On to Switzerland
Hallo Ihr Liebe,
Jetzt fängt die zweiter Kaptial dieser Reise an. Ab in die Schweiz! Ich freue mich riesig.
Sorry, should be writing in English, shouldn’t I. I’m sitting in the ICE 373 train from Frankfurt (Main) Hbf to Bern BE, and am reunited with my laptop again (not that I’m dependant on it or anything. I’m not THAT crazy about Macs. Actually, I liked being away from computers for a few weeks). The train just left the station, and it will be several hours before I’m in the comfort of my Aunt Käthi’s place. And this time I don’t have my orange-dark chocolate bar with me, so it’ll be a long, lonely trip…
Much has happened in the last week…let me recall…
Yes, last Monday I was still in Holland (feels so long ago already), and headed to Amsterdam on the train in the morning. Monday was Queen’s Day in Holland (the late Queen’s birthday), and the Amsterdamers take this as a great reason to dress up in orange, walk through the streets (and canals), listen and dance to rave music blaring from every street corner, and get high or drunk on any substance imaginable. Ah, the Dutch. I arrived there by train at 9:30, just when a few other trains came into the station. I had to wait a little while just to get out of the station because there were so many people. Intense. Everyone in orange (excluding myself. I am Swiss. We wear red.), everyone happy to have a day off work, everyone still sober. We get out of the station and stream off into the streets. I joined the main flow down a big street; it felt like the Sunrun: there were that many people. I didn’t actually have anything planned for the day. Most of the museums were closed of course, and those open would have been completely full. So I opted to just walk the streets and soak in the experience. Camera in hand, I strolled down many a street, alley, and canal edge. Amsterdam is a beautiful city, crisscrossed with canals, which are banked by sidewalks a few meters wide, lined with large deciduous trees, and backed by old, historic row houses. Tall, narrow houses right up against each other, with the characteristic small winch hanging out of the attic to load and unload goods from the street below.
We’re just coming into Mannheim.
Queen’s Day is the only day of the year where you can sell your goods along the street without having to pay the city rent. As a result, you see lots of residents having garage sales, artists selling their works, and some people selling stuff which is absolute garbage. Seriously, stuff you would never use. Beer is everywhere, of course, plus any other kind of alcoholic beverage. What was interesting is that I could only see Heineken beer cans. I don’t know what else they sold in the beer gardens, but in can form, all you could find was Heineken. The big attraction of the day (or nuisance) was the music. Rave music (and only rave music), was blared from every bar or concert stage. In addition, hundreds of boats were plying the canals, many with a dj, mini bar, and huge speakers on them, full of grooving people.
Now, this was kind of cool for the first few hours. You don’t get to see this anywhere else. However, a few defining factors. First, the rave music was lousy. I know, some people would say that rave music always sucks, but I have to say I’ve heard good stuff. But you couldn’t find it here. Everything was bland blah blah blah. Second, I was hoping to see some good dancing, knowing that Amsterdam was famous for it’s break dancers. But nothing. Nadda. I didn’t see one break dancer in the whole city. And I was there for a long time. A bit lame.
But, all in all, it was a pretty groovy experience. I stayed till 7:00, walking through the streets, taking pictures, smelling food…
Towards evening the moral depravity of the place started to show. Garbage was everywhere. Homosexual activity was all over the place. People getting drunk and rowdy. The portable toilets were full by noon, meaning people would just pee wherever they felt like: random walls, dumpsters, trees. I accidentally walked through part of the red light district (which was more or less a street across from normal, quiet neighbourhoods) which wasn’t too uplifting either. I was glad to get back on the train to Rotterdam, where I had the good fortune of having a few drunk and stoned teenagers sit next to me. By the time I got home, I didn’t have a very high opinion of the human race.
The next day was a whole lot quieter.
A period of 41 minutes pass as Thomas decides that he doesn’t feel like writing at the moment and takes a nap, during which the train stops in Karlsruhe and Offenburg. He is waked up by the conducter asking for his ticket (although he was more or less awake already) and is made aware of the fact that this train will only travel to Basel today despite it being scheduled to go all the way to Bern. A bit vexing, but Thomas takes it in stride, seeing the change over as a possibility to stretch his legs and see different people in a different train. Thomas takes almost everything in stride, due to his extraordinarily long legs.
