Day 82: One Last Look

Guten Morgan. Our last (full) day. A day for cleaning, packing, and last minute sight-seeing.

First things first... we must send three more boxes. But, they are heavy and awkward, too much to carry, so we take a taxi. It's a short distance for a taxi ride (5€) but it helps us get the packages to the Deutsch Post.

I'm a little bummed that this is how we're spending our morning. I had wanted to get in one more walk with Chris to his office. I wanted to run home via Mauerpark one last time. But, after last night's debacle, we slept in a little bit and these boxes have got to be mailed. It's another short line at the Post, today, so there's that!

The woman said, as far as I could understand, that because one of the boxes was valued over 800€, we would have to pay a little more (to insure it?) She asked if that was ok... and what were we supposed to say? Not much choice, so we say, yes, it's fine. I quietly add, "Es ist was es ist (It is what it is)". And she added, "Genau (I agree or exactly)."

After shipping the boxes, Chris heads to work and I head back to the apartment to clean. Either because of the prospect of needing to clean, or more likely, the fact that we are on our last day, I am relishing my short walk home. I feel the air, look at the shops, and try to soak up as much "Berlin" as I can.

Meanwhile, we have no internet. It was out when we arrived back last night. It's still out today. It's being fixed, but there is no news as to when this might happen. It's frustrating to all of us to not have our connection to the outside world (ok, the kids can't play their games or watch YouTube and I can't blog). This lack of internet adds to all of our sadness about leaving.

Mould in the cream cheese

The kids and I tired to eat out of the refrigerator. The kids ate the rest of their frozen dumplings, rest of their chicken nuggets from last night, and other foods from the refrigerator. I thought I'd have a bit of cream cheese on one of our last tortillas... but, I found mould in the Philadelphia cream cheese! Maybe we got "something" in to the cream cheese and it "grew", but still... I have never seen this much mould in cream cheese that is only a few weeks old. I'm convinced it's because it's "fresher" than the stuff they market in the U.S. Either way. Gross.

The Brandenburger Tor continues to be one of my favourite spots in town. It's on my list of things I want to do today. See the gate one more time with the kids. We hop on transportation and head over.

The kids and I take in the gate one last time. Then we're off for one last visit to the Jewish Memorial. As we walk through the gate, I see, what I think could be the inlaid stones, that used to be the wall... and then, doh! I realise they are just the outline of a bike lane. But, as we make our way to the memorial, I see more inlaid stones in the street going at odd angles... ahhh, that's the path of the old Wall. I had wanted to see it and now I have. Check!

The path of the Wall (left), Bike lane (right), Cool manhole-cover (right)

The kids enter the memorial and take one more tour around. I take more photos, and really just soak as much in as I can. The sounds. The sun. The shadows.

And now it's time to say good-bye to the memorial. Good-bye to the gate. It's hard to not look back.

"US"
UBahn and SBahn

And now for an errand. Remember, I have no raincoat anymore. We're about to go to London during the rainy season. I must get a coat. So, we're off to the Galleria one last time. I'm not as sentimental about the Galleria, but I will say it has become a lifesaver in many instances.

We decide, that since we'll be there anyway, let's take a quick detour to see the World Clock one more time. It really is a beautiful day and great weather for us to be out and about (makes all our sight-seeing fun and leisurely).

I do find a coat to buy that fits my needs... at least I think so. Out of the 1,000 coats I see for sale, there seem to be only about 3 choices for waterproof. Of course, I can't read most labels and then there are many without labels. The only one I found with a label and in English said, "water resistant" not "water proof". Sigh. So, I settle on a coat that looks like it's water resistant and isn't too expensive (after all, I have tons of coats back home, so no need for a new one...)

