Berlin, my Favorite City !

Berlin was awesome. I think it's one of my favorites of the cities that we've seen so far. Our hostel was just on the edge of the citz in the Grunewald. It was cool because here we are in a huge city and our hostel was in the middle of a big park. We took a free tour through Berlin our first day. The guides work for tips and the guide we had definately earned hers. She was energectic, funny, and fit hundreds of years of history into an understandable summary. Wer saw most of the main sties in Berlin on this 4 hour walking tour. First we saw the Brandendurg Gate, it was built as a tribute to peace in the 18th century. It was the site of many military parades, demonstrations, and it was the backdrop for the famous pictures of when the Berlin wall game down. Next we saw the Reichstag which had an interesting role in history. Today the Reichstag is the home of the governing party but in 1933 it was mysteriously burned down after which Adolf Hitler declasred a state of emergency and seized power. We walked through a gorgeous park called the Tiergarten (Animal Park) which was used as the Royal Hunting grounds for the Prussian monarchs. After that we saw a holocasut memorial that was built in the city. It was very simple yet very effective in conveying some of the feelings and experiences of the people sent to concentration camps. The memorial took up about a block and from the side it appears to be a bunch of blocks lined up in rows all at the same height. When you walk through it the ground level starts to change and you become lost among these huge pillars, I almost lost Laura in it. Our tour guide mentioned that it's the feelings of getting lost, being separted from the people you're with and being alone that perhaps allow people to reflect on what the holocaust must have been like. Our guide took us to a spot which is apparently not advertised in most tourist books. It was the location of a Nazi bunker in which Adolf Hitler had killed himself in. There was nothing there to state what used to be there because they don't want people to memorialize it and it turn to a place hwere people would bring flowers to and such. The entire bunker was destroyed as part of de-nazifacation after the ar. Next we walked through the square in front of the university where the Nazi's burned books that sent a 'wrong' message or were written by people of Jewish decent. We also stopped in front of a huge building designed and built by the Nazi's. It was truley huge, the door to get in was much taller than your standard door entrances and the door handle was up to my neck. Our guide said that Nazi architecture was designed to be big, intrusive, and meant to make people feel small when they walked up to it. What was interesting about the building was that on one side wall was a long mural of the 'perfect' socialist society. Happy people working tough labour jobs together, business people and labourers shaking hands, etc. Just adjeacent to the mural was a picture of the people in the front row of a demonstration in protest of that type of society who were shot in the back, the reality. I thought it was an interesting display. Just past this building was a piece of the Berlin wall, I'm not sure what I was expecting exactly but it was nothing special, but the story behind it makes it interesting. When the wall was torn down they left a brick outline in the road so people know where exactly it used to be. At the end of the tour our guide told us the story of how the wall had come down. A long story short, from what I understand, there was a misunderstanding between some important people and it was announced on Live TV that travel restictions would be lifted between east & west Berlin, effective immediately. Our guide went on to tell us the 3 day party that followed the announcement and the destruction of the wall. Wow, I can't imagine what it would've been like to live through an experience like that. Berlin seems to have come a long way since then, there's been a lot of rebuilding going on. But there are plenty of reminders throughout the city of it's past, such as the Kaiser-Wilhelm Gedachtniskirche (Memorial Church). It was built in the late 1800's and was significantly damaged during the war. It still stands in downtown Berlin as it was when it was bombed. I these things so interesting, coming from a city like winnipeg that doesn't have such an ancient history. Our second day we went to a suberb of Berlin, Potsdam and visited the Palaces there. We took a tour through the New Palace where Fredrick the Great lived in 1763. One room that made this palace unique is the Grotto Salon! It was really cool and had sea creatures designed into the flooring and seashells decorated on the walls. We stopped at a German Film History museum that Laura wanted to check out, wanted through the parks a bit more and head back to Berlin. Our third day there we went to see the main attraction at the Berlin zoo, Knut ! He's a baby polar bear that we lined up for 45 minutes to see. He was so cute. We also saw a new born deer there as well, the mom was still licking him clean and he was trying to take it's first steps. After a few hours at the zoo we went to the German History museum. It was really interesting but 3 hours of stnading and reading boards was tiring. They had so much information there. Lauar and I decided to stay an extra day in Berlin.. there's just so much to do and 2 days just wasn't enough. Next we venture out to see our family friend Heike Pottast in a tiny little town of Hagedorn !