Tuesday I borrowed Hans’s road bike and headed out into the countryside, taking advantage of Holland’s flat landscape and incredibly well-kept bike routes. I biked along a dike bordering a harbor canal, before turning inland to the village of Brielle, a very quaint, typical Dutch village. Beautiful, really. Getting there by 11, I spent the rest of the day walking around, taking photos (as always), reading, contemplating, and eating. I could have gone on to more villages in the area, but the thought of that hard roadbike seat was not incredibly inviting, so I opted to stay put. And it was good that way. Very relaxing. Towards evening I made my way back, getting distracted a few times by the beautiful lakes and scenes. Sat on a dock at sunset and listened to a WCCF sermon on my ipod. Amazing how the world is so connected, really. Of course, by the time the sermon was done, the sun had set, and I actually had a long way to go, having underestimated the time it would take to get back. In addition, a strong head wind gathered force after sunset, making progress frustratingly slow. Nevertheless, it was kinda cool, head down, biking through the wind in the dark with no light, trying to avoid the sheep who liked to stand in the middle of the path…the black ones were especially hard to see. But I got home at 10:30, rather tired, as I hurried home so the Buddings wouldn’t worry too much about me. I enjoyed sleep that night, having biked 70 km, and with a nice sunburn to boot.
Wednesday it was off again to the next stop, Berlin. As I came across the border, I could hear passengers speak German; it felt like I was coming home. I got into the Berliner Main Station at 5, where I met my cousin Fränziska (my mother’s brother’s daughter), with whom I would be staying with the next few days. She’s a Germanistic student and freelance journalist, and she got some free press passes to a theater performance that night. We quickly headed to her place to drop my stuff off and change, grabbed some food, and headed down to the theater. The thing took place in a round tent, like a circus tent, but only with seating for about 150, with the stage on one side. You would sit at tables, order drinks and food, then sit back and enjoy the show. The piece was called Geschwister Pfister, two brothers and one of the brother’s girlfriends all living in one apartment, showing how life at home is like. In reality, none of them are related and the two men are going out. The piece was a bit strange, although having seen some other European works, I wasn’t surprised. There were some compelling moments, the thing was full of great musical numbers, and the 3 actors and their band were all excellent musicians.
The conductor just announced that the train will be arriving in Freiburg shortly. English is more or less the second language here, so all the announcements are made in both languages. Being fluent in both, Thomas finds the difference between the two announcements amusing. In German, the conductor will announce the approaching station, rattle off all the connecting trains and their respective destinations, thank you for traveling with them and say goodbye. In English, it just is “In a few minutes we will be arriving in (insert station here). Thank you for traveling with Deutsche Bahn. Peace out, dog.”
As this was the première, Fränzi was invited to the Afterparty, so we stayed around a bit, ate Bratwurst and potato salad and some yummy fruit and vanilla custard.
The next day Fränzi and I headed into the city (or at least to the important part. She lives right in the city). We checked out Brandenburg Tor and the Holocaust Monument together, after which we went to her office where she had to do some work in the afternoon. I headed out alone and checked out Checkpoint Charlie, went back to the Holocaust Memorial to visit the info centre underneath the Memorial, but ran out of time there as I had registered for a tour of the Parliament building at 5. So, went on this tour (which was only five people strong. Sweet stuff.). We met at the Brandenburg Tor and were led around the political part of town by this historian who spoke a mile a minute and could rattle of dates about things that happened three hundred years ago as easily as you can count to 100. Then, he took us into Parliament (Reichstag in German), bypassed the long line-up (already making the 7.50 euros I paid worth it), sat in the plenary room and had this MP tell us all these cool things about what goes on there, then headed up to the roof and the glass cupola, which you can go into. From there one has a brilliant view of the city, where our guide talked some more and wrapped up the 2.5 hour, 20,000 word tour (yeah, I counted). I stayed on the roof a while longer to photograph the glass dome. The Reichstag building is square, with a big, cathedral-like dome on top. In the war this was largely destroyed, and when the rebuilding started, a modern, glass dome was built in its place, through which you can see down into the plenary hall and all the MPs governing your country (if you happen to be German). This building is the most visited Parliamentary building in the world, receiving 8,000 visitors per day on average, 20,000 on peak days.
