Berlin

Boulevard of broken dreams

DSCN3537By this stage we had consumed enough Schnitzel and wurst to keep a currywurst vendor in business so we headed for some real curry at the Indian joint just a couple of doors down the street. Currywust, a Berlin favourite, is my least favourite wurst by the way. It’s basically just a frankfurt with awful curry sauce. The Indian place near our apartment on the other hand was real Indian – different to Australian Indian but Indian flavours nonetheless. The prices were so cheap we over ordered a bit. At two euros a serve, we figured the samosas came singularly so we ordered two serves. They turned out to be normal sized, homemade and really yummy. The alloo mutter was really, really good as you might expect from a country famed for its potato dishes. The chicken tikka was a bit different to what we’re used to. It came on a sizzling plate with lots of onions and capsicums and while it was quite tasty, it didn’t taste anything like the chicken tikka from the tandoor oven that we’re used to. Each main was served with rice and salad. The Naan bread was pretty good. And because it was a German restaurant the drinks list was longer than the food menu, including cocktails I haven’t heard of in years and beer was cheaper per litre than water.

After stuffing ourselves and still leaving food on the plate, we decided it was time to get out and see some stuff. We had seen many of the attractions that interested us on our last visit – we had walked much of the remaining wall, visited the holocaust museum, checkpoint Charlie, the Brandenburg Tor, walked Unter den Linden, seen the TV Tower and visited every Christmas Market in our path. I was keen to walk Karl Marx Allee to get an appreciation of the spaces where the massive GDR marches would have been held. That is after we actually found Karl Mark Allee. (Sheena is a Punk Rocker – The Ramones – lack of music complexity aside (and really who expects that from Joey and co), this is one of my favourite Ramones tunes. My love of punk rock and teen drama collided when Gossip Girl used this tune as the basis for an impromptu fashion show and I’ve got to admit the visual mix that accompanied it on the show was perfect – even if it probably made a few of the gritty CBGB regulars roll over in their graves.)

At its Alexanderplatz end, the boulevard named after the grandfather of communism doesn’t look like much – surrounded by decaying buildings that look close to an undignified end from a wrecking ball with the middle of the avenue converted to a parking lot like so many wide roads before it. But as you wander further along the boulevard, its former glory days in the 1960s start to hit home with architectural references and the magnificence of median strip and the rows of trees either side.

And there just peeking out on the left hand side was a modern update- just for Dan – The Computer Games Museum. We decided to limit ourselves to checking out the gift shop – good museums usually have a pretty awesome gift shop and as has been long established I love a good gift shop. There were a few good things in here but in the end we kept it conservative and got a postcard to prove we’d been.

DSCN3484

As we wandered further up the Allee, the history came into sharper focus as row upon row of magnificently designed housing rose from the sidelines to provide the grandeur (and symmetry) that one expects from a communist regime. Standing there, with the traffic stopped at lights further along, if you squinted you could almost see the goose stepping and hear the bullhorns. All we needed was the crackly loudspeaker from the Dülmen train station that sounded like it had stepped through a time warp to echo broadcasts of the Nazi and GDR era. It was unnerving sitting at the Dülmen train station late at night but you could imagine it here blaring from loudspeakers on the street during displays of GDR military might. (Bone Machine – The Pixies – I always get there on any trip but The Pixies have taken a long time to surface in my MP3 roster this time around. Well enjoyed though as always)

At the Frankfurter Tor end of the Allee, the buildings were most magnificent, actually designed as part of a 1950s design competition for nine – storey apartments with trade and public institutions at street level. The buildings were gran, modern and with all the symmetry you expect. The competition winners – five or six of them – were given a section to design for – all had the same design sensibility and the resulting buildings created a right angled harmony of form broken only by the traffic circle at the frankfurter Tor intersection – yes roundabouts are not just a modern traffic flow device but were also used to create a sense of order and symmetry in modernist town planning. Sadly, the Stalin Allee project was never completely realised but the buildings around Frankfurter Tor are an example of how town planning and architecture without democracy produces a grand order much like the neatly hedge rowed formal gardens that surround many of Europe’s Palaces but on a larger scale.

We mused at the ability of communist regimes to embark on massive infrastructure projects, creating unified design outcomes and housing for the populous. Of course the housing model is based on a one size fits all solution, and they ran out of cash so never completed their utopian dream here. Perhaps it speaks to the broader reasons for the doctrine’s collapse – the reality never matched the utopian dream and the egalitarian philosophy belied the need for individuality. Still, it is interesting to ponder the planning possibilities that are available without the influence of big business, the bureaucracy of local government, development driven by economists or the grass roots nimbyism that limits utopian dreamers in the 21st century.