Cloudy in Poland

From Prague we moved on to Cracow, Poland. we arrived just around dinner time and the Easter Markets were still going strong. So Laura and I went over to check things out. Most of what they were selling were the same as in Prague but some of the food they were making wsa a bit different. Laura and I stopped at this stand that was cooking up some great pork and veggie dishes, it tasted amazing! After a long day on the train it really hit the spot. There was also a stand cooking up waffles so of course we couldn't resist that one either! The weather wasn't the greatestwhile we were there but Luara and I still managed to get out and explore the town a bit. Cracow, along with many other towns we've visited, had a castle that we went to see. In the middle of the castles courtyard there was this huge cathedral that was amazing! We went inside to take a peek and it being Easter monday, there was a service going on. It was all in Polish but it was nice to get some Church time in. What was really great was the men's choir that was singing from the balcony at the back. It sounded so great in that church. For the rest of the day we wandered town a bit more and found a bagel shop, which are few and far between here in Europe. So we stopped in there for lunch! Cracow has a Jewish quarter called, Kazimerz. When WWII broke out there were some 70,000 Jews living in that area. They were eventually all sent over to concentration camps, most likely to Auschwitz that was only an hour and a half bus ride away. Our second day in Cracow we went out to see Auschwitz. The cloudy, rainy weather almost felt appropriate for our visit there. What I hadn't realized is that there are actually 2 camps in that area, Auschwitz I was the first one. It was originally built for Polish prisoners of war but as the war progressed it expanded and used to house the Jews, gypsies, and others that were sent to concentration camps. Auschwitz I is where we found the famous sign that reads, 'Arbeit Macht Frei'. The second camp that is only 3 km away is called Birkenau, Auschwitz II. It was several times larger than the first one and the conditions at this camp were much worse. At the first camp the barrocks were made of brick and were somewhat insulated, at Birkenau the people slept in wooden barrocks that were originally used to keep horses in. The tour we took through this was really interesting and I had learned a lot about WWII and Auschwitz that I had no idea about before. One thing that really stuck out for me was that the Nazi's had kept and re-used everything that they acuired from the people who arrived at the camp. Most of the Jews that arrived at the camp were under the impression that they were just being relocated so they had packed all of their most valuable possessions, unfortunately when they arrived at the camp their luggage was confiscated from them. There were warehouses on the camp site where prisoners were put to work and sort through all of the luggage. Valuable things like jewlerey were sent back to Germany and other items such as shoes, brushes, glasses, pot&pans, everything else was store in the warehouse. The museum we visited had rooms full of this things that were kept. What hit me the most was that the Nazi's had kept the hair they had cut from the people who were gassed in the gas chambers. Apparently it was quicker and easier for them to cut the hair off the people after they had been killed. A portion of the warehouse was full of sacks filled with human hair to be sent to textile companies to make cloth from. In the museum there was a display of such fabric that was made from the hair sent from the camp. On our tour we also saw what was left of the main gas chambers and crematoriums as most of it was destroyed by the Nazi's at the end of the war in an attempt to cover up what they were doing there. This picture on the right is of the train tracks where people were first off loaded and where 'selection' took place. That's where the decision was made weather a person was fit enough to stay and work in the camp. Most elderly, pregnant women and children were sent directly to the gas chambers that were located at the end of these tracks. It was definately an educational experience to say the least. That evening Laura and I just spent some time on the net and relaxing. We head back to Germany, next stop... Berlin!

