Berlin on Sunday

After an extended lie-in for Adam, I got up and attempted to clean the appartment and erase any evidence of the pukefest that happened after Friday night at The Bird.

Both of us were nackered from E-Tropolis(the industrial music festival i was dragged to on the Saturday - love the music, don’t love standing for 13 hours) - so we decided to keep our sightseeing to a minimum. Checkpoint Charlie, and Brandenburger Tor.

Walking out onto Pappelallee, people were in the full throes of Brunch(which they take very seriously in Berlin), cafes were full to the gunnels, and the sun was beating down a hefty 28 degrees. But the cool breeze that came with it made it all worthwhile. And bareable.

We headed down towards Ebenswalder Str. U-Bahn, or at least we tried to. Within about 5 minutes we were a bit lost - we looked at each other and thought - fuck it. Then kept walking.

People started walking past with assorted bric-a-brac. The more we walked, the more people walked past with vintage goods and secondhand housewares - you only get bric-a-brac in one place on Sunday in Prenzlauer Berg - The Frohmarkt! At last we were in my territory! I adore fleamarkets, thrive on the second hand and vintage - so this was mana from heaven for me and it was entirely accidental!

We took a quick turn round the mauerpark - getting in a wee bit of sightseeing by looking at one of the last remaining bits of the Berlin wall. Well I found that out after the fact - I was in a grump because The Dude was walking us further and further away from the Frohmarkt.

So we doubled back, and finally got in the middle of the hot and sweaty crowds of people all on the same mission I was - to shop.

There were so many stalls - old furniture, second hand clothes, jewellery, leftovers from the Russian Occupation of the East, and amazing finds from students selling their arts, crafts and bleeding edge fashion.

Being the tubby cow I am, I didn’t even bother going near the clothes, but found a fantastic wallet and bag design collective called Jiab Prachathul - amazing workmanship and a wonderful sense of the quirky. The Dude treated me to a wallet, which I now show off at every opportunity!

I treated him to a print by a german artist whose name escapes me for the moment - but he’s at the Mauerpark every Sunday if you want to check him out.

Time was marching on, so we headed out of the Frohmarkt and hailed a taxi to get to Checkpoint Charlie.

I have never really understood the word ‘tourist-y’ until we got there. It was surrounded by 5 souvenir shops, a MacDonalds(insert irony here) and a throng of people taking photos. We managed to steal a couple of decent shots and ask for directions from a lovely German shop assistant, then headed down to the KochStr. u-bahn so we could find the Brandenburger Tor.

Thanks to the directions, we found it in 5 minutes - and sat a spell taking in the sights. Lots of patriotic people cheering and being good natured as the world cup game was on - some beautiful horses who in my opinion should have been getting watered since it was so hot, and the Tor itself.

It was actually really peaceful, and we reflected on our weekend, all the planning, the buildup and now we were here! Berlin seemed to click into place for me. I realised it’s where I am supposed to be - I took to german life again very quickly, and The Dude even thought he could easily live here(language barrier notwithstanding).

We headed back to The Bird for our last meal in Berlin, after another lost spell which involved me having a meltdown because we were late!

The Bird was virtually deserted as the game was on - so we sat down to a nice quiet meal. The owners dog was wandering about and occasionally let me pet him which I was told was a great honour. They didn’t realise I was feeding him part of my burger which although some people like, was raw in the middle. My already delicate tummy wasn’t going to handle that so the dog got some gourmet steak mince :)

The Crown Royal bourbon I had bought on the Friday was untouched - so we thought it would be a nice gesture to give them the full bottle as a thanks for a great welcome to Berlin. What I didn’t know was that Bret(one of the owners) and actually went out and bought us a gift too - Bifi Rolls(he’d recommended them on the Friday)! Adam decided he wanted to go back to the apartment and have a lazy night, and we had to leave before saying bye to them all which I was a bit miffed about. I hate seeming ignorant, especially to people who I really like, so doing this kind of ticked me off. I emailed them when I got back - no reply but at least they know I wasn’t being rude on purpose.

Back at the apartment, we packed and then had a really quiet night in watching german tv. Then, at 6 the next morning, we woke, dressed, and said goodbye to our little piece of heaven in Pappelallee.