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!

Amsterdam

I left London the morning of July 31st. I had the sense to book my ticket in advance this time, and had no problems whatsoever with my ticket and seat.
The difference with this trip was that somehow, during my stay in London, my backpack had managed to grow exponentially in both size and weight. I had given Chad a duffle bag full of my stuff to bring home less than a week earlier to lighten my load. But somehow my backpack leaving London was so large and overweight that it was the first time I was unable to put it on my back without help!  I had managed to completely fill up my entire 95 liter backpack, and I would estimate it weighed at least 24 kilos. I have this miraculous ability to accumulate ¨stuff¨, when I travel, and even in my own home in Toronto/Hamilton (as anyone who has travelled with me or helped me pack while moving can attest to).
Lucky for me, there were many kind gentlemen who were willing to help me with my backpack, and when I didn´t have help, I would either drag it or kick it across the floor (it´s smooth, so it doesn´t provide much friction when dragging). If I was walking a long distance I would ask  someone to help lift it up so I could get it onto my back. Once it was on my back it wasn´t too bad.
To make matters a little more amusing was the fact that I didn´t pack my backpack straight, so it was lopsided, and looked a bit funny when viewed from the front.
I do believe that the photo doesn´t do the backpack justice, as the photo makes it appear smaller than it really is! Believe me when I tell you that I have never seen my bag so large (and heavy) in my 6 weeks on the road!
I arrived in Amsterdam after a 6 hour journey to find Fieke waiting for me on the platform! Fieke lives in Amsterdam and we met by spending 1 month traveling together through Japan last summer. I was thrilled to see her! (on a side note: she immediately burst out laughing at the sight at my oversized lopsided backpack).
She brought me by metro to her apartment. She lives in a refurbished sea container (yes the kind that they use to transport goods across the ocean in large transport ships…), in a sea container village, right next to the Amsterdam prison. The sea containers are stacked up one on top of the other, and each one houses one person. Each unit has its own bathroom, kitchen, bedroom and balcony. They are so cool! When she described them to me I couldn´t really picture them in my head, so I have provided some photos below to help visualize this idea:

Inside the apartment/sea container:

After dropping off my enormous backpack at her container we set out to see the city!
Amsterdam is a beautiful small city with lots of canals! It reminded me a bit of Venice, except that in Amsterdam you can drive OR boat around town, while in the city center of Venice you can´t drive as there are no roads, only canals and walking streets.
Amsterdam was very busy with people! This was because a) it was a Friday night, and b) the following day was the Gay Pride Parade and the whole town was pre-partying in preparation. 

Like my shoes?
We thought we would walk around and check out the Red Light District.  I´m not sure what I was expecting, I had heard so much about it over the years, but I didn´t have a clear vision of what it would actually look like.
Imagine a street, all lit up with lights and signs of different colours, lined with stores. All the stores have windows, and in the store windows, instead of displaying the merchandise, women in small bikinis or lingerie would stand. If you looked closer into the ¨stores¨ you could see that each woman had their own small room, with a bed in it, and curtains could be drawn so the people on the street couldn´t see into the room when the woman was ¨busy¨ with a client. In addition to the ¨stores¨ of woman, there were many sex shops, where one could buy toys, creams, costumes and many other objects to fulfill different unique fetishes, as well as small theatres when one could watch live performances.
I was unable to take a photo of the stores, and I wouldn´t have wanted to, as I felt really sad for the women in the windows. I can´t even imagine what it would feel like to be them, standing there, while horny tourists walk by, or even worse, actually go in and take part in the ¨services¨offered. We did not stay long, only long enough to do a quick walk through of the area.
We spent the rest of the evening hanging out and catching up with each other.
The following morning we made a trip to the Anne Frank house. Anne Frank and her family were Jews, originally living in Germany. They fled to the Netherlands when Hitler came into power, but when the Germans occupied the Netherlands in May 1940, the Frank family went into hiding. They occupied the two upper floors of the annex of Otto Frank´s (Anne´s father) company warehouse and offices, in a very small space accessible only by a small doorway and very steep stairs, concealed behind a bookcase.
They lived in this small area, which they called the Secret Annex, for over 2 years, in almost complete darkness and silence, as any movement or noise could reveal them. During these 2 years, Anne wrote diaries about her daily life, her feelings, her family, and the terror of the idea of being discovered. The office personnel working for Otto Frank helped them by bringing them food and supplies daily. After spending over 2 years in hiding, on August 4, 1944, they were betrayed by an anonymous phone call to the German police, and everyone in hiding as well as the non-Jewish helpers were imprisoned. Anne died after contracting typhus in March 1945, only one month before everyone was freed. Otto Frank was the sole survivor from the Frank family, and had Anne´s diaries published when he returned to Amsterdam. He also helped turn the Secret Annex into a museum.
While walking through the museum Fieke and I felt a sadness come over us. It reminded us of how we felt while looking through the museum in Hiroshima (Japan). It was so sad to see how they lived and suffered.
After the Anne Frank House we went to Amsterdam´s Royal Palace, built in the 17th century as Amsterdam´s city hall. During that time Amsterdam was one of the world´s most important trade center. In 1808 it was turned into a royal palace by Louis Napoleon (King of Holland and brother of Napoleon Bonaparte).
It was beautiful, with so many sculptures, chandeliers, paintings and decorated furniture.


From there we did some walking and found this enormous shoe!
After our photo with the shoe we made our way over to the Gay Pride Parade. We were so excited about it, so we thought we would be festive for the occasion by buying pink and purple scarves.
This would be my 5th Gay Pride Parade worldwide, as I´ve been to pride parades in Paris, Milan, Boston and Toronto. But this one was unique because the whole parade was on boats! 