As we wandered along the Boulevard Dan hadn’t just been noticing the GDR era planning but also the post-reunification capitalism. The ground floor public institution spaces were filled with high end outdoors stores, cafes and (of course) a model shop. I found a café down the street that advertised hand roasted beans and had a flat white on the menu. A flat white. In Germany. I ordered one and some water and sat down at the extremely hipster looking Coffee Profilers and contemplated our next destination to explore. The coffee, by the way, was awesome – really strong but creamy and very well made. I thoroughly recommend seeking out this little gem if you are in Friedrichshain (or have a model kit obsessed travelling companion). Dan emerged from the model shop without purchase as he wanted to contemplate a coveted model – of the Unimog I heard so much about at the Mercedes museum – overnight. By this stage it was close to 7pm and exhausted by our busy afternoon (and lack of overnight train slumber) we headed to Frankfurter Tor (where by the way there doesn’t seem to be an actual gate anymore) and grabbed the U-Bahn back to our apartment for the rest of the evening. (Special K – Placebo – for some reason this song reminds me of summer nights and parties in the 90s. Placebo were never the core of my track list but there was a time there where I swear I heard this tune every time I left my house.)

Shoe purchases – 2  Tank Museums – 0  Model purchases – 0 (yet)

Guten Morgen Berlin

We thought Berlin would be easy because we had been there before – but that was a year and a half before and we hadn’t expected to be returning so didn’t really commit any of it to memory. We were also really tired. Eventually we worked out which station we needed to head to and how to get there. Then we had to deal with the ticketing system which not only serves the local S-Bahn and U-Bahn networks but also the wider German train network. Eventually we deciphered how to get a day pass for the local network. The kicker was that the machine wasn’t accepting cash and didn’t except credit cards which made my travel card kind of useless. The maestro network saved the day and I used my savings withdrawal card.

The next dilemma was remembering the right station to get off at (and how to get there). We vaguely remembered we had to change trains somewhere – probably between the S-Bahn and U-Bahn networks. In most parts of Germany, the S-Bahn is the train network and the U-Bahn is the tram or light rail system. In Berlin these are called trams. The S-Bahn network is an electrified third rail network that in the central part of the city runs through the same stations inter-city trains stop at. The U-Bahn is the underground/ above ground network that transitions from underground tracks to a kind of high line. While both networks existed during the cold war, more of the U-Bahn stations were in the West and several in the East were closed down. Where the Western trains travelled through the east, the stations remained closed and well-guarded and became known as ghost stations. In the early years after the division, the GDR used to sell duty free items to West Berliners at a number of stations situated under East Berlin. Given some of the U-Bahn stations had been repurposed and routes altered, it took a little while to put the system back together after reunification.

Eventually after surveying the station map, (and the GPS) we remembered Ebswalder Strasse station on the U-Bahn and then traced the nearest S-Bahn station as Alexanderplatz. We got to the U-Bahn station at Alexanderplatz after an epic journey up and down stairs between the two stations. The night before Dan had mentioned that he was wary of one of us missing a train when we did our dice with the schedule at München Ost. Several years ago we had found ourselves in an interesting position when Dan had got off the train we just boarded at the Gold Coast in order to take a phone call, leaving me on board with all our luggage as the train pulled away. Two hours later I waited about half an hour in Brisbane after struggling to offload the luggage with some assistance from some very helpful fellow passengers. This morning, because he was tired Dan rushed to catch the train, forgetting that my strapped foot preclude me from moving fast, especially while towing my luggage. He got off at the next station and waited for my train. He found me again but not until after I had a run in with a ticket inspector who harangued me for not validating my ticket on the platform. She subsequently signed the ticket and outlined to me several times that her signature was in place of a validation. The funniest part – the trains were less than five minutes apart. (Woman in Chains – Tears for Fears one of their lesser known numbers, but one of my faves. The Hurting was one of my first three band albums (along with Adam and the Ants’ Prince Charming and Madness’ One Step Beyond). Their new wave appearance and love of synthesisers belied lyrics as dark and miserable as any written by Morrissey and The Cure.)