After this, we head to the parks near our house. The kids play for about 15 minutes ate the big one (where the kids did a bit of circus arts and ping-pong). And while I was in the middle of emailing on my phone (using cellular service since we have no wifi), I sent the kids to the park across the street to take one last go at the steep slide. I finished my email and went to catch up with the kids. At this point, I realised that "across the street" might be ambiguous as there are a few branches of streets intersecting at this point. I'm now worried that they took the wrong street and we'll be lost from one another... in the dark. I look on the street that I think they could have accidentally gone down... I don't see them.... so I head to the park, and, phew, there they are, swinging and having fun... in the dark (good thing it is dark, at one point, Xander had to "water the plants" and the darkness gave him good cover).

It's cold. It's dark. It's late. So, we don't spend too much time at this park. Time to get home so we can go out to dinner one last time.

Dark park (left), Zionskirche (right)

As we head out with Chris, we see our tram coming. We run about two blocks to be able to catch the tram. I guess I got my run in after all! And... guess, what... it's the wrong tram, which we only realised two stops too late. Time to back track. Whoops!

We picked Zia Maria for our last dinner in Berlin. This was a good pizza place and it's a place where we don't need to make a reservation. Other than the tiny fly that kept bothering Xander (and landing on his head, so he said), we enjoy a perfect last meal.

We are looking forward to more Hokey Pokey for dessert (that super yummy ice cream place that has been recommended time and time again by one of Chris' coworkers). But... it closed at 7pm (it's close to 9pm now). So, dejected, we head home for ice cream from our freezer (silver lining... cleaning out the refrigerator).

Between the wild boar delay, no internet, no Hokey Pokey... we've decided it's the universe making it a little easier for us to leave Berlin.

Day 58: Festival of Lights

Part 2 of the Day

After coffee time, we headed to our dinner destination. No reservations, but we're going on the idea that we're early. Seems to work every time.

As we near the area of the restaurant, we notice the street ahead has multiple polizei cars blocking the street. We try to go around, so as to avoid whatever's happening. Only, when we round the corner on the other side, there are more polizei. No one seems to be panicking, no one seems to be "alert", they just seem to be blocking car traffic. Pedestrians are strolling within this "boundary" of polizei. We did have to go about half a block past the barricade, but we never did see what was going on. We did hear someone on a megaphone. We're guessing some sort of rally? Again, no one sounded too energised or angry, so a peaceful rally? We arrived safely to our destination and there were plenty of places to sit.

Chris had heard of this restaurant (Zur kleinen Markthalle) from a friend. Supposedly the crispy Chicken here is really good. Crispy Chicken is a popular dish, here in Germany, and is usually sold as a 1/2 chicken plate (1/2 Backhendl or baked chicken). Because dinner is so early today, we're not as hungry as we'd like to be. You know, to enjoy more food! So, we only order a few dishes to share, including a warm, freshly cooked pretzel. Funny thing, Chris asks, "How big is the pretzel?" The server looked confused as she said to us, "It's pretzel-sized." Ha! Just for the record, it seemed smaller than pretzel size (at least smaller than some of those giant ones we see at the stands), but perhaps it was the size of a normal, every-day pretzel.

The Festival of Lights began last night and will run for two weeks. We headed out to see some of the places tonight, hoping to cross a few off the list (there are over 20 spots with lights). We began at Potsdamer Platz, because I wanted to see "The House of Cards". Most of the lights are on the sides of buildings, but this one is three-dimensional in the middle of the sidewalk. The artists are from a German-Israeli group who are depicting "50 years of German-Israeli relations".

Building near Potsdamer Platz, with "fruit" lights (left), Street in Potsdamer Platz (middle-left)
The "Rolling Balls" with sound effects display (middle-right), Potsdamer Platz (right)

When we arrived at "The House of Cards", they were dark. Turned off. A man was inside the "House" fiddling with, what looked like, 1,000 cords. We walked down the street for a bit, taking in other lights around the area, when we looked back and "The House of Cards" was fixed! Wahoo! The lights were flashing, on-off, here there, and then fully lit (then the routine would repeat). Cool.

After enjoying "The House of Cards" for a while, we turned around to watch a display on the side of a building in the same "square". This one was a video showing different kinds of balls rolling, plunking, and spinning through a contraption of sorts. All the while we could hear the loud sound effects accompanying the display. Xander was mesmerised.

