ohne Vordermann und wirklich riesig Platz.

      In Singapur ließen wir uns in der Transit Zone E am Scoot Schalter die Boarding Cards für den Weiterflug nach Denpasar ausstellen; ansonsten haben wir die Wartezeit in einer netten Transit Zone mit viel Platz und viel Relaxing Arealen und einem Food Market (Rolltreppe hoch) verbracht. Der Weiterflug und die Ankunft in Denpasar waren entspannt, und wir sind dann mit dem Flughafentaxi nach wilder Preisverhandlung in unser Hotel in Kuta gefahren.      Read more

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    • TravelerBerlin Leichtathletik EM 2018
      Day 2

      Berlin, Deutschland

      August 12, 2018 in Germany ⋅ ⛅ 25 °C

      Mein Sportlerherz wird sentimental🙈
      Bei Liebesschnulzen verdrücke ich keine Tränen, aber wenn Athleten ihren Traum verwirklichen bin ich sehr nah am Wasser gebaut.
      Glückwunsch Malaika Mihambo 😍

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    You might also know this place by the following names:

    Kaiser Willhelm Memorial Church, Gedächtniskirche, Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church, Église du Souvenir de Berlin

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