The Excursion, Vol. 1: Mr. Gorbachev, TEAR DOWN THIS WALL! Great, Now Tour Me Around It!
We left on a cold Thursday morning, and armed with coffee and a book, I promptly fell asleep on the train; needless to say, it was a thoroughly enjoyable ride. We arrived in Berlin and had a few minutes to get lunch, so feeling pressured by Vanessa, I bought a Happy Meal from McDonalds and brought forth into this world the newest addition to our trip to Berlin: a stuffed bulldog that I named Kennedy. We all decided he would be the mascot for the week and would be important in all our activities and pictures.* After settling into the hostel, our tour guide arrived and for me, so did Christmas.
He wore an entirely matching tweed suit, complete with a jacket, golf cap, and knickers. I'm sorry, it bears repeating: KNICKERS. He merrily strolled us around Berlin showing us the remains of the Berlin Wall, the Brandenburg Gate, the Reichstag, the World War II Memorial and a Starbucks, occasionally punctuating his tidbits of history and mistranslated jokes with a cheerful "ha HA!" We enjoyed his company, which was inappropriately jaunty for the subject matter, and then went to dinner.
Though everyone in our group ordered his or her own pizza, it was only our end that ate it in its entirety. Food-drunk and euphoric, we decided it was time for alcohol.
Jessica and Friends Stumble Around Berlin Inquiring "What are Yooouuuu Loookin' At?"
A few of us found a liquor store next to the hostel and for a mere 4 euro drank like we were at a high school New Year's Eve party, taking long swigs from Champagne bottles and coming to the deeply philosophical conclusion that though it was torn down, every wall we were looking at was in fact a Berlin Wall. After thoroughly testing out every piece of equipment in a public playground, we set off with the rest of the group to a bar called "White Trash Fast Food" where I made sweet love to a hot fudge sundae.
The following day we toured the Reichstag, and I had the following fight with my arm:
"...You know the answer to that question. Just raise me."
"No. The tour guide is asking rhetorical questions. Just calm down."
"But the fire was what enabled Hitler to issue The Reichstag Fire Decree-"
"-Yeah I know, shut up"
"COME ON. JUST RAISE ME, YOU KNOW YOU WANT TO"
"...Stay....down!"
It went on like this until she got to a room I had never heard of and my not-so-inner nerd was silenced. Until we meet again, historical tour...
The next day we went to a concentration camp, which I can't describe in the same blog where I make poop jokes, so I won't. We later went to another museum about Jewish history, which was terribly confusing and extensive so Brittany and I decided we needed coffee before heading out that night, and it needed to be the Berlin equivalent of the Einstein: the Balzac Cafe.
We sat for a while, mistakenly drinking each other's coffee, going over Brittany's terrible 21st birthday when she choked on her coffee and started laughing uncontrollably. "Well, I guess that would only happen at a place called Balzac!" That's right. All that build up for a 7th grade "balls" joke that may never stop being funny to us maladjusted minds.
Later on, we went to dinner and then to Soda club. Only 3 things of note occurred there:
1)My hand stamp smeared on my face, which nobody bothered to tell me about until after I had taken several pictures; thankfully it was on the side of my mouth instead of someplace terrible, like above my lip. Which would not have been funny in BERLIN. However, the free shots made up for it.
2)I knocked over a bar stool in front of DOZENS of people, who simply looked at me in confusion as I put my finger to my lips and mouthed "NOTHING. HAPPENED."
3)They played "Celebration" by Kool and the Gang.
The last day was our traveling day to Prague, so we had a few hours of free time and Gina and I went to an underground tour, which turned out to be the highlight of our trip. We were led around underneath the metro tracks to a shelter for German citizens during the air raids of WWII by a diminutive German woman with black curls, tiny eyeglasses, and red lipstick. She talked with increasing dramatic flair, making dark jokes and serious declarations about human rights, the horrors of the National Socialists, and the function of the shelter during the war. She turned out the lights, shouted theatrically, and showed us artifacts that we'd never seen before and probably will never see again. I wanted to wrap her up in bubble paper and take her with us to Prague.
Later on, we shoved our clothes into overstuffed bags and headed to the train station to begin our next adventure, which will be relayed to you in the next installment: The Excursion: Vol. 2; I Find Kafka's House and Czech People Are Rude.
Auf Weidersehen!
*Note, this dog remained in my pocket for the rest of the trip and was only seen when I occasionally brought him out and remarked, "Oh hey, this dog is still here."
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