But, the cold weather, and our patience urged us to move along to the Brandenburger Tor. I thought Potsdamer Platz was crowded... oh boy! The Brandenburger Tor was super, duper crowded. From the S-Bahn exit to the gate measures at least a football field, if not more. It was packed from the moment we stepped out of the Bahn and up to the street level. We wove our way around and about, trying to see if we could get a better view (poor Xander is shorter than us and we needed to find a place where he could still see).

Interestingly, once we got into the thick of the crowd... it actually started to thin out and we found a great spot to hang out and watch the show.

Images by Noir displaying on the Brandenburger Tor

The display on the Brandenburger Tor is a video comprised of 6 finalists' entries. The theme is "Vision of Energy". Germany was one of the finalists (perhaps they were "favoured" to get in) and was super fun with all the "Berlin" references (Buddy Bears, faces by the artist Noir, the Fernsehturm, the World Clock... and more). I think the other countries were Hungary, Poland, France, Australia, and Austria. Each had about a 2 minute show with their interpretation of "Vision of Energy". There were lightning strikes, windmills, green trees growing, flowers, geometric shapes.. and all sorts of other ideas in the 6 presentations.

I think these are all from the German finalists.

This program would repeat. We came in the middle of the last finalist, so we waited a few minutes and the program began again, this is when we learned about the different finalists and theme. Lots of appropriate oohs and ahhs from the audience. Lots of people putting their cameras on tripods to record video. Lots of people taking photos, of course (look at the video below and you can see all the glowing smartphones).

I don't remember which country created these amazing scenes. Lightning (top)
Beautiful colours (bottom), possibly from Austria.

I took a little video. Unfortunately, their sound equipment wasn't very powerful, so if you were far away from the speakers, you could barely hear the soundtrack. So, in our video, you probably hear mostly us talking :)

After the Brandenburger Tor performance, we headed through the gate and around the back to see the American Consulate's display. Well, I will grant that anyone following the Brandenburger Tor performance is probably doomed to fail in impressing anyone. But boy, the American Consulate's display was pretty boring. It was politically correct... and static. We should have visited this one first, then we wouldn't be so disappointed.

The upside is that we got to see one of the "lighted guides" walking around in her suit of lights (she had controls that could make a smiley face on her back, flashing lights, coloured lights, etc.) on her metal stilts. We also happened to cross paths with a Buddy Bear dressed to look like the Statue of Liberty (and bonus, "She" had a pink ribbon saran wrapped around her bosom).

"Statue of Liberty" Buddy Bear (left), American Consulate (middle), Lighted Guide (right)

It's late. It's cold. It's time to return home. We have to forge our way back through the crowds to find the S-Bahn station.

It is at this moment, so close to being "done" for the night, that Xander trips and falls, twisting his ankle. His reaction guarantees something big happened. But then he calms down quickly, which helps me believe nothing is broken. We offer to carry him home, but he refuses and he sadly limps to the Bahn. Chris thinks quickly and I have Advil in my purse. Xander takes it and we hope it's enough, we have big plans for tomorrow and we'd like to keep them!

He's grateful to get into bed with the thoughts, "Of the lights we got to see, I liked the Brandenburg Gate the best."

Day 52: German Unity (and Shopping)

German Unity day and Shopping day - Do Over

I guess that's the luxury of being somewhere for a while. If you miss out one day, there's another day to give it a try.

We all overslept, again. I don't know how it happens that we can do this, especially since our neighbours upstairs seem to be raising a herd of elephants. But seriously, you can hear them walking around ALL THE TIME. I woke up at 4:22 am and heard them walking back and forth for a long time. I know they have kids, but I don't know why anyone on a Sunday morning would be doing that much walking around that early. And it's loud. Not to the point where it sounds like they're  jumping or doing something silly, it does sound like they're just walking... but it's loud enough that I often think my own kids are about to enter our room after walking the hallway. It often tricks me into thinking it's in our apartment instead of above us. This is why you should always live on the top floor. Sigh.