When we got off at Ebswalderstrasse everything was familiar, yet different. Last time we were in Berlin, it was the middle of winter – we arrived two days before Christmas in fact. There was no snow but the streets were cold and dark and there were carry few people milling about. The only place we found them in Prenzlauerberg was in the restaurants and bars and even those were closed from midday Christmas Day. On this visit mid-summer, the street was alive with people, there was outdoor seating everywhere with patrons enjoying brunch, and there was lush foliage on the trees that framed the streets of vintage and indy stores that are Prenzlauerberg’s hallmark. These hadn’t opened yet as it was still only 9am. Given the timing of our last visit, we hadn’t actually met our hosts. We retrieved our keys from the lock box when we arrived and deposited them on our departure.

This time we were warmly greeted and shown to our apartment, just as we had expected it to be – A simple old school East Berlin bedsit apartment with a few modern touches – a great kitchen, plenty of space to sprawl and a quiet homey feel. The apartment on the first floor, like many similar apartments in the area had windows that opened into the central courtyard – while the view below was to the garbage collection area, the windows and the slightly more reasonable temperatures allowed us to sleep with fresh air and birdsong through the open windows. The windows themselves were similar to those a friend has installed in his beautifully renovated terrace in Sydney – double glazed and opening in two directions on a 10 degree plane to the window with the opening to the top to allow airflow in but maintain security and wide open on a hinge like a door.

Dan had a bit of a snooze while I did some essential washing to keep us going. I remembered where the waschsalon was and indeed how the system there worked. Of course it was complicated by the assistant who didn’t seem to understand that I would prefer to lose a Euro in the machine that didn’t return money than use a dryer with only a hot setting to dry my bras, shirred back sundresses and quick dry travel gear. Eventually I came to an arrangement with an older kiwi lady (who didn’t seem to care if her clothes shrank if it would get her out of the laundromat quicker. Clothes done I headed back to the apartment to get Dan up so he didn’t end up sleeping the whole day away. (What’s the matter with parents today – NOFX – a song that reminds me of what I fear most… that young folks at the shows I go to will look at me and think what the hell is that sad old person doing here? Wrinkles don’t worry me (too much) and I found my first grey hair at 16. It is the expectation that I am required to be an adult when I get old and stop doing the things I love that scares me. For the wreck chord, Fat Mike is older than me)

The many faces of Berlin

The art gallery
Brandenberg Tor
Jewish museum
The makeshift memorial to those that died crossing the border
The museum at Checkpoint Charlie
The Sony Centre roof
Shopping around Unter den Linden
Bauhaus Archiv
East German architecture with some modern balconies added
Prenzlauer Berg
Kanack – one of the hippest German venues apparently
The golden angel – not hard to see why she’s a gay icon
Where The Ramones Museum was supposed to be

 

When I set out on this journey everybody I spoke to said that I, in particular, would love Berlin. And I did. Well parts of it anyway. Berlin is a huge city with a rich and varied history and the city is today a multi-faceted place with many rich and varied personalities. I had hoped for more from Prenzlauer Berg, the much trumpeted, former East Berlin neighbourhood, and since reunification, artistic centre of the universe. What I found was an area clinging to its reputation that was becoming gentrified with those with money that follow the artistic set. And there seemed to be a kind of resentment in the air. Resentment from the old school East Berliners for whom the place had been home – the tired old men running corner stores squeezed in between the trendy boutiques and discount stores run by Asian immigrants. Also resentment from the bohemians that the gentrified set was moving in. And then there are the other bohemians – the ones who think they’re cool because they are bohemians and eat eco-friendly produce and look like they are bohemians. The ones who make a judgement about who and what you are because you don’t look like them. The antithesis of what this area was about before the wall came down. The true artistic revolutionaries of the cold war days must weep for what their neighbourhood has become. Walking around Prenzlauer Berg, you see some of the wonderful street art that followed the fall of the wall. Unfortunately much of it has been defaced by taggers. [‘Under the Milky Way’ – The Church – Kind of an appropriate tune for my Berlin experience.]

 

Don’t get me wrong – Prenzlauer Berg is definitely worth a wander, if only to see the architecture of the East, including the pre-war townhouses (with shops underneath) as well as the concrete boxes of the post-war period. In the daylight I realised why I was so confused (and why the hostel guys though I was an idiot). When you walk through the front door from the street, you go through a kind of arcade – there are doors into flats (or in this case the main part of the hostel) then you walk through into a central courtyard with entrances to other apartment buildings. Everything makes more sense in daylight after sleep. The other thing to note about Prenzlauer Berg (and particularly Alexanderplatz) is that this is where you find the scammers, people begging for train fare, gypsies just begging, and guys selling, what I am guessing is a more political version of The Big Issue. A mix between Green left weekly and The Big Issue. And while The Big Issue people just use grim looks to sell their wares, these guys are in your face and you find them everywhere in Berlin, mostly in the stations in the east but they also ride the trains as well.