¨Everybody Should be Free to Celebrate¨



There were people everywhere!! (on land and in boats!)


We had such a great time!! There was so much energy, music and happiness in the air!
We spent the rest of the day relaxing and hanging out at Fieke´s container before going out at night. The city was still energized and full of people through the whole night!
The following day, and my last day in Amsterdam, we slept in, relaxed, did some shopping, and other low key activities. I also had a chance to repack my bag. After my struggles getting from London to Amsterdam I knew I needed to make some changes!! I removed a small backpack (used for day trips) from my large one and filled it with stuff. I spent quite some time reorganizing my backpacks and finally was able to balance out some weight in preparation for my journey to Berlin the next morning (August 3rd).
I had a wonderful time in Amsterdam with Fieke, and I was very sad to leave her, but she promised me she will come see me in Canada very soon!

Last Impressions of London

On the morning of July 29 I set out on foot to continue my exploration of London. I had discovered how expensive the ¨tube¨ was (aka. the subway, as us Canadians know it as), charging 4 Pounds for a single ticket (which is equivalent to $8 Canadian). If you live in the city and use the tube every day then buying an ¨oyster¨card (a pay as you go refillable card) makes each trip much more affordable, or day passes are also available. But since I was hardly using the tube, none of those other options made traveling too cheap.
I first walked through Hyde park. I had been there the previous day with Adam, but the park is so large and beautiful that I wanted to see it again!
I spent the rest of the day walking around the city, checking out the shops, markets and other parks.
I really enjoyed the Piccadilly area, and I spent a lot of time walking through the streets around Piccadilly Circus shopping. Actually ¨shopping¨ is the wrong word for what I was doing, as everything was completely unaffordable for regular people. So I was walking through the stores, wishing I could be purchasing all the amazing and beautiful things I was seeing, and promising myself that one day  in the future I will go back and will be able to do some major shopping in this incredible city!
One thing I noticed about the city and the streets is that since the cars drive on the opposite side of the street than they do in Canada (and most of the world), they have signs at most crosswalks telling you in what direction to look when crossing! It helped me immensely since I was always so confused when crossing the street!!
Later that day I met up with my friend Patrycja, who is living in London for the summer. She took me to Covent Garden, and the Covent Gardens Market, which is a market with lots of shops and restaurants.
We had a dinner and drinks at a bar and restaurant overlooking the square. The square featured some street performers doing all their standard tricks.
We had a great evening together, and it was really good to catch up with her!
The following day, July 30th, I woke up super early so I could spend the whole day at the British Museum. It was founded in 1753, is the oldest public  museum, and it is one of the world´s most visited museums. It´s collection spans over 2 million years of history, and has collections from Africa, Asia, Europe, the Americans and the Ancient world. As an added bonus, entrance to the museum is free!! It was the first thing that I haven´t paid a fortune for since arriving in London!!
The building:

The Great Court, in the center of the museum:

Visiting the museum was one of the most amazing things I´ve done since arriving! I´m so happy I decided to visit it! I spent hours walking through the museum, but I will only highlight my favourite parts.
The first thing I saw, and my most favourite piece in the museum was the Rosetta stone, a famous stone which contains texts written in two Egyptian scripts and Greek. This stone enabled historians to finally decipher Egyptian hieroglyphs.
  After the Rosetta stone I went through the galleries on Greece and Rome. It was interesting to see the Parthenon gallery because they boast that the museum contains about half of the artifacts recovered at the Acropolis (the other half are in Athens at the New Acropolis Museum). What´s interesting, and what they do not mention anywhere in the British museum, is that I remember our tour guide in Athens telling us that the city of Athens was trying to get back these Parthenon and Acropolis artifacts, and Britain wouldn´t give them back as they were taken many many years ago. I´m not sure how accurate this information is, and it could have just been the opinion of our tour guide, but it´s still interesting!!
They also had a large exhibit on Ancient Egypt, and had many mummies on display.
Here are some photos from the museum:

Cleopatra´s Mummy:
The museum also had pieces from the Mausoleum at Halikarnassos, which is one of the Seven Wonders of the World. Below is a set of sculptures from this Mausoleum:
Below is the cameo-glass Portland Vase from Rome, made during the turn of the 1st century. It is a masterpiece, that is very difficult to make. It was preliminarily blown into shape and coated in opaque white, and then blown into full size. Once at full size, then the design was carved out of the white layer to create this masterpiece.

After the museum I went back to my hotel to rest and pack my luggage before going out for dinner with some friends. But I arrived at my hotel room to a very unpleasant surprise. The door to my room was open, and the lights to my bathroom were turned on. I searched my room for another person, but I couldn´t find anyone. Apparently the cleaning staff at my hotel had forgotten to close the door after they were done cleaning, and it was left open all day!! Luckily all my belongings were intact, and nothing was stolen, but I was very angry.
I immediately went down to the front desk and told them what happened. They assured me they would talk to the manager and the housekeeping staff. This wasn´t really enough for me, so I convinced them to let me have a meeting with the manager. I told the manager how upset I was about having my hotel room left open all day, and that I was really disappointed in management, and if I wasn´t leaving London the following day I would have switched hotels. The manager was very nice about it and came up to my room with me, and then she had my room switched to a larger room, with a larger bed and a larger bathroom. She also offered me wine and drinks to make up for what happened. She even carried my extra large and heavy backpack down to the new room for me!! I was satisfied with the service after that (even though I was still unimpressed with why it happened in the first place).
After my meeting with the manager and my room change I went out to meet some of my contiki friends for dinner.
This was my last night in London, and I was sad to leave!! I loved the city (apart from how expensive and unaffordable everything was), but I was super excited for my next stop: Amsterdam!!