You belong among the wildflowers

Three girls dance to Katy Perry in a park. When asked how they got up on the pillars, they replied “we climbed a tree over there!”

Berlin is like no other city. I never knew how peaceful a large city could be until I found myself staring up at the buildings that hold so many historical memories with the ivory that flows from window to window. I found that the shoes I brought made me feel every stone from the cobble stone pavements throughout the city. I found a discarded cobblestone a few nights into my trip and decided to bring it home with me as a little reminder of old and new Berlin.

The parks in Berlin are beautiful and inspiring. This green city really takes advantage of having them, with children flocking to the parks and people young and old enjoying each other’s company on a sunny day. You’ll find Ping-Pong tables in most of the parks in East Berlin because the former socialists of the east used Ping-Pong as a non-official sport. Germany and Korea were both front-line states in the Cold War and shared this hobby.

New Yorker in Berlin

We had the opportunity to meet Christoph Niemann in his studio on Thursday. The illustrator, artist and author showed us some of the projects he was currently working on and the past covers he had published through different publications. He showed us an interactive cover of The New Yorker that he created, which includes using an app on your phone. The augmented reality animation allows the cover to come to life on the screen of your phone, where you navigate through the city. The woman on the animated cover compares to Lady liberty, where the modern woman is holding a coffee cup instead of a torch.

Stolperstein

When walking the streets in Berlin, you may come across a golden-square plate next to a few others in front of apartments. The plates are called stolperstein, translated as “stumbling stone.” The stolperstein pays tribute to victims of Nazi oppression. The golden stones allow you to stop and reflect on the past and imagine the horrors that the people in these quiet neighborhoods experienced 70 years ago. The stones say who lived in the building, when they were born and when and where they were murdered.

 

A lot of the stones show that the victims were well into there 60’s and 70’s at the time. It’s sad to think that the victims lived a long, prosperous life just to be murdered in a concentration camp.

Fat Tire Bike Tour

After a few stops, the M4 dropped us off at Alexanderplatz where the journey began for us. We arrived at Fat Tire Bike tours where our two guides Lucy and Andy greeted us and set us up with our bikes. Keeping a group of 20 Americans together for almost five hours can be tricky, so we were lucky to have two knowledgeable and enthusiastic guides throughout East and West Berlin.

We can call this the graffiti tour.

These cool cats were rummaging through piles of second-hand clothes at one of the stops of our tour. The cat on the right scored on a fur coat from a heaping pile of fur coats to his right.

Our tour guide Andy discussed the influence of Berlin’s graffiti scene on communities in this area.

 

Initial thoughts

 

All I wanted was a nap after traveling for almost two days, but Professor Freeman advised against that. We drove from Gainesville to Miami Thursday morning, where our flight left around 4 p.m. We landed in Düsseldorf around 7 a.m. the next day, where we switched planes to arrive in Berlin around 9 a.m. Friday the 13th. Yes, I was a little apprehensive of arriving to a foreign country on a lucky day like Friday the 13th.

We waited for our bags for awhile, hoping that we weren’t going to be the ones to lose our bags on this trip. Luckily everything followed us from Miami and we were on our way to the hotel. It didn’t seem like we were in Berlin. The surroundings were green and almost resembled Florida, aside from everything being in German. We arrived at the hostel a few hours before check-in time so we explored a little. The neighborhood we are staying in, Prenzlauer Berg, is a quiet family-oriented neighborhood. Made up of old pre-war architecture and green parks, Prenzlauer Berg is known for bars, restaurants and tree lined roads.