Ok, we're not going to see if the farmers market is open today, or any market for that matter. We're going to go boot shopping. Chris needs some. I need some. Again, how does one shop in a city where there are tons and tons of shopping but you don't really want to go to every. single. store. looking for the right boot? And if you remember, I did get some the other day, only to see my "dream" boot in a window just across the street from our apartment. For Chris, we check on-line. I remember seeing a cool-unique shoe store that got rave reviews when I was looking for dirndl shoes for Oktoberfest. I looked again and the store is located nearby. They are top notch, and priced accordingly. But we'll take a look because they have a good selection and Chris' feet are hard to fit as well as he (like all of us) is particular in taste.

Anyway, we're off to go see if we can shop. At our tram stop, we are able to pass by "my" boot store. It's closed. No sign. Well, I can always come back during the week, if needed. But as we wait at the tram stop, I notice a poster advertising "Sunday Shopping" for The Mall of Berlin (a section in town, maybe like UnionSsquare in SF). It says they're open today for shopping from 1-7pm! Ok, so maybe that's just for that mall... or maybe it's for all stores that participate in the Sunday Shopping?

And we're crossing our fingers that the tram doesn't do what it did yesterday (take that weird route)... phew, it is back to "normal" schedules today.

Sunday Shopping (left)
So is short for Sonntag (Sunday) but it seemed funny to us, "So Closed", yep, that's for sure (right)

We get to Hackescher Höf and find the store Trippen (for Chris) and it's not open yet. We look around and check out other stores. Eat Berlin. Chocolate. A toy store. At one of the stores we ask and they say, oh yes, the stores should open at 1pm. We're just early. So it seems that there's the agreement that stores open for Sunday shopping at 1pm unless they decide to open early. Ok.

So, we'll do lunch while we wait for Trippen to open.

We ate at Hackescher Hof (left) instead of Oxymoron (bottom of the right photo)
The photo on the right also shows an independent movie theatre.

Random photo of Venice's hair looking very pretty.

We showed Chris around this cute shopping area and the Amplemann store. We wanted him to see what we explored the other day. We didn't, however, go into the Amplemann Store (we spent enough there for now!)

After lunch, Trippen was open. Chris went to try on food as the kids played on the store's custom made tiles and then out in the courtyard. Chris had really good luck and ended up buying two pairs of boots. The woman who helped him talked about how the leather will last a very, very long time. That if he brings the shoes back, they can resole the shoes and they will be good for another very, very long time. He asked about shipping, etc. since we don't live here and how that could all work. But she was very adamant about knowing how we can have the shoes resoled and they'll last for-EVER.

At this point, the kids were "done" with shopping (and yes, we did buy them ice cream for doing "so well") No desire to look around anymore, so we headed home. At our tram stop at home, I noticed "my" boot store was open (they probably opened at 1pm!) I asked Chris if he'd come with me to help me try some on, he said yes. We sent the kids the 1 block-walk home with our packages and keys. A win-win situation.

The woman working at this store spoke very limited English. Enough to say words like, "stretch", or "good for winter", and things like that. It is a very small store and most of the shoes are up high. So as I was trying on different styles of boots, she was going up and down the ladder, working very hard for me. I was worried that I wouldn't like any of the boots and she'd have gone up and down for no reason. The boots I went in looking for did not fit well, but there was another style that fit very well and I thought would be comfortable for walking miles every day. I went in looking for black. Thought about brown and taupe. And walked out the store with dark green! Yay for us all!

By this time, we were almost running out of time to head over to the Brandenburger Tor again! So, we rallied the kids, got ourselves ready and headed out to the tram stop again.

We arrived at the perfect time. The sun was beginning to set and it cast a beautiful light through the Brandenburger Tor. The ferris wheel created a cool silhouette in the late-afternoon sky. And... it wasn't crowded at all?! Where was everyone? I think they were shopping because stores were open on Sunday. And, they all probably came yesterday when it was the "real" holiday. Whatever the reason, it's not crowded and it's perfect weather (not freezing like it was at Oktoberfest!)

