#altbayern

Day two of Berlin exploration was a raging success.

The first thing to be noted is that for a tourist Berlin is a silly, wonderful place.  Mostly silly. What fun though.  I started my day off with a leisurely breakfast and then made my way to the Technikmuseum.  It’s a trio of buildings that consist of an ancient train station, and two newer multi-story warehouses all filled with technological relics of Germany’s past. Absolutely glorious, gorgeous, and wonderful.  I can’t say I’ve ever seen as much history packed into one building before.  It’s any geek’s dreamland.  I’ll post some of the pictures I took of it at some point, but it might take me a little bit since internet connections aren’t exactly a common thing for me right now (staying with my grandparents and don’t really like bringing my laptop into the city, grandparents don’t have/want internet). Anyways, one of the newer buildings is devoted entirely to nautical/aerial tech.  Four stories tall and enormous, you could spend an entire day in that building alone. Floor one is devoted to all of the earliest creations in seafaring ways, complete with incredibly detailed, scale models of earlier sailboat/ships ( I don’t know what they’re called but think like pirate ships ) That and the first attempts at underwater travel.  That’s a helluva’ thing, by the way, what the first submarines were like.  I cannot believe that someone willing crammed themselves into one of those little tubes and let someone else drop them into the ocean in it.  Mostly replicas, lots of history, and a whole bunch of navigational artifacts.

 Floor two starts off with the German beginnings in flight, along the lines of the Wright brothers, but a lot more geared towards gliders and single person helicopter like contraptions.  Oh and an intro to wartime flight and weaponry, along with the very beginnings of German rocketry.  Especially towards the end when they start gearing you more towards the next floor up, which is the continuation of WWI developments and the intro to commercial air travel.  The first few Lufthansa planes are incredibly small and rickety looking, and yet the interior is posh like it’s designed for the very richest of the elite, which it likely was!  Rockets are cool, by the way.  I won’t go into detail on the next couple floors, since it’s all just progressively more modern continuations of the above.  Wartime history is a little more detailed here than what I got in school, and that’s all I’m going to say.

Another notable part of this building is that the first computer ever built is stored there, even though it’s barely a computer and more of a ridiculously big calculator.  The next few additions are stored there as well, or on loan from other museums.  It’s pretty crazy how big 1mb of ram looks like.

 Next building is the train station, which I think was actually an old Nazi depot and train station, or was maybe taken over by them. I don’t actually know that, but it would stand to reason.  Filled with engines, and I mean like… engine blocks as well as train engines, all from the oldest models to some of the newer ones.  Just barely outside of this is a supremely cool old brewery and a very pretty little park.  Pictures of these will come at some point as well. I’d like to note real quickly that at the time of writing this, I’m sitting in a 100 something year old bar in Neu-Westend drinking a beer and a whiskey, and watching some old guy winning hundred of Euros at a slot machine.   Anyways, if trains or airplanes or ships are your thing, then this is a place you should visit.  If you don’t like any of those, then visit anyways (insert expletives involving science).

 The last building is essential a four story tall science playground for children.  There are only two things that I will point out about this one.  There are live electrical experiments to play with, and there is also a cloud chamber.

Part Two of This Silly Day

 Oh did I mention that this is a two part day?  It is, it was long and fun, and my feet hurt now.  From the Technikmuseum I wandered over to Potsdamer Platz, about a half hour walk. This is the technological, modern center of Berlin. I don’t know if it’s quite the downtown, but it sure seems like it is.  I did a nice walk around the square and then settled down at a little Bavarian restaurant for food.  Radler and bratwurst with sauerkraut and mashed potatoes, an excellent decision. I didn’t exactly intend to stay for more than that, but there was a table across from me consisting of Texans that were just too funny to listen to, so I stayed.  Nothing quite like Americans complaining about the fact that water/soda isn’t automatically served with ice.  Really, I enjoy these little cultural differences; they’re what make people-watching (one of my favorite activities) so much fun. So I drank another radler and watched them, and after the whole affair I introduced myself.  Turns out that one of the guys (supposedly) was the guy that did all the lighting stuff in the Invesco field in Denver.  Who knows how accurate that is, but hey I got a free beer just because I spoke English with an American accent.

 Potsdamer Platz is an impressive place, and the Sony center is exactly what it sounds like, a huge technological wonderland as a testament to that corporation’s might.  That’s where the Blue Man Group seems to be based, I’ve seen them before so I didn’t go to a show, but I might before I leave Berlin.  Next up are the shopping malls.

 This doesn’t necessarily need a paragraph, but whatever. Imagine the biggest American shopping mall you’ve been to, and then load it up with French and Japanese clothing outlets, and add in tourists speaking languages from all over the world, and then you know what those are like.  Also our elderly gambling friend is now down a hundred Euros, and I’m considering buying him a beer to help him cope with that fact.  

 Through all of this I should really emphasize how much I like public transportation in this city. There are three basic modes; U-Bahn, S-Bahn, and busses.  U-Bahn is the subway, S-Bahn is (for you Denverites) the lightrail, and busses are busses.  The point being that you can get literally anywhere in this city and the outlying suburbia via one system or other, or a combination, and it’s all extremely simple and cheap to do.  A day pass for all three modes of transport costs 9 Euros, and one way passes are 2 Euros a piece.  Now you might be thinking “well that’s not really that cheap “but considering how far and how directly you can travel with these systems, it works out pretty well.

 Next and final downtown stop for me was the musical instruments museum.  I’m such a nerd for music and old instruments… that sort of place are perfect for me.  They had an early Stradivari violin on display, along with countless other brands of violins, violas, harpsichords, guitars, pianos, harps… the list goes on. So many instruments from all time periods.  Didn’t know that the hurdy-gurdy is an old French peasant instrument, and I bet you didn’t know that either.  They also had one of those full-sized old Catholic church organs that I very dearly wanted to play, but likely would have gotten arrested for if I had.  The real kicker to this place is that they host concerts of all sorts with musicians from all over the world.  All classical, of course, and all in an acoustically perfect concert hall.  I had the dumb luck of timing it perfectly, and got to see an Austrian piano prodigy named Mathis Bereuter play Hersant, Beethoven, and Prokofiev live.  Beautiful music and he’s no older than I am.  Fun little racist moment too from the elderly lady sitting next to me, when after the performance she leaned over and whispered “He’s not German, but at least he’s not the usual Asian type that plays here”.

Anyways!  That’s the end of the day.  Next up is the part where I’m sitting at a 100 year old bar, drinking a delicious Berliner Pilsner, and still just… watching this guy gamble away.  He’s still losing, by the way, for those of you that are cheering for the guy.  I know I am I want to see him make it big, damnit!

 Until tomorrow!

Ich war zur Bier-Recherche im Bier-Mekka Bayerns unterwegs – und das liegt keinesfalls in München, sondern in… Oberfranken!

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