Hallo!
One thing that I realized through out this week was that I never actually told everyone what exactly I’m doing over here. So I figured that I would start this entry off with a little description of what’s going on.
Ike Lahue, Bethany Creed, and myself all got assigned to work at the Wartburg Castle to help with some of the basic public relations work in the castle including: an article for The Lutheran Magazine about the Luther Decade, a video guide of the castle to be brought back to Wartburg, some minor translating, and a few English tours through out the castle. But as our last week of work is beginning I can only imagine it is going to a long, but fun, week. This week we have a interviews for the article lined up with the lord Mayor of Eisenach, the head of the castle and a few other tasks that need to be finished up.
But enough about work, we got off early this week because of the German holiday of Ascension (Christ’s trip to heaven.) So we decided to celebrate by going to Berlin. Once again we all rolled out bed early and caught the train out of Eisenach. So one stop and four hours later we made it. But I thought Munich was a busy place… clearly I had never been to Berlin. People were EVERYWHERE! And being a guy of bigger proportion, this makes fitting into small spaces with lots of people a rather difficult task. :) But I managed to make it and soon we made the trek to our hostel. It was a very nice place and not at all what I was expecting it to be. It had a loft-style room with 6 beds, a balcony, ect. The only downside, it was 2 bus stops and 30 minutes from the downtown area, which was ok… once I figured out was going on. Once we all got settled in, it was time to go to supper; this is where I experienced the glory of a “Berliner Wiesser,” a delicious concoction of raspberries and wheat beer. (I understand that sounds pretty gross, but it is very good.) Once again we met up with the Marberg trip for the weekend and they made it just in time for the Cabaret Show. This was… um.. We’ll say interesting. It was very good, don’t get me wrong, it had everything from trapeze artists to ice dancing to some other acts that could be interpreted a few different ways. The show finished up around 10 or so and with all of the traveling we decided to call it a night and save up some energy for the nights to come.
The second day brought sight seeing and museum walking. The first stop of the day was at the Pergamonmuseum. This is the home of many historical temples and monuments from Turkey. Next stop on the tour was the Brandenburg Gate, one of the biggest national symbols in Germany. Up next were the new Jewish Memorial, Kaiser Wilheom Gedachtnis, and finally the Sony Center. But after hours and hours of sight seeing we took a few hours to wonder around the city, only to top off the night with a front row seat to the Blue Man Group show. (Which was awesome!)
On the third day, we hoped on the bus to East Germany and went through the Charlie’s Checkpoint Museum. This was important because it was the checkpoint into the American section of Germany once the war was over. It was one of the most powerful museums that we went through. It showed me what everyone had to go through just survive the post-war. Next on the Berlin checklist was a trip to the famous Rihgstag building. Before the war, this building was the main government building, but got destroyed. After being rebuilt, it became one of the biggest attractions because of the obeservitory that was built on top of the building. This allowed people to get a full view of everything that the city has to offer; it was unbelievable. (Unfortunately my camera died so no pictures.) After that finished up, we had the rest of the night to go explore the nightlife that Berlin had to offer. We came to find out that the Berlin had a soccer match that night against none other then Munich. (Which we saw in Munich.) So the downtown area was out of control. The pubs were packed and full of chanting soccer hooligans, it was so much fun. (I uploaded the video so you could get a little taste of the EuropaCenter after the game.) It was a great way to close out the night.
On our final day in the city we went to the American church and Jewish Museum before leaving heading back to Eisenach. This church was not at all what I was expecting because of how up beat and modern the services were. One fact about the church that shocked me was that it is located in a very rough neighborhood of East Berlin, and yet so many different people from over 20 different nationalities were in attendance. And after walking through the museum it was time to leave Berlin behind us, and head back to Eisenach.
Well, that’s all I have for now, next weekend is open, but a few of us decided not to waste it and are planning a trip to Amsterdam!! So check back next week to see how we do on our own!
Auf Wiedersehen,
Justin