By now the sun had set, so I headed back to Fränzi’s place, where she had cooked up this fabulous dinner. We had some good discussions. Her boyfriend (I forget his name), a thermal-acoustic engineer, came over later. Seems to be a great guy. I certainly approve.
The next day Fränzi had to go to class, so I headed out on my own, took a tour about the history of the Berlin Wall, visited the Denkmalkirche (a church which was largely destroyed in the bombing of the city, leaving only the tower standing. The government decided to decided to clear the rubble away and leave the bombed out shell of a tower standing as a memorial. Pretty beeindrucksvoll). Walked through the large central park in Berlin to the Holocaust Memorial to check out the info centre and finish seeing it, walked around the area a bit, went to a concert that night, and then headed home, making sure I got a shot of the Brandenburg Tor at night (I’m such a tourist).
On Saturday I was planning to visit a thing or two in Berlin before heading to Potsdam to see some things there before meeting up with Pietro Widmer (a colleague of my Dad, and friend of our family who has been working in Germany for the last few years. That nice piano in our house is his). Turns out, I got hooked looking at things in Berlin, so I stayed for the day and met up him and his wife in the evening in Berlin (as they happened to be in the city too), before heading to Potsdam for dinner. What did I do during the day? Well, visited Alexander Square (the famous Square in East Berlin), latched myself onto a free tour of the area (it was in English, too), walked around some more (as I love doing), wrote some postcards, and got a killer sunburn.
At six I met up with Pietro and Renee, and we headed to Potsdam by train together (they don’t have a car here in Germany. The transit system is actually so good here that they don’t need one. Pretty cool, eh?) We ate at an Italian place in their neighbourhood, where Pietro likes to go because he can talk Italian with the manager there. They live in this area which is comprised of lots of brick row houses, much like in England. We were talking English (as Renee doesn’t know German), and I kept having the feeling that we were in England or Canada. Only when I would read one of the signs on the nearby shops would I realize that I was sitting in East Germany. Surreal, really.
A word of two about Berlin. Berlin is an incredible city. By far my favorite city so far (maybe excluding Winchester, but I liked Winchester out of completely different reasons). Berlin is not a nice city, or a very old city. Anything decently old was destroyed in the war. But the place is bubbling with culture, alive with history. The Second World War, the Holocaust, the Berlin Wall and everything associated with the Iron Curtain, it’s all here, right in your face. It brings history so tangibly close. And it’s not just any history (like some old cathedral from the middle ages), but it’s the history that we spend so much time studying in class, the history (in the case of the Wall), that many of us have been a part of ourselves. You can see how the last century’s history has really shaped the city. I highly recommend it. Ask me more when I get home.
Thomas gets into Basel and switches trains. Having 10 minutes, he debates if he should just stand on the platform and enjoy the fresh air, but decides it may be wise to get a seat before the train fills up. Turns out that was a good decision. Thomas settles down, pulls out his laptop and starts typing…akdjf;dfdf…The passengers across the aisle from him are speaking Swiss-german. It does his soul well. The feeling of coming home is very strong.
Pietro and Renee live in a beautiful apartment above a small store. They even have their own backyard. Sunday morning we had a gourmet breakfast of crêpes with all manner of things (lemon and sugar being my favourite). After that Pietro and I headed out on bike to see some of the town. First we headed up a “mountain” (a hill, by Canadian standards), with this funny Greek building on top which some King Frederick had built for his garden parties. Incredible views from there.
Great, the train starts and Thomas realizes that the train is going the other direction than he thought. Thomas hates traveling backward.