The Brandenburger Tor from the East side.

We weren't allowed to walk through the Brandenburger Tor, we had to go around a bit. This is because the music stage was set up right on the other side (the west side) of the gate. And, they seemed to be directing admissions to the area through a small security check. I think they're mostly looking for fireworks, flares, and glass bottles (things that are not allowed inside). We don't go through any metal detectors, just a "open your purse we want to glance inside" type of security (like for a football game or something).

The Brandenburger Tor from the West side.

Photo by http://www.pfalz-express.de/

Coca Cola has a huge presence at this celebration. Their ads are everywhere. Photos by them are on the barriers. The sound equipment has their logo. There are sound speakers all along the street and several big screens to show what's going on the stage no matter where you are along the faire. Big sponsors. The singer we saw the most of was Marc Marshall. A good singer with a stage presence... like Don Ho? I don't know, I felt like we were at a lounge show in Vegas or Hawaii. It was that kind of entertainment. Of course, 90% of what he was singing was in German. Anyway, he sang his heart out as we walked the street (the celebration is happening on Straße des 17. Juni, I think I said this already, the street on the west side of the Brandenburger Tor) looking at the food options and aiming for the ferris wheel.

Xander LOVED watching the patterns on the ferris wheel, watching for
patterns and thinking how he would program it if he had the chance.

Views from atop the ferris wheel. You can see how uncrowded it is!
Victory Column (top and bottom-left), Brandenburger Tor (bottom-right)

After our ferris ride (Venice is excited to ride every ferris wheel we ever cross paths with, and so far, so good), we looked for dinner. The kids and I opted for a Chinese cart while Chris went looking for bratwurst of some kind. After eating, we looked for dessert. Chris = crepe with nutella and coconut. Venice = chocolate covered strawberries (we had to go up and down the street on this one as no one could quite remember where we saw it). Xander = zuckerwatte (but it was old so he didn't end up eating it). Diana = zuckerwatte (yay, I got two as I'll eat old cotton candy and I took Xander's!)

Funny story: As we were purchasing Venice's chocolate covered strawberries, Chris handed the woman €4 (the sign read €4). But the woman said, "No, €2." We looked again and saw a different sign. We were confused and looked at her and she said, "Happy hour!" Ah! We gathered that it was nearing the end of the night and they were trying to sell off all inventory before closing down. Perfect timing for us!

With our treats in hand, we headed back towards the Brandenburger Tor to exit and head to the Bahn station. We thought the last performer was done and we thought the evening was over. But no! There was one more "act", from a local radio station. We're not sure if all the singers with this "act" are from the radio station or if they are regular people who tried out and won a spot in the show or what. But, they introduced, "Tina Turner," "Kim Wilde," "Joan Jett," "AC/DC," and more. The "house band" was comprised of "Slash" on lead guitar, "Ringo Starr" on drums and more. The performers were pretty talented and it was fun to be at this eclectic concert. It helped that we (including the kids) recognised most of the songs. So, we stuck around to watch them all.

The lights on the Tor were particularly fun to watch. The last song of the night? We Are The Champions (by Queen). What a fun way to end the evening.

Random story: At one point, a super tall man (and his companion) stood right in front of us. I want to say he was about 7 feet, but maybe more like 6'5"? I don't know. Dude was tall. No worries, we've had an unobstructed view for a long time and we could easily move back and forth if we wanted to see better. They also didn't stay too long. But as he stood in front of us, I could only think, "Poor guy. He's so tall, he must block people's view wherever he goes. And he probably gets dirty looks for it."

Some of the awesome lights during the show (left). The super tall man (right).

Congratulations, Germany! Gute Nacht!

Day 48: Shopping

Today's goal is to find a flash drive for Xander. He is making videos for his YouTube channel and wants to speed them up (from an hour to 4 minutes) and needs to be able to get them from the shared computer to mine (which has the software to speed it up).

