DAY 9: (Dec29) Sat : Holocaust Memorial, Alexanderplatz, etc.
We got up rather late, having been out so late. Yay! There was blue in the sky!

We had to wait to take a shower as the other people in Evelyn's apartment were taking their time, possibly washing each other in the bathtub for an hour.

We enjoyed a laid-back breakfast while waiting for the couple to finish up. We cussed them, watching the weather fade outside.

A LONG WALK IN BERLIN

By 12:30 pm, we were at Holocaust memorial, near the Brandenburg gate. We took some pictures. I sat and took in the site, while Jason found some cool angles.



A young German woman in front of me was especially annoying. Here this was a monument and she was screaming and laughing loudly to her beau:

"Oh my God, look at the picture. Oh!." She laughed hysterically, "Take another!" she screamed.

In retrospect, I should have approached her and reminded her that this was a monument, that, she, if anybody should be respectful to it. But, I kept to my own and sat and thought. People don't sit and be still and think enough.

Jason had eyes on going to the Jewish museum, but I suggested, instead, a walk across Berlin to Alexanderplatz, to a famous restaurant I knew that was under the TV (fernseh) tower.



This meant walking past the Spree, the Berliner Dom, the Palast der Republik (which is 3/4 demolished) and more...



We literally happened upon Gendarmenmarkt on accident, but didn't go into any of the edifices. We walked on past the Neptune fountaine.

At Alexanderplatz, we ate at "Alex" (restaurant.) My food was good but Jason's fish & chips were lacking.

We went to a couple of ths shops, including the Galleria Kaufhof, on Alexplatz. We both liked this store better than KaDeWe, although even sale items were laughably expensive, even if there had been a good exchange rate between Euro and Dollar. We looked, but did not buy.



THE TREK FOR DINNER - MORE WALKING

I suggested that we go to an Italian Restaurant in Wedding (by Evelyn's place) for dinner. After dropping off our stuff, we walked a couple of blocks to the restaurant. I found it! Unforunately, the lights were off. Closed for the holidays. Guido probably went back to Italy to defrost for a week.

So... Where to go? I thought the best idea would have been to go to Friedrichstraße--you know lots of shops = lots of places to eat. That's what you would think.
We got there and there were not so many options. We did see the Italian restaurant we ahd been to earlier in the week. (Ironically, this would have served our purposes fine!)

We walked on. And on. And on. Since we thought we were going to the nearby Italian place, we were not wearing gloves and hats and it was cold.

We finally settled on a Bistro across from Gendarmenmarkt, which was ok, but, in retrospect, overpriced. Anyway, it was a warm place to ear decent food and chug down a beer or two.

The idea was to go home and relax our feet and watch a movie.

We were absolutely exhausted. We tried to watch a bit of "Shrek 3" in the room, but we were both so very tired. We could not keep our eyes open and agreed to hit the sacks. (Technically, we have two beds that are side by side. Not the most ideal set up.)
- posted by Matt @ 6:17 AM