Berlin: trying to escape paying for the bathrooms.

Yes that's right. You may not have had to pay for the bathrooms in France but starting in Germany you better have cash on you if you need to pee. However, if you are eating in the restaurant you shouldn't have to pay but they will still ask for money, sometimes really aggressively. So pee and then run before they catch you for your 50-75 cents.

Welcome to Berlin where the tour we took went something like this “please look over to your right, where now stands a new hotel we are building, now if you look over to your left you will see this other new building that we just finished building”. Now I understand Berlin went through some terrible destruction during WWII but I didn’t realize this until I actually went to Berlin and saw that there isn’t that much physical history left. However, the places that we did see were incredibly eye opening. Also I got to see and stay with the wonderful Karo, another au pair friend. She was totally understanding when we got into Berlin in the morning and just wanted to take a nap, gave us a tour of the main points of Berlin, and packed us lunch on a daily basis!

I hadn't noticed this until now but apparently I took a great photo of two strangers when trying to photograph the Reichstag building.

Escaping the wall. 

One of the days we explored Berlin all by ourselves. First we took a cruise on the Spree to see the shore-side buildings. Personally I wouldn’t recommend this cruise to people who are like me and want to see historical Berlin. This cruise was cool to see modern buildings that Berlin has. [If you think about why that is: attacking bridges to stop supply runs and population transport is a strategically method of thinking by the Allies, so with history it makes sense why we saw mostly modern buildings along the shore].

We then went to explore the German History Museum, and walked around Museum Island. We ran into a not-so-lovely lady at the cash who for some ridiculous reason did not understand that summer vacation is a thing, and a student card cannot be validated until September (you know when school actually starts and you use the student card).  So unfortunately we did not see any of the Museums on the island. However, if you are in Berlin for a long period of time definitely check them out.

One of the museums on the Island.

At one point we went to a market that is very popular in Berlin called Hackescher Markt which we really enjoyed! We stopped by a comedy show (that was in German but who cares, actions are universal], and listened to some great music.

                                               

A market is more fun with beer.

So while in Berlin we were suggested we try “CurryWurst”, a sausage with curry powder and fries. It sounds simple but remember this is a German sausage and it was delicious! We also wanted to try some schnitzel, but we weren’t looking to pay 30 euros for the real veal meat. Instead we looked up a place on Trip Advisor that was apparently the best. So we ended up taking the train 20 minutes out of central Berlin to end up in a pretty sketchy area (the reviews on Trip Advisor did warn us about this to be fair), and came to a small place under the bridge. The place was decorated with black writings on the wall in all different languages. We ordered two pieces of the regular schnitzel (which came out to about 12 euros for both), and were incredibly pleased with the portions and quality of the food. The place is called Scheers Schnitzel, if you are in Berlin definitely check it out, it is worth the hike out.

I don't know how to flip photos in blogger... But this was the schnitzel we got! comes with a side salad. Just looking at this photo makes me want to go back to the place.

On our last night in Berlin we went out with Karo and her friends for some Happy Hour drinks. Luckily for us the bartender was kind enough to extend the Happy Hour prices well past the hour. After enjoying some large drinks we made our way home to start packing for our bus ride to Prague the next day.

Berlin where the monuments that do stand are breathtaking but you can see what war has done to them.