Easter in Czech Republic

I hope everyone had an excellent Easter weekend! Laura and I spent easter in the Czech Republic. After we left the Derksens in Buren we spent a solid 2 days on several trains going across Germany, through Austria, and into the Czech Republic. Our first stop was Cesky Krumlov. It's another small midieval town with a 13th Century castle. It was quite cold out the day we spent there so we tried to make the best of it by staying indoors as much as possible. We took a tour through the castle (which was even colder inside), checked our emails and drank some warm tea in a Tea House in town. Our hostel here was the first one we've had that has a kitchen, so we were thrilled to pop a pizza in the oven our first night there. Laura and I also discovered an english book store just down the street from our hostel. Since I finished the book I brought along in Austria already I was due for some new reading material. After Cesky Krumlov we stopped in Prague. I have heard so many good things about this city so I was pumped to get there. It was quite overwhelming to arrive at the train station there and be swarmed by crowds of people. But we managed to navigate our way around the station and through the city to our hostel, with very few signs in English to help us. Our hostel was pretty new, it had just opened the week before, which would explain the missing shower door, the blinds without a string to close them, and the bed rail pieces under my matress (which I didn't even notice were there until the second night..haha). It was a good hostel though, it was clean and there were always people buzzing in and out. We had 2 full days to wander through Prague and I think we were able to see all the main sights. Prague has a very recent history iwth communism and we stopped in their communism museum to check it out. It feels like this trip has been one big history lesson so far, I've been learning so many new things and am totally interested in reading further on some of this stuff when I get home. The museum was pretty interesting, they showed video clips of a riot that occurred in Prague in 1989. It occurred in Wenceslas Square where thousands of people gathered to protest the communist government, we happened to walk through this place on our way to the museum. The video showed people getting attacked by the soviet run police for protesting. This is something that has happened in my lifetime, most of the things we've been seeing are hundreds of years old, which makes it all the more interesting to read about. Now, in Wenceslas Square there are huge easter markets set up. They were selling everything from cheesy souveniers, food, paintings, to hand painted easter eggs. It was difficult to resist spending a lot of money here but I was able to limit myself to only a few things. I picked up a Czech patch to add to my collection, a small painting of the Charles Bridge in Prague, and a pair of earings & a ring that had an amber stone in them. The Czech Republic doesn't use the Euro so we were using Koruny's ( I don't think that's spelt right) and the exachange in something wierd like 18 korunys to 1 cdn dollar. So it was tricky to know exactly how much I was spending, since my mental math is not so great! Either way things were a bit cheaper out here. They had a stage set up where Laura and I stopped to watch a group of kids dressed in traditional clothes singing and dancing. It was quite cute. We went on to the Old Town Hall to check out the Astonomical Clock. Tourists pack this area full every hour on the hour to watch the apostles float past the 2 little openings above the clock. This clock records three different kinds of time, Old Bohemian time, time as we know it today and so called Babylonian time. Thie clock also shows the movement of the sun & moon through the 12 signs of the zodiak, it's a very complex clock! just down the road, and past a few more Easter market shops we walked up to the Charles Bridge. At any given time during the day this bridge is packed with tourists, artists drawing caricatures, vendors selling art and other souveniers, and musicians playing music. The bridge was built in 1357 so it's extremely old. Prague also has a castle that we climbed up a steep hill to see. We didn't go inside the castle itself but it hada really nice Cathedral in the middle of its courtyard. The whole place was really crowded with tour groups so we didn't linger there for too long. Next we walked up Nerudova Street. This street was interesting because before people used numbers to distinguish houses they had signs above the doors. There were things like a Swan, 3 Fiddles, two Suns, and a Shoe for the shoe makers house. Laura and I also found this building called the Ginger & Fred building. I'm not sure why it's called this but it was neat because it was had a different look to it. I'll let the picture show you what I mean. It was designed by a Fred Gahry. Overall Laura and I enjoyed Prague a lot, there was a lot of cool things to see but I think after a few days it's nice to get away from all the crowds of tourists ! After Prague we move up to Crakow, Poland !

Long Lost Relatives !

We arrived in Frankfurt to meet up with our second cousin Olga for a few days when for some reason we couldn't get her cell number to work. So, with no way of communicating with her besides with emails Laura and I stayed in a hostel our first night in Frankfurt. Apparently there was a Music Festival going on in the city so most of the accomodations were pretty much full. We lucked out and got 2 beds in a hostel just accross the street from the train station. Olga had tracked us down in our hostel and we were finally able to touch base with her. We met her the next day at the train station as she had to go to school and she directed us to her flat. It was so nice to be able to settle in someone's house for a bit. It was a nice change from being at a hostel. We settled at her place for a bit caught up on some emails, did some laundry, and met Olga downdown later that day. The last time I had seen Olga was about 5 years ago when she had come to Winnipeg for the summer, so there was much to catch up on! Olga took us to the University where she attends and we grabbed some lunch, we wandered the downtown streets for a bit, checked out a really old church, and of course stopped for some Ice Cream ! We went to this cafe that has a full menu on all the different types of ice creams you could get. They had some really fancy items there, I'd never seen anything like it! We also went to a Film History Museum that was pretty interesting. It displayed some of the first cameras used, they had a set set up that you could check out, and they had an interesting display of costumes and stage makeup ! That evening Olga took us to her Bible Study group that she attends every week. It was just a small group but it was nice to meet some of the people that Olga knows and hangs out with here in Frankfurt. Laura and I finally sent home a box home with stuff that we've picked up along the way and didn't need. Wow, that helped a lot and cleared up some space in my bag! Our visit with Olga was really fun and our next stop was in Buren to visit the Derksens, also second cousins of ours. There's our Uncle Johann and Tante Sara and they have 5 kids Victor, Peter, Klara, Willy and Daniel. They were all able to join us and spend some time with us over the weekend! They are such a friendly family it was hard not to feel at home there. Johan took Laura, Klara and myself to this Castle that is not too far from their house. Apparently Hitler wanted to make this castle the centre of his empire, as it's the centre of Germany. There is some really amazing history just in their backyard! After that we stopped at Klara's apartment not too far from Buren, did some shopping, stopped for some coffees and that evening we watched Deutschlands Super Star!! On Sunday we went to church with them. It was nice because we haven't been to church this whole trip so far and with Easter coming up it was nice to be there. We stopped in to meet Johann's mother (who was married to my Opa Derksens brother) and she was quick to tell Laura and I how much Laura looks like a Derksen and that I look more like my moms side! The Derksens in Buren didn't speak any english either so my german got a good workout for the weekend. It's tricky when I have so many things I want to say but can only say half of it because translating it is kinda difficult, but I made the best of it. Overall, we had a great visit with our relatives in Germany and it was probably one of the highlights for me. Our next stop will be in Czech Repulic to see Cesky Krumlov and Prague! So until then, Take Care in Winnipeg !