Seeing the under-workings of an escalator (left)
Me, mimicking the statue (right)

Finding a Radio Shack type of store has proven difficult, so we are headed to the Sony Store, because they will have one and we know where the store is! The timing is ironic (or coincidental, English lessons can wait), as I have run out of computer space. Several of my programs are quitting on me and/or won't run. I can't save my photos... all is crazy for me. So, I have purchased a hard drive via Amazon.de so that I didn't have to go all over town looking for one, or spending a pretty penny at the Apple Store. But, here we are, going to the Sony Store... my hard drive is coming today (to Chris' work), but had I known a trip to the Sony store was in my future, I would have just purchased it there and had it hours earlier. Anyway... that's the way it goes.

After lunch, we headed to Potsdamer Platz, where the Sony Center is located. We walk in and don't even need to search the multi-leveled store, as the flash drives are right there on the first floor. Found one. Boom, done.

Xander wanted me to include that as I got my change Euros and 1 cent, the cashier said, "And a lucky cent." (instead of lucky penny)

Bubble Tea in the sunshine.

Playing around with the iPhone and perspective.

Venice (still crazy about bubble tea) asked if we could get bubble tea after our errand. The restaurant we decided to buy the tea from, didn't actually have the "bubbles" (tapioca balls), instead they had strawberry bubbles... I can only explain them as having the consistency of a bath oil ball, that melts in the warm bath water and then eventually explodes. Needless to say, I didn't care for these anymore than I care for the squishy tapioca ones.

But, I did enjoy the sunshine and the beautiful day. We found a spot behind the Sony store that had some lush green grass and interesting landscaping (wall/retainer walls).

From here, instead of getting back on the Bahn, we decided to walk through the Tiergarten. We've been through the main thoroughfares (on a bus) but not walking through the pedestrian pathways. I, for whatever reason, wanted to see the Brandenburger Tor again, so we cut through the Tiergarten on the western side to get there.

Tiergarten

The kids are stomping acorns (middle) and Xander shows us the nut inside (right).

As you can see from the photos, the weather continues to be cool, but not freezing. The leaves are falling, and some are turning, but things are still pretty green.

Unfortunately, we were not able to walk through the Brandenburger Tor! There were fences all around, tents going up, and more. At first, Venice wondered if it was left over from the BMW marathon that happened last weekend, but that seems too late for event items to still be up. As we walked around to the other side of the gate, we saw the banners.. duh! The 25 year anniversary of German Unity is this Saturday!

Signs tell us it's on the street west of the gate and that you are not allowed to bring in fireworks, flares, or glass bottles. No problem! And Chris found out from a coworker that it's free entrance and will have live music, food, and such. So, one more festival!

So, this is exciting and a great reminder of what to do this Saturday. However, I have to say, I was bummed we couldn't walk through the gate (had to go around)... To make up for this, I decided to do another shopping errand I've been thinking about. A stop to the other Amplemann store in Hackescher Höf (instead of the one inside the Potsdamer Platz we went to earlier in the trip).

Hackescher Höf is a set of shops near Hackescher Markt. The kids and I walked around twice before we found the store. The area is really quiet nice. You walk between/under two buildings and come into a set of courtyards. The courtyards are surrounded by buildings. All have stores on the bottom floor and apartments on the upper levels. I think only cars that are delivering are allowed in, so it's mostly a walking area with nice little shops.

Entering the courtyard that has the Amplemann store (left)
A view of the Fernsehturm from Hackescher Höf (right)

Then, back home on the M1 tram.

Dinner time!

Day 3: Sweat Boxes and Rain

OMG! I SLEPT IN!
First, I woke up around 4:30 and had some wicked insomnia. I was committed to getting back to sleep. I don't know how long it took me, but I did see the sky lightening and worried I was up for the day. However, next thing I know, I hear Chris around the corner and I ask what time it is... 10am! Wow. Nice to get all that sleep, and I definitely slept like a log once I fell back asleep. The bad news is I woke up on my back funny which led to my arms feeling numb and I definitely had an "off" feeling all morning, just feeling disorientated. I'm ready for jet lag to be over! Good news, we have to get up at 7 am tomorrow, so there's that. Not sure that information is pertinent, but just when we're sleeping in a little, we have to wake up to an alarm. More Murphy's Law.

