Hallo aus Berlin!

 

Another quick update again. I'm in Berlin now, after spending New Years at Maria's (Tim's friend from his Gap Year) house in Dresden, which was great fun. We hung out with her and her friends, played some German board games (they have heaps of them!), went out to see the fireworks at Midnight, which were crazy (Germans all seem to be closet pyromaniacs: absolutely everyone lets of tonnes of fireworks at the stroke of midnight!), and in General had a jolly time! The next day, Maria, her friends and us had a quiet day in Dresden, sightseeing around Dresden, including visitng the new Green Room with the Saxon Crown Jewels, and making Pizza for dinner. All in all, a great time.

 

We travelled from Dresden yesterday afternoon to Berlin and arrived early evening. One of Maria's friends, Sebastian, also joined us in Berlin for the evening so that he could catch an English movie at the Sony centre. We ended up seeing the new Woody Allen film, Match Point, which was actually not too bad- quite arty, and somewhat Ripley like, with a modern day Shakespearean twist. Great to do something different after a month and a half of sightseeing, and I think the movie was enjoyed by all.

 

Today, Sebastian went back to Magdeburg, where he goes to Uni (Maria is leaving tomorrow), and Maria and Tim went to the Museum Island here in Berlin, whilst I did a free Berlin Walking tour, which included the Brandenburg Gate, Hitler's Bunker, the Holocaust Memorial, Checkpoint Charlie and the Wall remains, amongst others. The tour was really cool, despite the guide being Aussie. He gave an awesome account of what happened when the wall came down, and the whole revolutionary uprising on November 9th 1989, which really made the history of Berlin come to life. Berlin is by no means the world's prettiest city, but each street is so ingrained with history that you canät help but become fasinated by the monumental events that have gone on here. I'm looking forward to the next few day so much!

 

Tschüss!

 

Dickson