 

The kiosk under the Eberswalder station, near the hostel, reportedly sells the best old school curry wurst in Germany (and it was rather good). It also sells alcohol. You can buy a beer and drink it in the train station with your currywurst and also on the train. While that would be a complete disaster in Australia, it doesn’t seem to present any problems here. I didn’t come across anyone who looked noticeably drunk. You can also buy cigarettes from vending machines on street corners. Finding somewhere to buy bottled water is harder.

 

Breakfast on day one in Berlin was a cheese Danish and coffee from a bakery stand. I was at a train station in the east and the reason I could tell that is that most of the people working in shops or restaurants in the east, speak English. The rest of the morning was spent seeing the historic sites and while I visited the Brandenburg gate and the Reichstag, it was more the history of the wall that interested me. However, the most poignant memorial was a ramshackle memorial with crosses denoting many of those who died trying to cross from East Berlin. There was a short story about each one and the story of one guy really touched me. One year older than me, in 1989 when I was enjoying myself at uni, drinking beers and dreaming of visiting places like Berlin, this guy was shot and killed trying to get the kind of life I had and only a short period of time before the wall that stopped him was torn down. I was also touched by the eeriness of the Jewish memorial. There was a chilling stillness about it – a memorial probably more powerful in winter. Just on winter – Berlin had the same slushy snow of Copenhagen and on my first day at least it was mostly sunny. I was a bit smarter this time and teamed the thermals with a skirt and my trusty snow boots. I guess that’s the thing about Berlin – while it’s reformation in 20 years is incredible – it takes a map and a close look at some of the buildings to determine east from west – and it is a vibrant, energetic modern city, there is a melancholy from its past that permeates.

 

One of the places where this is evident is at the museum at Checkpoint Charlie. Rather than a building with exhibits, this is an open air museum with panels around three streets that converge at the site of the notorious border crossing. It is an eerie venture and kind of looks half finished as if these are panels surrounding a building site. That may be the point – whatever building goes on (and there has been much) the scars that run moiré deeply through this place can’t be healed so easily with a shiny new building or a lick of paint. [Every rose has its thorn – Guns ‘n’ Roses – I am writing these blogs on a train in Italy so I’ve whipped out the 80s compilations that seem appropriate for Italy somehow but more on that later.  I imagine in their heyday the gunners were popular with the same Germans who idolise AC/DC. I once had a German friend who chose to come to Australia with the German foreign office because it was where AC/DC were from and because he could drive a V8 in Australia. So right there parked in the garage of Ollie’s Potts Point apartment next to the beemers, was if I recall correctly a HQ or HK station wagon.]

 

Speaking of new buildings – the Sony Centre at Potsdamer Platz has got to be the epitome of saying stuff you to Berlin’s divided past. A huge almost open air plaza, save for the steel structure above it, surrounded by glass and steel buildings and restaurants. There is a modernised train station (save for maintaining some of the walls of the East Berlin original) and a modern shopping mall below. It reminded me of Darling Harbour – something built to artificially modernise a forgotten area and in the process turning it into a kind of plastic model of modern, frequented by tourists but bearing little relationship to the culture of the city to which it belongs. Nestled there in the central plaza was the Corroboree restaurant plastered with Fosters signs and serving a range of Australian delicacies including kangaroo and crocodile. I opted for the classic Australia burger and this cut Australian chips. The burger came with one of those really thick patties you find on a Maccas burger, Swiss cheese, tomato, lettuce and gherkins. Where was the beetroot? You can’t have an Aussie burger without beetroot. The chips were actually wedges although the spice coating on the wedges was good – it’s not strictly something you’d find in an Aussie takeaway. Amusingly I was provided with my own small bottle of Heinz tomato sauce on the table – presumably for the ‘thick cut’ chips. Needless to say I didn’t decide to suddenly start drinking Fosters. I had a Coopers. [‘I would walk 500 miles’ – The Proclaimers. I’m sure I will have walked more than that by the time I come home, quite a few of them through snow.]

