Excursion 2

Yesterday was an outstanding day, and I wish I had gotten back home earlier so I could've posted about it while all of the day's events were still fresh in my mind. But since we didn't get back until about midnight, I folded laundry, cleaned up my humble abode a bit, and then went straight to bed...or tried to, but I was too excited about Germany's victory over the Netherlands to fall asleep at a decent hour.

From the top:

Since yesterday was an excursion day, that meant I got to sleep in an hour later. At 10 AM, our class met up at Hackescher Markt, a train station and really neat area that reminds me of Diagon Alley from Harry Potter. You walk behind a row of buildings that look like nothing special, and then all of a sudden, you pass through this quaint little German doorway, and a whole new world of boutiques and restaurants and historic homes opens up to you. There are also Stolpersteine everywhere--the stumbling stones that mark where Jews lived or worked. Unfortunately, the many stones we saw in this area all marked the same fate of the local Jews: murdered at Auschwitz.

I should also mention at this point that my camera had run out of battery, so I didn't get the chance to take any pictures of the things I'm describing. But my friend Junyi took pictures, so included are some of her photos.

After wandering around the Hackescher Markt area for a while, our teacher, Hyoun-A, gave us all some German candy she had bought for us, and she then sent us on our ways. We had all chosen a Kiez, or district, to visit, on which we will give a twenty-minute presentation tomorrow. Junyi and I went to Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf, which is an upscale part of Berlin, where much of the "old money" is concentrated, as one local explained to us yesterday.

Places we visited:

-the Deutsche Oper Berlin (the German Opera, Berlin)--

Not as pretty of a sight as we expected, but cool nevertheless. The Deutsche Oper Berlin is the second-largest opera house in Germany. It was built in 1911, but it was destroyed by a British air raid on 23 November 1943. The current Deutsche Oper building opened in year 1961.

-Schloss Charlottenburg (Charlottenburg Palace)--

Between 1695 and 1699, Prince Friedrich III had this bright and ornate summer residence built for his wife, Sophie Charlotte. Sadly, Sophie Charlotte died just six years later, in 1705, so in her memory the palace was named Charlottenburg, and the settlement just opposite the palace was dubbed Charlottenburg. That same year, Charlottenburg became a chartered city. A fun fact about this palace, modelled after Versailles, is that during the Napoleonic Wars of the 1800s, Napoleon himself occupied the palace.

-the Kaiser Wilhelm Gedächtniskirche (the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church)--

In the years of the Berlin Wall the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church was a symbol of West Berlin. This church was built in 1891, in order to honor Kaiser Wilhelm I. On the 23rd of November 1943, however, it, too, was also bombed--but this building was irreparably damaged. Only part of the church spire and part of the entrance hall survived.

We didn't get any pictures of the church because it's currently being renovated, and we couldn't even see it...but here's what the church normally looks like:

The old church is obviously on the left, and the new church is on the right.

-the Olympiastadion (the Olympia Stadium)--

My favorite place that we saw on Wednesday was definitely the Olympiastadion! This stadium is home to the Bundesliga team Hertha Berlin. It was built in 1913, in order to host the 1916 Olympic Games. However, because of World War I, the Games were cancelled. In 1936, Berlin finally hosted the Olympics, and this was the historic year in which Jesse Owens, the African-American track & field athele, won four gold medals, much to Hitler's dismay. (Hitler was in disbelief that anyone but an "Aryan" should or could win the races.) The Olympiastadion was one of the few buildings that was hardly damaged during the War.

Happy to be in Berlin and happy that I just bought a mini-soccerball in the Olympiastadion gift shop! :)

-the Ku'damm (Kurfürstendamm Avenue, Ku'damm for short)--

Finally, there's the Ku'damm, which is just a really popular and really expensive shopping street, where all the big boutiques and brand-name companies keep shop. The street gets its name from the Kurfürsten, or prince-electors, who used to use this road to travel from Brandenburg to Grunewald. During the Golden Twenties, the Ku'damm was the center of leisure and night-life in the "New West."