Chris had gotten up and gone for a run. Great for him and his state of mind. Great for us as he did a lot of reconnaissance. He found the closer ATM, directions to some main areas, and just got a better feel for where we're located. He schooled me with a map in front to help pass along his discoveries.

TAXIs and THE 100 BUS
Breakfast was late. We sat around and chatted at the table. The we lunched and headed out after 2pm. We decided to ride the 100 Bus, a regular city bus that also doubles as a hop-on, hop-off tour of the city. You buy your bus ticket, get on the 100 bus, take it to a monument, hop-off, check it out, then hop back on and head to the next site.

Chris used a newly downloaded taxi.eu app to call a taxi. A taxi arrived in front of our apartment 6 minutes later. Nice! It was a "dry run" for tomorrow morning when we'll need at taxi at 7 am to take us to the airport. Chris asked the driver if it was easy to get a taxi and the driver said, "Oh yes, in Berlin, easy."

We got the starting point of the 100 Bus line (near the west end of the Tiergarten). Reminded me of Golden Gate Park in SF. I'm guessing it's similar to Central Park in NY, too. Lots of green space, lots of park areas to picnic, lots of walking paths, etc. Located at the other side of the Tiergarten is the aquarium and the zoo. And somewhere near there is where the 100 Bus line begins.

Of course, trying to hydrate, we are drinking a lot. Which means, as soon as the taxi drops us off, Venice and I need a restroom. We didn't see any public-pay toilets, to we went to McDonalds. Sigh. We hadn't set foot into one of these for over 5 years now, but when you gotta go, you gotta go. They had a bathroom with an attendant at the entrance. You tip her and she gives you a paper towel. Perhaps you'd get the towel anyway, but we'll tip, as it's the custom.

Buying bus tickets. (left)  Ducking so I can snap the KFC. (right)

Feeling better (other than using McD's), we got tickets and jumped on the first bus (or Sweat Box, as I like to call it) to come by (they come every 5 minutes.) Yes, we climbed to the top of the double-decker bus to get a better view. Yes it was over 85 F. Yes, it was humid. No there wasn't any air conditioning on the bus. Yes, we melted. No, we did not have a map to understand the route. So, yes, we jumped off the bus was sooner than planned and walked a little farther than expected. But, we got to see more of the Tiergarten than we expected (and more of a sunbathing man than we expected to!)


SIEGESSÄULE

First tourist spot, Siegessäule, The Berliner Victory Column. Three Euros per person. To do it or not to do it? We did it. It was good. It was a LOT of stairs. We thought you could only go to the second floor (thus the ticket debate), but you can actually climb all the way to the top, to just underneath the golden woman at the top.

Xander photographing the Brandenburger Tor from the second floor (right). 

We went in and explored the exhibits on the main floor, then climbed to the second floor viewing area. We thought this was it. Nope! We then climbed the 285 steps to the top. The kids made it, but felt more comfortable heading back down to the second floor. Chris and I stayed at the top, circled it once, took a few photos, and then headed back down to meet the kids. Going down was much easier, but faster and more dizzifying.


REICHSTAG
Next stop was the Reichstag. But first, another sweat box ride on the 100 Bus. When we got to the bus stop, we realised Xander had misplaced his ticket. We let the first bus go by, it was too crowded. The second bus came and Chris asked the driver if he spoke English (he didn't), so we tried to say we lost the ticket, and wanted to buy another one. Chris showed him his receipt. Just blank stares or shoulder shrugs, so we got back off. Third bus, was right behind the second bus so it just drove by (darn it, maybe that bus driver spoke English!). But then we remembered our friends saying that they don't check tickets. You just want a ticket in case they check. So, we decided to just get on and pretend we had a fourth ticket. Boom. Done. No problem. And side note: Chris had showed his receipt to the Siegessäule and not his receipt from buying bus tickets. Perhaps that's why the bus driver was shrugging?