After checking out the view (from which you can see part of Berlin), we headed down to this park along the lake. I forget the name of the park, but it is a UNESCO Heritage Site. In the middle of this park an English Manor house is to be found, from where the leaders of the Allies parceled up Europe after the War in the Potsdam Conference. Part of the Wall can still be seen along the shore of the lake to prevent East Germans from swimming across to the other side, which was under the jurisdiction of West Berlin. We rode through the forested West Berlin side of the lake, biked through the film park (actually one of the most important film studios in Germany), saw a huge street scene set where the Pianist was filmed, slipped in through the gap in the gate to take a look (I did,
Uh oh, the first tunnel. Not this again…
not Pietro). Headed back for lunch (which was gourmet, too. Pheasant soup, wholesome German bread, excellent cheese). After lunch I headed out on my own with the bike to Saccousi Park, the place for which Potsdam is really famous for. The place was built for numerous German royalty (I have no idea who whey all were), with summerhouses, palaces, gardens, statues (everywhere), fountains. The wonderful thing is that you can see all these beautiful cultivated lawns and historic things, but the park is big enough that there are large tracts of relatively natural, peaceful forests. If I lived in Potsdam I think I would go there all the time to study, run, or just contemplate life. I got back by 7, in time to experience some more of Renee’s gourmet cooking: Thai stir-fry. Sheer goodness. Had some interesting discussions about religion that night. Did some reading, and then it was off to bed.
Monday, I headed to the station with Pietro, where he got on his regular train to work in Brandenburg, and I got on mine to Berlin, from where I caught a train to Frankfurt, where I met up with Nicolas, picked up my laptop and some other baggage I left with him, caught a train to Bern, which only made it to Basel, then caught another train to Bern.
And this is where Thomas finds himself, peering out the window and the beautiful Swiss countryside. He can hardly believe that he is back in Switzerland again. It is cloudy, but after a month of only sunshine everyday, Thomas doesn’t mind the cloud. Until tomorrow. Then it could get sunny again. Thomas leans back into his seat, closes his eyes, smiles, and listens to the Swiss guy across the aisle with a strong dialect that Thomas can’t quite place. Possibly Basel…
Jetzt fängt die zweiter Kaptial dieser Reise an. Ab in die Schweiz! Ich freue mich riesig.
Sorry, should be writing in English, shouldn’t I. I’m sitting in the ICE 373 train from Frankfurt (Main) Hbf to Bern BE, and am reunited with my laptop again (not that I’m dependant on it or anything. I’m not THAT crazy about Macs. Actually, I liked being away from computers for a few weeks). The train just left the station, and it will be several hours before I’m in the comfort of my Aunt Käthi’s place. And this time I don’t have my orange-dark chocolate bar with me, so it’ll be a long, lonely trip…
Much has happened in the last week…let me recall…
Yes, last Monday I was still in Holland (feels so long ago already), and headed to Amsterdam on the train in the morning. Monday was Queen’s Day in Holland (the late Queen’s birthday), and the Amsterdamers take this as a great reason to dress up in orange, walk through the streets (and canals), listen and dance to rave music blaring from every street corner, and get high or drunk on any substance imaginable. Ah, the Dutch. I arrived there by train at 9:30, just when a few other trains came into the station. I had to wait a little while just to get out of the station because there were so many people. Intense. Everyone in orange (excluding myself. I am Swiss. We wear red.), everyone happy to have a day off work, everyone still sober. We get out of the station and stream off into the streets. I joined the main flow down a big street; it felt like the Sunrun: there were that many people. I didn’t actually have anything planned for the day. Most of the museums were closed of course, and those open would have been completely full. So I opted to just walk the streets and soak in the experience. Camera in hand, I strolled down many a street, alley, and canal edge. Amsterdam is a beautiful city, crisscrossed with canals, which are banked by sidewalks a few meters wide, lined with large deciduous trees, and backed by old, historic row houses. Tall, narrow houses right up against each other, with the characteristic small winch hanging out of the attic to load and unload goods from the street below.
We’re just coming into Mannheim.
