Berlin

My 7 hour train ride from Amsterdam to Berlin on August 3rd was extremely uneventful, as was my ride from the train station to my hotel. I was so tired from the trip that I didn´t do anything interesting that night! I actually fell asleep at 6:30pm and slept until morning!! My weekend in Amsterdam and my train ride completely tired me out!
The following day I set out to explore Berlin! I started with a city bus tour that covered the major tourist sites in the city.
Berlin is a city that I didn´t have much background knowledge of when visiting it. My parents visited it last year and tried to describe it to me, but hearing about it is different than seeing it for myself. Berlin is a very interesting city that was very badly destroyed during World War II, and then completely divided in half by the Berlin Wall.
I will give a very simplified and concise history of The Wall, and I will try my best to give as accurate information as I can, given my limited knowledge of this very complex history. The Berlin Wall, constructed on August 13, 1961, separated West Germany from East Germany, and it cut right through the middle of Berlin, separating the two sides. West Germany (and West Berlin) were free, and were close allies with the American, British and French, while East Germany (and East Berlin) was not free and were strictly controlled by the Soviet Union.
The wall and separation between West and East Berlin happened overnight, and a temporary ¨wall¨ of barbed wire was put through the city (until the real wall was able to be built). If you woke up on the wrong side of the wall then you were stuck. Boarder guards were ordered to shoot and kill anyone who tried to pass from one side to the other. Families, friends and loved ones who lived in different sides of the wall were torn apart. Houses that were on the boarder had their windows sealed shut so people could not escape through the windows.
The Berlin Wall stood for almost 30 years and was finally torn down on November 9, 1989, and the East was finally free.
Here are some of the remains of the wall:

Me with some of the remains of the wall. It was completed covered in paintings on the West side (but not the East side, as you were at risk of being shot and killed if you got too close to the wall).

I then went into the Checkpoint Charlie Museum. Checkpoint Charlie was a famous crossing point between East and West Germany.

The museum houses collections of photographs and objects showing the progression of the wall, and the numerous escape attempts. During the almost 30 years of the wall, more than 5000 people were able to successfully escape from East Berlin to West Berlin. They chose very inventive ways of escaping, for example through reconstructed cars with small compartments (large enough for 1 body), by using hot air balloons, another man constructed a small submarine and used it to drag himself along the Baltic sea, some people hid themselves in loudspeakers, or hollowed out surf boards, and many people built tunnels. It was very interesting but also extremely sad to see the measures that people had to go through in order to see their families. Some people were separated from their families for years and years, and some never saw their families again.

After that, I went to see the Jewish Museum. It was a very interesting museum, and it showed the story of Jewish people, and the history of the millions of Jews who lost their lives in the Holocaust. (It seemed that I was visiting one sad thing after another!)
The building was designed by Daniel Libeskind, and was designed to have many long empty hallways and areas, in a sort of zig zag design. The emptiness was designed to symbolize the void left after the Jews were removed from Germany and Europe.

I found it very sad to walk through the museum and read about the stories of families who had been taken into concentration camps, or had to escape. There were many photos, and personal objects of Jews who had been murdered or taken. It was just so sad.
After the Jewish museum I continued on my bus tour and saw some major city sites.
Berlin Parliament:
Some other nice areas of Berlin:

The Schloss Charlottenburg (The Charlottenburg Palace):
After that I made my way over to the KaDeWe, a very expensive luxury department store, very similar to Harrods in London. I needed a little cheering up after seeing such sadness and destruction earlier that day. I had so much fun walking through the Tiffany, Omega, Tag, Gucci, Fendi etc. areas of the store!! The best part was the top two floors, which are the luxury food food sections. They had different seated areas where you could sit and eat, so I had some sushi!! I also got a little carried away in the chocolate department… so delicious!!
The following day I decided to walk the route of the tour bus, since I felt I didn´t get a full feel of the city by just sitting on a bus. It was a long walk (it takes 2 hours by bus), but it gave me a chance to explore the city in more detail.
Some of the highlights of the walk are shown below.
The Brandenburg Gate, which was modeled after the Propylaia of the Acropolis (in Athens), completed in 1791.

While I was there I found a set of street performers that were really good!


From there I walked to the Jewish Memorial (also known as the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe or the Holocaust Memorial). There are 2711 blocks of concrete arranged on a sloping area, in a grid pattern. When walked through, it gives a sort of uneasy and confused feeling because of the sloping and the uneven heights of the blocks, this was done on purpose.
From there I went over to Berliner Dom, Berlin´s famous Protestant cathedral, completed in 1750.

I spent the rest of the day walking around the Museum Island (an island in Berlin that contains numerous museums), and the Hackescher Market area.
All in all it was a really great stay in Berlin! Berlin is a very interesting city with so much history, and I am so happy I was able to visit it and learn about it´s interesting past!