Anyway, phew, we made it to the Reichstag building.  Just in time for some lightening to start! Still, it was a very crowded place, everyone taking photos. VERY tourist filled. Took our own pictures and selfies, then a few drinks to hydrate. Then, we headed down the street to the next spot.


BRANDENBURGER TOR

Next tourist spot was the Brandenburger Tor. Lots of photos here. More selfies (we saw many people with selfie sticks. maybe we were a little jealous.) The embassies are located here, on the East side. We found the USA embassy. I did have a fantasy of running up to the building and yelling for amnesty, or help, or whatever it is you yell when you're running from the enemy and want help from your consulate. I just took a photo instead.


DU DU
At long last, Du Du, the sushi restaurant we've been dreaming about since Chris came home and told us about it. Du Du did not disappoint. Great food. Not quite normal sushi, but mostly in presentation (lots of food on top of the sushi instead of all rolled up inside.) Very tasty. Everyone left happy.

I did make a language blunder (not too bad) with the server. She asked if we liked the food, and I said, "schlecht", which means poor, bad. We're saying it all day, "Mein deutsch is sehr schlecht." Doh! I paused after she reminded me that it means bad, and I said, "Oh, no... schmeckt gut!" which means to taste good. Sigh. Xander kindly reminded me that this is one of my Bingo squares (to make an embarrassing blunder in German and survive!) Done!

Until we got outside and it was pouring down rain. A short debate of run for it, or take a taxi. Run for it. Or taxi. Well, we ran for it, for about 50 feet and then said, "TAXI!" We were drenched in a matter of 100 ft it took to get into the taxi. Once home, we were treated to a lot more thunder and lightning. One clapped super loud behind our apartment and made us all jump. Yikes!

FIGHTING THE MACHINES
We are the first renters here, so we're getting to discover all the fun intricacies here in the apartment. For example, the first time we ran the dishwasher, we ran it on ECO mode. Sounds good. However, it's a 2.5 hr cycle. I'm not sure how eco friendly that is. And, at some point during the cycle, the machine stopped and gave an error, "open faucet". Poked around, fiddled under the sink, and checked an on-line manual. The manual said to open the faucet and rerun the cycle, if the error comes up again, call the manufacturer! So, we tried turning the cold water valve under the sink, the error went away and ran it again. This time it was a success!

However, after unloading the dishwasher, there was another error. This one said to, "add dish salt." What? Back to the on-line manual. I guess you add dish salt to soften hard water to avoid calcium deposits. So, the dishwasher is out of commission until we get buy some dish salt. And, as you know, stores are closed on Sundays, so we'll wait until next week to get this (we're heading out tomorrow for a week.) Hand washing for now!

The refrigerator is the largest door.
Below it is the freezer

We are trying the washer-dryer for the first time tonight. Washing seemed easy. We are late into the evening, so we're just doing a quick wash. We're not dirty, just sweaty, right? But when trying to do the dryer, the display kept saying those programs weren't possible. After Googling the translations to be better than our best guesses, we decided it said to turn off the machine and back on. Done. Now we can pick a dryer setting.

As our friends, who lived here for 6 months warned us, it was very confusing. What setting do you try? The translations were permanent press and fluff dry, but fluff dry turned out to be something like steam press, so we obviously translated wrong there. And the "warm air" kept translating into "hot", but we chose that anyway. Only 30 minutes. After 60 minutes on hot air (plus a side step for the accidental steam), and the clothes were still damp, I gave up. They are now hanging to dry throughout our room. Onto the second load and trying to dry for 60 hot minutes. We'll see. It doesn't just dry, it sounds different at different times and I don't know what it's doing...

So far, we like our refrigerator, it's small, but works well.

The new Nespresso machine works great, too. Maybe too well. It's so easy. Might over do it on caffeine now.


PACKED
We're packed and ready for tomorrow's early trip to Venice, Italy! We're going dark for the week. We're not taking any laptops, so no updates for a few days. We may figure something else out, but until we're back, Auf Wiedersehen!