 

From here I headed back to Alexanderplatz for a wander up Karl Marx Allee – a wide boulevard, surrounded by typical East German dwellings and that served as a backdrop for many a communist parade during the Cold War. The park down the middle was actually quite beautiful with rows of snow-covered trees glistening in the sunlight. I walked back through Prenzlauer Berg back to the hostel, checking out some of the funky little boutiques and side streets. I stopped at a sports store and bought a new travel towel. Unfortunately I left mine in Stockholm I think (sorry Cass). After that it had come time to do some washing. I had noticed a ‘wasche salon’ just around the corner so I headed there. Of course it was all automatic and all the instructions were in German. In the end, I was proud of my ability to decipher them, actually explaining to a German woman how the system worked (in English of course – I was a bit embarrassed to use my rudimentary German and stuck to bitte and danke schön). In Australia only the well-heeled have a Miele in their laundry (mine is some Korean brand). In Germany, that’s what you get in the Laundromat. After the Laundromat, I thought about heading out to a couple of venues I knew were famous for finding underground bands but it was snowing, I was tired and, most of all, I still didn’t feel comfortable with  the idea of walking around at night by myself somewhere unfamiliar. Despite staying in hostels with the idea that I would meet traveling companions who would head out and do this kind of thing with me, that hasn’t happened as yet.

 

On the morning of day two I wandered through Prenzlauer Berg again (the hostel checkout time was midday) and thought I’d check out the two clubs I had been too chicken to go to the night before. They looked like they would be cool but at least I didn’t really miss too much. The first one had no band (it was Tuesday) and the second had an American indie band. From there I made my first attempt to send stuff home. I went to the Post Office and despite the fact the attendant didn’t speak English, managed to purchase a postpack the right size for the stuff I wanted to post. I went back to the hostel, assembled the box (without the English instructions), packed everything up, addressed it and headed back to the post shop. What the attendant hadn’t managed to get across in our first exchange of gestures was a) there doesn’t seem to be such a thing as surface mail from Germany, b) the package which weighed less than a kilo would cost 40 euros to post and c) I couldn’t do it from this post shop but would have to go to the central post office. I gave up – Just have to be careful hw much I buy until I get to Spain – I am sure Scott will be able to help me out with the Spanish I need to use the postal service (or if not the Ireland where they speak English even if the accent is hard to understand).Good news though – the visa people came through.

 

After checking out and depositing my bag in a locker at the train station, I headed to Freidrichstraβe to take a look around and walked up and down Unter den Linden. There is so little space here that there are actually elevators from the street down to rail stations below. There are two rail networks as well the S-Bahn and the U-Bahn. The central station has about five levels due to this phenomenon. One of the things I am interested to do when I get home is some research about how they managed to link up the train networks after reunification. From Unter, I headed to Teirgarten, the big park in the middle of Berlin with an incredibly large gold angel, which has become a single for gay culture in Berlin (and is reportedly a cruising spot as well), at the roundabout in its centre. Europeans must find our roundabout hilarious when they visit Australia – theirs all have monuments at their centre. From here I headed to one of the beacons that had brought me to Berlin – the Bauhaus Archiv. There it was in all its glory, the museum of all things modernist including a heap of Marcel Breuer chairs (and a couple of thing by Mies van der Rohe (although not a Barcelona chair in sight). The thing I learnt from the Bauhaus? Breuer made some reasonably ugly tubular steel chairs before he hit upon the cantilever shape. Proof that your first design is not always a good one. [‘I Touch Myself’ – The Divinyls. If she wasn’t Australian, I’m pretty sure Chrissie Amphlet would have been a Berliner]

 

From here I headed for my other Berliner beacon, The Ramones Museum in Kreuzberg, I knew it was only supposed to be open on the weekend but thought it w2as worth a punt. Try not open at all. I went to the address that is supposed to be its home (checked with Lonely Planet and the museum’s website) but it seems the Ramones Museum at Solmsstraβe 30 has become an art gallery. Maybe the superfan who ran it got sick of spending his weekends with people looking at his stuff or maybe it was just so well hidden I couldn’t find it during the week. At any rate, looking for it turned out to be a good thing – I actually really liked the area around Unter den Linden

Kreuzberg, both the unpretentious western end and the grittier Turkish end. Here I found surf and skate stores, sneaker stores, and an awesome gothic shop. I bought a jacket – kind of a classy zip front black number and a woolen cap – I was feeling like I needed something a bit classier than the Pennywise beanie I brought with me – great for the snow in Australia but not quite the look for a chic European city. [‘The Only Way is Up’ – Yazz & the Plastic Population – a dancefloor classic from back when I did that kind of thing,]

 