Queen’s Day is the only day of the year where you can sell your goods along the street without having to pay the city rent. As a result, you see lots of residents having garage sales, artists selling their works, and some people selling stuff which is absolute garbage. Seriously, stuff you would never use. Beer is everywhere, of course, plus any other kind of alcoholic beverage. What was interesting is that I could only see Heineken beer cans. I don’t know what else they sold in the beer gardens, but in can form, all you could find was Heineken. The big attraction of the day (or nuisance) was the music. Rave music (and only rave music), was blared from every bar or concert stage. In addition, hundreds of boats were plying the canals, many with a dj, mini bar, and huge speakers on them, full of grooving people.
Now, this was kind of cool for the first few hours. You don’t get to see this anywhere else. However, a few defining factors. First, the rave music was lousy. I know, some people would say that rave music always sucks, but I have to say I’ve heard good stuff. But you couldn’t find it here. Everything was bland blah blah blah. Second, I was hoping to see some good dancing, knowing that Amsterdam was famous for it’s break dancers. But nothing. Nadda. I didn’t see one break dancer in the whole city. And I was there for a long time. A bit lame.
But, all in all, it was a pretty groovy experience. I stayed till 7:00, walking through the streets, taking pictures, smelling food…
Towards evening the moral depravity of the place started to show. Garbage was everywhere. Homosexual activity was all over the place. People getting drunk and rowdy. The portable toilets were full by noon, meaning people would just pee wherever they felt like: random walls, dumpsters, trees. I accidentally walked through part of the red light district (which was more or less a street across from normal, quiet neighbourhoods) which wasn’t too uplifting either. I was glad to get back on the train to Rotterdam, where I had the good fortune of having a few drunk and stoned teenagers sit next to me. By the time I got home, I didn’t have a very high opinion of the human race.
The next day was a whole lot quieter.
A period of 41 minutes pass as Thomas decides that he doesn’t feel like writing at the moment and takes a nap, during which the train stops in Karlsruhe and Offenburg. He is waked up by the conducter asking for his ticket (although he was more or less awake already) and is made aware of the fact that this train will only travel to Basel today despite it being scheduled to go all the way to Bern. A bit vexing, but Thomas takes it in stride, seeing the change over as a possibility to stretch his legs and see different people in a different train. Thomas takes almost everything in stride, due to his extraordinarily long legs.
Tuesday I borrowed Hans’s road bike and headed out into the countryside, taking advantage of Holland’s flat landscape and incredibly well-kept bike routes. I biked along a dike bordering a harbor canal, before turning inland to the village of Brielle, a very quaint, typical Dutch village. Beautiful, really. Getting there by 11, I spent the rest of the day walking around, taking photos (as always), reading, contemplating, and eating. I could have gone on to more villages in the area, but the thought of that hard roadbike seat was not incredibly inviting, so I opted to stay put. And it was good that way. Very relaxing. Towards evening I made my way back, getting distracted a few times by the beautiful lakes and scenes. Sat on a dock at sunset and listened to a WCCF sermon on my ipod. Amazing how the world is so connected, really. Of course, by the time the sermon was done, the sun had set, and I actually had a long way to go, having underestimated the time it would take to get back. In addition, a strong head wind gathered force after sunset, making progress frustratingly slow. Nevertheless, it was kinda cool, head down, biking through the wind in the dark with no light, trying to avoid the sheep who liked to stand in the middle of the path…the black ones were especially hard to see. But I got home at 10:30, rather tired, as I hurried home so the Buddings wouldn’t worry too much about me. I enjoyed sleep that night, having biked 70 km, and with a nice sunburn to boot.
Wednesday it was off again to the next stop, Berlin. As I came across the border, I could hear passengers speak German; it felt like I was coming home. I got into the Berliner Main Station at 5, where I met my cousin Fränziska (my mother’s brother’s daughter), with whom I would be staying with the next few days. She’s a Germanistic student and freelance journalist, and she got some free press passes to a theater performance that night. We quickly headed to her place to drop my stuff off and change, grabbed some food, and headed down to the theater. The thing took place in a round tent, like a circus tent, but only with seating for about 150, with the stage on one side. You would sit at tables, order drinks and food, then sit back and enjoy the show. The piece was called Geschwister Pfister, two brothers and one of the brother’s girlfriends all living in one apartment, showing how life at home is like. In reality, none of them are related and the two men are going out. The piece was a bit strange, although having seen some other European works, I wasn’t surprised. There were some compelling moments, the thing was full of great musical numbers, and the 3 actors and their band were all excellent musicians.
