Berlin

This is going to get really fragmentary and list-like.. sorry...

-with Karen, Leah, Laura and Becky

SATURDAY
-Met them at 5 a.m., headed out to Termini station, took a bus to Ciampino airport. There was a cat wandering around in the airport. He hid underneath the seats.
-arrived in Frankfurt, had 7-8ish hour layover. did NOT know that... that's what I get for not helping plan, I guess. Luckily I had plenty of sketching to do. We hung out at the cafe, went for a walk outside (it was actually fall here! colors and trees, crisp air!)
-German words are really long...
-Arrived in Berlin around 9pm, got picked up from the airport by Becky's friend Henning and his friend Noah. On the way back to Noah's place, we stopped to pick up some Doner Kebaps (these were super delicious, and really cheap) and beer (oh, they have beer that is actually decent in Germany, hooray!)
-Sat around at Noah's apartment for a bit, with some of his and Henning's friends.. there were three languages being spoken, it was kinda crazy.
-I was super tired, but they all wanted to go out, Henning wanted to take us dancing. We didn't even GO out until after 2am. It was a long journey to get there, and the place had a few different dance floors. None of them had really great music, though. Was not so much a fan of the hip hop one where everyone spent all their time. We didn't get back to Noah's apt until about 6am.

SUNDAY
-Noah was a great host: got us breakfast.. fresh bread (whole grain kind, yum!), and tomatoes and many homemade jellies and jams and honey and nutella, yum yum. It was delicious.
-long journey north of Berlin to Sachsenhausen concentration camp
-although this really goes without saying, the camp was sad.. depressing to think that TONS of ashes of human remains were found.
-there was great signage there, though, and the design nerd in me was happy.
-it got really cold and windy, especially as the afternoon was getting later
-on the way back to the train, we picked up some hot mulled wine. yum.
-went downtown (finally). When we finally emerged from train/metro stations, we were in the middle of some magical Christmas market. It was super exciting! Lights and people in costume and candy and everything. There was a big built hill with fake snow you could sled down...
-saw Sony Center, very cool, futuristic looking.
-went to a mexican restaurant for dinner.. even though it wasn't great mexican food, it was still great to have that. It's certainly one thing you can't really find in Rome.

MONDAY
-explored Berlin all day by ourselves. Noah had class. He was worried about us getting lost, it was cute. We were totally fine, though.
-cold and rainy rainy rainy this day.
-walked along the edge of the Tiergarten to get to the Bauhaus museum. The museum did not have too much to display, as the building is under construction and so much stuff is at MoMA in NYC right now (man, I go to Europe, to Berlin, and go see this stuff, and it's actually in the States right now? Really?). We did see some nice teapots, a bunch of chairs and architectural models, and a really great photography exhibit, though.
-long walk through the Tiergarten back up (fall colors and puddles and singing in the rain, oh boy!)
-Brandenburg Gate-- there were some tugboats being held upside down in a little structure behind it.. not quite so sure why.
-Currywurst for lunch. Pretty good. Also, it came with french fries, which I haven't had the whole time I've been here. Weird.
-Holocaust Memorial, very powerful.
-cafe for a cappuccino. It's nice that they have coffee shops you can actually hang out in there. I miss that.
-Berlin Wall. we missed the 20th anniversary by a weekend, bummer.
-back to the Christmas market, we went SLEDDING. it was awesome, then got some treats.
-flew back to Frankfurt this evening

TUESDAY
-woke up bright and early from our tiny room at the B&B, flew back to Rome.
-arrived back at the apartment around 11:30.. mere hours before leaving for the North Field Trip. Crazy.