Germany

Due to technical problems of my computer hating the internet, photos coming soon!

Berlin

Arriving at the bus station with no reservation for a place to stay (no different than usual) I headed to the main train station and attempted to find tourist information. Most things in Berlin and Germany generally seem to be quite well signposted, but in this case I followed the signs for 700 meters, and when I got to where the tourist information should be, there was another batch of signs. The one for tourist information pointed me back 650 meters in the direction I had just come from. Something to work on Berlin, if you want to encourage happy tourists!

I took the u-bahn to the hostel I had stayed at the other two times I was in Berlin, but it was full. And so I spent a very hungry and tired hour on the internet obsessing about hostels, and decided to go with the Mitte backpackers hostel. They had space, it was all good. Dropping my stuff, I tried to wake up, brushed my teeth, went and found food, and for lack of anything else to do, wandered to Ingo's gallery. I hadn't told him that I was stopping by, and when I looked in I saw mostly photos I recognized, but no Ingo. The guy looked at me a bit strangely, and I was going to leave when Ingo came out. It was so nice to see him again. I realized how much I had missed him. I went in, looked around, helped a bit, and got in the way a bit. We took one framed photo and a print to the framer so she could swap out the prints, because the new one was better. We also went to the bindery to pick up the art book that Ingo had made for the exhibition.

After leaving, I wandered about a bit, and when it started pouring went back to the hostel, made some pasta, read some, and then crashed around 10 and slept over 12 hours. Amazing what some sleep can do for you. The next day I wandered about until I was meeting Ingo at 3. We went for amazing sushi and walked through Mitte until we parted ways so he could get ready for the opening at 6. I kept walking, and visited the Maur (wall) park. As you walk through the park on the left side where the wall once was, now there is nothing. It is separeted from the park by a fence, and is clearly still a sort of border area. From one of the plaques I read, perhaps they are keeping it that way as a sort of memorial.

The opening of Ingo's exhibition was the first art opening I had ever been to. When I got there it was still pretty empty, but it seemed that everyone else showed up at once soon after that and Ingo ran around stressed and tryed to talk to everyone. I had a fantastic time. I got to see Thies and Antje, Marko, Jorn and Filiz, as well as meeting Thies and Jorn's cousin, who was a bit crazy, and very funny. He tried to teach me how to say "I love stuffed tigers" in german, as well as other things. After a few hours in the gallery, the celebrations moved to a nearby bar. There was some food, and everyone drank a lot. At the end there was dancing.

The next day I met Thies and Anje for coffee, which turned out to be ice cream. They had just finished their berlin internship, and were leaving for Hamburg to start classes early the next morning. And then I took my things from the hostel to go stay with my lovely couchsurfing host, Buck. He has one of the most amazing, crazy flats that I've been in. As he puts it, it's beautiful, if you like dilapidated beauty, and I do. After talking a bit, we went over to his friends' house, and I stayed while he went to study german. The friends - Adam and Paul took me with them to see a band that some of their other friends play in, called the cowboy killers. It's a banjo guy who also plays kazoo, a guitar and harmonica player, and for that night, a bass. I guess they normally have a washboard player, and a drummer. The guys reminded me of people back in Chapel Hill. A bit funny to go all the way to berlin for american folk. The band was awesome though.

The next day I wandered around Kruzberg, one of the main Turkish neighborhoods in Berlin. I walked into a bakery, and asked for manti in Turkish. The guy looked at me and went off on this long string of german. I tried to explain that I didn't understand, when one of the german turkish guys sitting in the shop, who actually knew Turkish, stepped in, and told me the guy didn't have what I wanted. A little bit further on was a doner shop. So I stopped inside and asked if he spoke Turkish. Of course he said. Every donerci speaks Turkish. So we had a bit of a discussion. He told me he thought obama would be elected and then assasignated. And then he gave me free Baklava.

I finished my wanderings around Kruzberg, and went to the Kruzberg museum, which has a history of all the different groups to live in the area, and of migration to berlin and germany more generally. Returning to the flat I then went off to meet Buck at the karmenoya, where he and his friends were supposed to be having a reading group. Except when I got there I felt a bit out of place because everyone seemed to already know eachother, and I saw no one there that I knew.

Minutes later though, Buck showed up on his bike, with another bike in hand. They had just moved the location of the readinng group to where I had walked from, and so he thought I could ride a bike back. Having not ridden a bike in a city ever, I freaked out a bit, and told him he should go ahead because I would be a bit slow. Once I got on the bike though, it was amazing, although I had a bit of a hard time with the backpeddle breaks. The reading group was fun - much better than any english class I've ever taken.

I left Buck's house on Monday to meet Ingo at Marko's house. Ingo works mostly nights, so after falafel, it was time for him to nap. Later on we visited his friend and got ingredients for a bit of a strange dinner - mashed potatoes, hot dogs, guacamole, and pickles. It was fantastic though. We topped it off by watching the new indiana jones film and sharing a pint of hagan daaz tiramisu ice cream.

After breakfast the next day (I miss breakfast with Ingo!), Ingo departed for his parents, and I spent the next two days enjoying the solitude of Marko's flat and not going out. Thursday was my last day in Berlin, and I met Filiz, and at a wonderful lunch at her flat that she had cooked for me, before walking along the canal and visiting the swans. I also got to have coffee with Sarah (on a grand to do her dissertation research) and Ben, before heading back to have dinner with Marko, hear about his trip to paris, and then fly to Istanbul.

My flight left at 3am, but for some reason they thought I needed to be there two hours ahead of time. It was the only flight leaving at that time, and we all just sat around in the waiting place. The flight was very empty - I got an entire row to myself. Somehow, the budget airline fed us breakfast, and then I got to lye down for an hours sleep. I woke up for the landing, which made the whole extreme red eye flight seem worth it. It was perfectly clear, and still dark as we flew over Istanbul, and I could see all of the bosphorus, the bridges, Kadikoy harbor, and everything else. I felt like I was looking at a map. What a beautiful sight.

Sadly, it took me two and a half hours on the bus to get from the airport to Kadikoy, just as long as my entire flight from Germany to Turkey. I was back.