The conductor just announced that the train will be arriving in Freiburg shortly. English is more or less the second language here, so all the announcements are made in both languages. Being fluent in both, Thomas finds the difference between the two announcements amusing. In German, the conductor will announce the approaching station, rattle off all the connecting trains and their respective destinations, thank you for traveling with them and say goodbye. In English, it just is “In a few minutes we will be arriving in (insert station here). Thank you for traveling with Deutsche Bahn. Peace out, dog.”
As this was the première, Fränzi was invited to the Afterparty, so we stayed around a bit, ate Bratwurst and potato salad and some yummy fruit and vanilla custard.
The next day Fränzi and I headed into the city (or at least to the important part. She lives right in the city). We checked out Brandenburg Tor and the Holocaust Monument together, after which we went to her office where she had to do some work in the afternoon. I headed out alone and checked out Checkpoint Charlie, went back to the Holocaust Memorial to visit the info centre underneath the Memorial, but ran out of time there as I had registered for a tour of the Parliament building at 5. So, went on this tour (which was only five people strong. Sweet stuff.). We met at the Brandenburg Tor and were led around the political part of town by this historian who spoke a mile a minute and could rattle of dates about things that happened three hundred years ago as easily as you can count to 100. Then, he took us into Parliament (Reichstag in German), bypassed the long line-up (already making the 7.50 euros I paid worth it), sat in the plenary room and had this MP tell us all these cool things about what goes on there, then headed up to the roof and the glass cupola, which you can go into. From there one has a brilliant view of the city, where our guide talked some more and wrapped up the 2.5 hour, 20,000 word tour (yeah, I counted). I stayed on the roof a while longer to photograph the glass dome. The Reichstag building is square, with a big, cathedral-like dome on top. In the war this was largely destroyed, and when the rebuilding started, a modern, glass dome was built in its place, through which you can see down into the plenary hall and all the MPs governing your country (if you happen to be German). This building is the most visited Parliamentary building in the world, receiving 8,000 visitors per day on average, 20,000 on peak days.
By now the sun had set, so I headed back to Fränzi’s place, where she had cooked up this fabulous dinner. We had some good discussions. Her boyfriend (I forget his name), a thermal-acoustic engineer, came over later. Seems to be a great guy. I certainly approve.
The next day Fränzi had to go to class, so I headed out on my own, took a tour about the history of the Berlin Wall, visited the Denkmalkirche (a church which was largely destroyed in the bombing of the city, leaving only the tower standing. The government decided to decided to clear the rubble away and leave the bombed out shell of a tower standing as a memorial. Pretty beeindrucksvoll). Walked through the large central park in Berlin to the Holocaust Memorial to check out the info centre and finish seeing it, walked around the area a bit, went to a concert that night, and then headed home, making sure I got a shot of the Brandenburg Tor at night (I’m such a tourist).
On Saturday I was planning to visit a thing or two in Berlin before heading to Potsdam to see some things there before meeting up with Pietro Widmer (a colleague of my Dad, and friend of our family who has been working in Germany for the last few years. That nice piano in our house is his). Turns out, I got hooked looking at things in Berlin, so I stayed for the day and met up him and his wife in the evening in Berlin (as they happened to be in the city too), before heading to Potsdam for dinner. What did I do during the day? Well, visited Alexander Square (the famous Square in East Berlin), latched myself onto a free tour of the area (it was in English, too), walked around some more (as I love doing), wrote some postcards, and got a killer sunburn.