-a random cafe'--

Here, Junyi and I simply stopped for coffee and tea. Also, as part of our excursion day, we had been assigned the task of interviewing random people in the area and asking them about the theme of gentrification (or, "the process of renewal and rebuilding accompanying the influx of middle-class or affluent people into deteriorating areas that often displaces poorer residents") and their experiences with it. We got some good answers, but Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf is not actually an area with much gentrification to speak of, since it's where all the Old Money already lives.



-and, last but not least, a Fußball field! :D --

 

When Junyi and I were on our way to the cafe', we passed by a Grundschule, or elementary school, with an amazing front: a football field! Since I was now the proud owner of a mini-ball from Olympiastadion, we made up our minds that it was of necessity to play a bit after we finished the day's work. So, we did the interview, got the info we needed, and went back to the school, where the kids were still playing. It was so good to see so many young kids playing football--not that that's anything unusual to see here, though. After the kids were directed off the field by their "referee"/teacher, the big kids took to the field--some guys about our age or older. So, we followed them, I threw off my boots, as it would've been impossible to play with them on, and then Junyi and I passed the ball back and forth for a while. Pretty soon, there was an influx of more little kids back on the pitch, and then it turned into some sort of scene from a movie. It was insane! There were, like, twenty kids of all ages on this field, with like six different balls flying around, and constant choirs of "Achtung!"s  ("Attention"--like, "Heads up!") could be heard.

Because Junyi and I had a tiny little ball we were playing with, some of the kiddos took special interest in us, as the ball was "their size." Before we knew it, we had been forced into a mad game of Keep-away; Junyi, myself, and three little boys, probably four- to six-years-old. We had such a blast, and it was the most fun I had had in a while. But just as we were ready to leave, one of the little boys took the ball and punted it over the fence...and onto the lofted train tracks conveniently running alongside the field, above part of the school property. And that was the end of my ball. :-|

But the little guy was so precious, and he must have said, Es tut mir leid! ("I'm sorry!") twenty times! I told him it was no problem, and that at least we had fun. But he felt so bad, he said he wanted to give me money for a new one. Since I was low on Euros at the time and my heart was hurting at the realization that my shiny new Bundesliga mini-ball was about to get crushed by a large passenger train...I accepted his generosity when he ran to tell his Mutti what had happened.

Then, I had a great conversation with his parents auf Deutsch. It turns out that this little boy, who spoke native German, was actually born in Colombia, where his mom is originally from. His dad is German, but as I was starting to walk off after thanking his parents for their money towards my new ball, I heard the mom start speaking to the boy in what sounded very much like Polish. So, naturally, I turned around and asked her if she spoke Polish, to which she answered, "No--Slovenian. Why?" Then we entered into a conversation about Polish and the Slavic languages, and she explained that her husband spoke some Polish. He then chimed in to tell me about how he had also attended the Freie Uni Berlin, for Eastern European Studies! :)

After all of this, Junyi and I returned to Berlin-Mitte, and off we went to meet our Vanderbilt group and Peggy for our weekly reunion dinner. This time, we ate at a place called "Ständige Vertretung," or "Steady Representations," which is a famous Berlin restaurant, originally located...elsewhere...Bonn?...and is the place where all the politicians and actors go to eat. There are photographs lining the walls of the restaurant--though we sat outside--to illustrate just how many famous folks have been there.

And as if this weren't enough for one day, there was STILL more!

Junyi, Matthew, Qiongru, and I went to an Italian restaurant about twenty minutes away from our apartments in order to watch the Germany-Netherlands game, which, thankfully, Germany won, 2-1. It was a blast, and I enjoyed a nice tiramisu while watching. Oh yeah, and before the match, we stopped in at a souvenir shop in the Friedrichstraße Bahnhof, where we were able to get further decked out in Germany gear. I am now one of those crazy football fans walking around with a national flag on their back. :)

Anyway, this was such a long post and so much happened on this Wednesday that it took me five days to write it all out! I hope friends and family out there are still reading, and that you will continue reading in order to hear all about my trip to Poland!

Gruß

-Monika