Thursday, January 7, 2010

Berlin

Day 1 - Berlin
I arrived in Berlin at around noon local time - 6am according to my body - but actually felt pretty good. I normally can't sleep on planes but was able to cat nap a little on the flight over, which had been delayed by 4 hours due to some "security issue" that delayed all flights to the US and therefore made all planes departing the US late to pick us up. I was greeted by about 6 inches of snow on the ground with the promise of more to come. Here is the view from my office window taken as the sun was trying to set.
Knowing that I had to stay awake as long as possible I left work at around 5pm and went downtown to an area known as Ku-damm, which is famous for its shopping. I don't get into shopping much but was looking for a restaurant that I like that's close to there. It was quite cold and I didn't have my long-johns on so I didn't make it to the restaurant and settled for a nice little Italian restaurant that was closer where I had one of my favorite real Italian pizzas called "pizza fungi", otherwise known as mushroom pizza.
There was still a lot of Christmas lights up in this area so I decided to come back the next night with the camera as I could see them removing the lights and trees.
Finally went to bed at 8:30pm after being awake for more than 30 hours.
Day 2 - Berlin
Woke up bright and early this morning - at 3am. Well, maybe not so bright but certainly early. Jet lag is so much fun. Thankfully I was able to go back to sleep until 6:30. That last bit of sleep seems to have finished the jet lag off.
More snow fell all day but it was really slow so not much accumulated. It is forecast to snow every day while I'm here with the temperature not to be above freezing at all. The locals say this is how winters used to be but they have had about 10 mild years up until now. Everyone is laughing at how well this whole global warming thing is working out for all of us.
Worked a long day and left the office at around 6pm, then went directly down to Ku-damm to shoot some pics.


They have taken most everything down now so these are what's left. Unfortunately I don't have the good camera with me so night photos leave a little bit to be desired. I was really dissappointed at how poorly the pics I took of the bombed-out church came out. It looks really cool at night as it is floodlit and contrasts dramatically with the overcast sky and snow coming down around it. This is one of my favorite landmarks and has a lot of cool places around it including the Europa Center, KaDeWe (a multistory department building), and many great restaurants.
I am now experiencing the innevitable reverse swing of jet lag where I'm not tired till late. I forced myself to go to bed at 11 and got a good night's rest with 6am coming way too early.

1 comment:

Jo Abair said...

Wait I missed something, why is Jon in Germany? I have been where he is! I missed it today seeing the pictures, we lived in Germany for 2.5 yrs and both of the kids were born there.