At six I met up with Pietro and Renee, and we headed to Potsdam by train together (they don’t have a car here in Germany. The transit system is actually so good here that they don’t need one. Pretty cool, eh?) We ate at an Italian place in their neighbourhood, where Pietro likes to go because he can talk Italian with the manager there. They live in this area which is comprised of lots of brick row houses, much like in England. We were talking English (as Renee doesn’t know German), and I kept having the feeling that we were in England or Canada. Only when I would read one of the signs on the nearby shops would I realize that I was sitting in East Germany. Surreal, really.
A word of two about Berlin. Berlin is an incredible city. By far my favorite city so far (maybe excluding Winchester, but I liked Winchester out of completely different reasons). Berlin is not a nice city, or a very old city. Anything decently old was destroyed in the war. But the place is bubbling with culture, alive with history. The Second World War, the Holocaust, the Berlin Wall and everything associated with the Iron Curtain, it’s all here, right in your face. It brings history so tangibly close. And it’s not just any history (like some old cathedral from the middle ages), but it’s the history that we spend so much time studying in class, the history (in the case of the Wall), that many of us have been a part of ourselves. You can see how the last century’s history has really shaped the city. I highly recommend it. Ask me more when I get home.
Thomas gets into Basel and switches trains. Having 10 minutes, he debates if he should just stand on the platform and enjoy the fresh air, but decides it may be wise to get a seat before the train fills up. Turns out that was a good decision. Thomas settles down, pulls out his laptop and starts typing…akdjf;dfdf…The passengers across the aisle from him are speaking Swiss-german. It does his soul well. The feeling of coming home is very strong.
Pietro and Renee live in a beautiful apartment above a small store. They even have their own backyard. Sunday morning we had a gourmet breakfast of crêpes with all manner of things (lemon and sugar being my favourite). After that Pietro and I headed out on bike to see some of the town. First we headed up a “mountain” (a hill, by Canadian standards), with this funny Greek building on top which some King Frederick had built for his garden parties. Incredible views from there.
Great, the train starts and Thomas realizes that the train is going the other direction than he thought. Thomas hates traveling backward.
After checking out the view (from which you can see part of Berlin), we headed down to this park along the lake. I forget the name of the park, but it is a UNESCO Heritage Site. In the middle of this park an English Manor house is to be found, from where the leaders of the Allies parceled up Europe after the War in the Potsdam Conference. Part of the Wall can still be seen along the shore of the lake to prevent East Germans from swimming across to the other side, which was under the jurisdiction of West Berlin. We rode through the forested West Berlin side of the lake, biked through the film park (actually one of the most important film studios in Germany), saw a huge street scene set where the Pianist was filmed, slipped in through the gap in the gate to take a look (I did,
Uh oh, the first tunnel. Not this again…
not Pietro). Headed back for lunch (which was gourmet, too. Pheasant soup, wholesome German bread, excellent cheese). After lunch I headed out on my own with the bike to Saccousi Park, the place for which Potsdam is really famous for. The place was built for numerous German royalty (I have no idea who whey all were), with summerhouses, palaces, gardens, statues (everywhere), fountains. The wonderful thing is that you can see all these beautiful cultivated lawns and historic things, but the park is big enough that there are large tracts of relatively natural, peaceful forests. If I lived in Potsdam I think I would go there all the time to study, run, or just contemplate life. I got back by 7, in time to experience some more of Renee’s gourmet cooking: Thai stir-fry. Sheer goodness. Had some interesting discussions about religion that night. Did some reading, and then it was off to bed.
Monday, I headed to the station with Pietro, where he got on his regular train to work in Brandenburg, and I got on mine to Berlin, from where I caught a train to Frankfurt, where I met up with Nicolas, picked up my laptop and some other baggage I left with him, caught a train to Bern, which only made it to Basel, then caught another train to Bern.
And this is where Thomas finds himself, peering out the window and the beautiful Swiss countryside. He can hardly believe that he is back in Switzerland again. It is cloudy, but after a month of only sunshine everyday, Thomas doesn’t mind the cloud. Until tomorrow. Then it could get sunny again. Thomas leans back into his seat, closes his eyes, smiles, and listens to the Swiss guy across the aisle with a strong dialect that Thomas can’t quite place. Possibly Basel…
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