By now it was about 7pm – the unfortunate thing about traveling on overnight trains is that you need to find something to do until they leave. The good news is that the shops in Germany (and everywhere I had been in Scandinavia) open from 10am until 8 or 8.30pm. I headed back to Unter den Linden as I knew Freidrichstraβe was on the same line as the Berlin Hauptbahnhof (central station). I walked up and down, past someone shooting a film at one point. There is a quite classy mall that runs a few blocks underground and ends in a five floor department store which I wandered around for a while. Then I visited what I guess is the German version of Borders except that they also have a huge range of music. I played spot the Australian artist, which was kind of interesting and showed the Germans have good taste when it comes to Australia. There was a whole row each of Nick Cave, AC/DC and The Go-Betweens. I also found The Church, The Triffids, Radio Birdman and Alchemist.

 

Once the shops closed, I decided to head to the Hauptbahnhof – I knew there was a McDonalds there so I thought I would try the theory of the McDonalds wi-fi connection. After all the world’s northern-most Maccas at Rovaniemi had wi-fi but alas not the Maccas in Berlin’s main railway station. It did offer flat whites and chai lattes though – the first place I had seen either since Hong Kong. In Scandinavia they have lattes and in Germany cappuccinos.  Also on the menu at German McDonalds – deep-fried camembert (and I thought that German restaurant in the Cross was the only place you could get it since 1975). [‘Girls Just Want to Have Fun’ – Cyndi Lauper – fun Tracy fact – I once had a hair cut quite a bit like Cyndi’s]

 

Because I have spent so many years dreaming of travel (at five I didn’t want to be a fireman, I wanted to be an air hostess and at 12, when I could choose to do a project on anything, I chose the countries of the world), I had a picture in my head of how many places would look and feel. Of the places I have visited so far, Berlin was the further than the others from the picture I had made.

U-Bahns, S-Bahns and all that jazz – south-east to Berlin

After my lightning visit, I farewelled Copenhagen and joined the train for Hamburg.  This time, my seat was even more plush than the last – in a glass doored cabin with six large plush seats and just two people. Now I had wondered exactly how it was that I was able to catch a train from Copenhagen to Berlin. I was aware I had to change at Hamburg but that still didn’t explain how we were getting across the ocean. At Malmo in Sweden, there is a long bridge across the sea to Denmark but the journey across the ocean between Denmark and Germany is a lot further. Did we have to catch a ferry and then another train? Where was the ticket for the ferry? And just as I was wondering, my question was answered – the train actually goes on a ferry to cross, just like the car ferries. And just like the car ferries, you have to get off the train and cross on the upper decks of the ferry. It was quite an experience. There’s loads of duty free shopping on the ferry too but rules about when you can shop depending on the tax laws in the direction you are heading.

 

Once we arrived in Germany and got back on the train, I saw my first grass since I landed in Helsinki a week ago. There was still snow everywhere too and wind farms. It’s actually the first place I have seen them so far. All day the announcements on the train had been in three languages – Danish, German and English. Unfortunately the last one, which should have told me the platform number for the Berlin train I had ten  minutes to find, was read in German twice and not in English at all.[‘Berlin Chair’ – You Am I – I swear this isn’t a ruse – it did actually just come up on my MP3 player – I actually forgot it was there.

 

Fortunately I worked it out and the directions to the hostel. It’s just a pity the door to the hostel had me flummoxed. There I was standing in the snow, with the same jeans problem I had in Copenhagen this morning and no one would help me. I ended up calling them by phone and they still wouldn’t actually come to the door. I have to say – I don’t think I’m cut out for the whole hostelling experience. In the corridor to my room the lights weren’t working so I couldn’t even find the door. The guy who worked there begrudgingly came to help me. They don’t provide towels. The showers turn on for 30 seconds and there’s nowhere to put your clothes to keep them dry. The nifty hanging bathroom thing only works if there’s somewhere to hang it. I think, in future, if I stay in hostels it will need to be the ones that offer a bathroom. The idea of a hostel, with fellow travelers is appealing but when most of them are under 21 and after a different traveling experience, it’s not really what I’m looking for. I am looking forward to getting out and amongst it in Berlin tomorrow but now I’m cold, wet and very tired so it’s time for sleep. [A Good Heart – Fergal Sharkey – pure 80s pop – it’s on one of my 80s compilation CDs and I had actually forgotten all about Fergal – living proof that an unattractive man can make it in the music biz]

 

On the train
On the ferry (while it was snowing)
A seagull using the ferry to propel it
On the train
On the ferry
seagull hitching a ride