Berlin

We got up early today for our walking tour of Berlin. It was cold and rainy for it, of course. We just can't escape rain. The rain didn't make the tour any worse for me, though. We got to learn so much about WWII history, which has always been so interesting to me. We started at a building where Hitler used to hold all his speeches. On either side of the staircase were two huge statues of men killing lions. Hitler liked this staircase for speeches because the lions were meant to symbolize the power the Nazi party had. He would do these speeches standing by himself because he was a short, angry little man and didn't want people to see how small he was lol. On this building, there were patched up bullet holes and patched areas from shrapnel. It was really cool to see that less than 100 years ago, something so chaotic and devastating happened right where I was standing. Now, it's a peaceful city still trying to find its identity. There were a few more stops that were really interesting to me, like an entire building for just one statue of a mother holding her dead son. It was used as a war monument. Afterward we went to the empty library. The empty library is another monument that represents the burning of the books. When Hitler first took over, he ordered all books by Jewish authors or in Hebrew to be burned in this square. Thousands of books were burned here. We carried on to the Brandenburg Gate. To get there, we had to walk down a street called Unter Den Linden. The Nazis used to March here, and in Hitlers classic antics, he told people hundreds of thousands were marching. It looked like it, but only because they marched around the block in a circle lol. In reality, there was about 50000 nazis marching. The Brandenburg Gate was built by the Greeks hundreds of years ago. On top of the gate was a statue of a lady on a horse carrige. This statue is called "the statue of victory." Everybody loved it, even Napoliean. Napoliean ended up stealing it and dragging it back to France, where he displayed it for a short amount of time before it was taken back to Berlin. Funnily when they put it back on top of the gate they repositioned the statue of victory to face and point at the French embassy building as a fuck you to the French. I thought that was pretty funny. We went to the "memorial for the murdered jews of europe," which was opened about 20 years ago. It's very abstract with grey concrete blocks in all different shapes. I think the grey rainy sky was the perfect setting for the plain grey blocks representing a grey Era. Unfortunately, the artist used concrete for these blocks, so it's had to be repaired a couple of times already. The last stop was Hitlers bunker, which is just a parking lot now. The tour guide told us how Hitler spent his last days here, suffering from schizophrenia from the opiods and meth his doctor was prescribing him. When he finally realized he was circled and the war was over he married his girlfriend of 18 years and they killed themselves. Hitler was shaky from the drugs so he was scared if he shot himself, he'd miss. So he took cyanide and shot himself. He ordered his generals to burn his dead body so they couldn't humiliate his dead body. The only known remains ever found of the little rat was a small jaw bone with two teeth on it. They were able to use dental records to confirm it was him. Not only did we get to learn lots about WWII, but the tour guide knew lots about the Cold War as well he told us about the Berlin wall. Everybody went to bed one night, and when they woke up, construction had started, and chainlink fences went up. People lost their jobs and were separated from their family's. Even one unlucky family had the border go right through their house. I have no idea what the rules were for them. After 31 years, the government held a conference saying they were reuniting east and west Berlin, and people could freely go back and forth. When the man reading the news to people was asked when this rule was coming into effect, he panicked and read the date of the meeting instead of the planned date 2 weeks in the future. So, people rushed to the borders excited to see their family members and friends. The city had a few choices, open fire on the citizens, open the border, or do nothing and let this angry mob get angrier by making them wait till the original date. They decided to let everyone in. For a city that's been caught up in a lot shitty history, they made the right choice for once. I really loved this walking tour it was right up my alley. A little bit of an extra was the tour guide pointed out the hotel Micheal Jackson held his baby over the balcony of his hotel. After we went to get food and warm up. Pearses cousin Amanda lives in Berlin and she wanted to go out to a club with us later that night. She told us the clubs have an all black dress code. Pearse needed some black clothes so we went to the mall and did a bit of shopping for our night out. We met up with Amanda for some ramen before the club. When I got my bowl, I added all the spices I saw in front of me and made an inferno on accident, but it was still so good. We went to a techno club called Kater Blau with Amanda. I have never seen anything like it in my life. It was by far the coolest club we've been to. As soon as you walk in the club they make you put stickers on your phone cameras. It felt pretty serious. We stayed till past 5 and got back to the hostel at almost 7. We had to be on the bus at 745 lol. I shut my eyes on the couch for about 30 minutes but it didn't help me lol. Overall it was an amazing dayRead more