Kathleen
Wow! What an amazing city. It is so Western that you feel about as at home as you will anywhere in the world, yet so grand and European that it impresses on a whole different level.
It is, as you can imagine, a very large city, but you feel like you can get around very easily because of the very efficient trams, subway and even bike lanes (we wented bikes one day, it Was Sunday and they had closed down the main boulevard leading west from the Brandenburg Gate, what an experience!)
There are, of course, any number of museums, statues, and historic sites related to WWII and its divided aftermath. It is very intersting to see how much effort has been put into portraying a German populace that is fully responsible for the atrocities of war and while heralding the freedoms that were taken away both during and after the war and celebrating the return to a unified, more responsible government and populace.
Truly one of the most awsome and poigniant examples of this is the Reichstag, or parliament building. Much of the building was destroyed in a fire in 1933, an event which directly led to many of the first restrictions on freedoms for individuals and government institutions outside of the party. There is speculation that it was, in fact, Hitler’s supporters who started this fire in order to provide a reason for siezing certain liberties. Today, the building again holds the German parliament in the middle of the building, covered by a massive glass dome from which visitors can actually view both the parliament in session and most of Berlin at the same time. It is symbolic that the government will remain answerable to the people of Germany. We were lucky enough to visit the building right before sunset and the views and effect were fantastic. If you travel to Berlin, do not miss a visit to the Reichstag dome.
As you can imagine if you have seen any Indiana Jones movies, Germany also possesses a vast quantity of art and artifacts from around the world which can be viewed in the many, many museums in town. One of the most impressive is the Pergamon, in which you find not only pieces of the ancient world, but spectacular, emmense walls and gates that have been reconstructed from both original stones and reconstructions. This is certainly worth seeing and really quite impossible to either describe or capture by photograph…you will have to visit yourself.
No visit to Berlin, of course, would be complete without visits to the Brandenburg Gate and the remaining fragments of the Berlin wall. They were every bit as awe-inspiring as you would imagine.
Beyond all of the amazing things to see, Berlin is a very approachable city and we greatly enjoyed the week we spent as Berliners. We had beautiful, warm summer weather and an extremely enjoyable time.
It is truly amazing how many, many places to go and things to do there are in Germany. We definately felt like our three weeks there just scratched the surface. This is not a country to see in one visit, but a place to pick a region to explore, do it thoroughly, enjoy it, and plan a trip back to see some more! We hope to return some day and see some of the many, many places we missed. Overall, it was an unexpectedly beautiful country with so many various landscapes and cities to explore. We weren’t glad to be leaving Germany, but were exciting to get on to places seeming more exotic……next stop, Poland!
