Berlin Part II

This is Part II of my experiences in Berlin with my friend Heleen. The first part can be read here. Part I stopped at the point where Heleen and I were at the Philharmonie, hoping to score tickets for the Cello Concert.


I went up to the cashier and asked (in my best German) if there were still tickets for the concert. It was all sold out! I felt despair, but when we stepped back I had an idea. Whenever a concert is sold out, there are always last-minute tickets left, from people who decide not to come and cancel their reservations! I was pondering for a few minutes how the hell I was going to ask that in German, but went back to the woman and asked. She replied that they also sell Stehplatzen one hour before each concert that is sold out. In my head I was screaming at her "why didn't you say so immediately!", but I politely replied "ok, danke schön". We both really wanted to go for this concert and decided to come back at 6 pm, way in advance so we could be sure of a ticket. The Stehplatzen are only 10 euros, so we would be cheap off and we didn't mind standing.

It was 2 pm now, so we decided to sit near the Kulturforum to eat our lunch. The Kulturforum is a cluster of museums we had to skip completely because of our lack of time. I wanted to visit the Staatsbibliothek that was also close by, but it would be too much of a hassle to look inside. You had to hand in your coat, purse, and be screened. No thanks! We decided to go to the park Tiergarten instead. We both needed a little bit of quiet and nature. The park is quite big and has a very nice Rose Garden.


Almost no one was there, except for a few lonely book-readers. We decided to do the same and I retreated with The Karamazov Brothers on a bench. I felt so relaxed however, that within a few minutes my eyes closed and before I knew it I was sleeping! That is certainly not because of the book, because I love Dostoevsky! Heleen was also reading so she just let me sleep for a bit. After some 30-odd minutes I was back in the land of the living and we moved on again.


We left the tranquillity of the park in amazement; why did so few people hang out here? It's an oasis of quiet in a very busy city. We biked to Gendarmenmarkt, which is the most impressive square according to the Rough Guide to Germany. We secured our bikes against a tree and walked on the square, it is quite big indeed. I was distracted at once though, because I heard the most beautiful saxophone playing ever! An older man was playing My Way, from Frank Sinatra in a way that gave me goosebumps. Perfect tone, perfect dynamics and vibrato. I walked closer and just stood listening. I normally never give money to street musicians ('cause most of them suck), but after he finished the song I walked up to him and gave some money. I told him "das war wunderschön!" and then he promptly answered "Ich weiss", and I couldn't help laughing.


We walked up to the Dom and took a look inside. The Komische Oper is also a very nice looking building, but it was closed. We decided to walk around a little and we really wanted to see a bookshop. We finally found one, packed with second hand books. I'm a Bismarck fan and found some really cheap books about him, but I didn't buy them. My backpack was already full and I wanted to travel back home light. It was almost 5:30 pm so we biked back to the Philharmonie. We stood in line, making puzzles for 45 minutes. We managed to score tickets for the concert though, so we were super happy!

We had a quick dinner at Subway, me likey! It's about the only fastfood place where vegas can eat a little decently. I love the honey-oat bread! Heleen was dressed nicely (wearing nice jeans and a neat cardigan) but I entered the concerthall in my baggy pants. Everybody was dressed up! Oh well, the poor students are standing anyway...


The concerthall is so nice, completely different setup than the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. The stage is way down and the seats are all the way around it, ascending all the way to the roof. Our standing places were almost all the way up and in the back. The orchestra entered and started warming up and tuning. I love watching the pro's, but we were too far off to really distinguish the faces. They first played a single Dvorak piece, Die Mittagshexe op. 108. I didn't know it but enjoyed it immensely. This orchestra really mastered all the dynamics, from fortissimo to ultimate pianissimo. Too bad that in the pianissimo parts people were coughing; that sort of breaks the atmosphere. After this piece, the cellist Steven Isserlis entered the stage. I don't know him, but expected nothing than awesomeness from him! The first notes of the famous cello concert resounded through the venue (important solo for the clarinet!) and I stood transfixed. Goosebumps everywhere. The sound of this orchestra is so amazing! The cellist was waiting for his turn and when it almost came, he raised his bow and tilted his head upwards. The release came and the low sounds of the cello filled the hall. Tears flowed down my face, because this was reaching perfection. The tone, the emotion, the whole composition defies description! Heleen later said she had goosebumps all the time and enjoyed it immensely. After 40 minutes of sneak peak in heaven, the cello concert ended with a blast. Time for a break. We both praised the cellist, who in my opinion did a very good job. I also liked the way he expressed himself, it was very dramatic but not TOO dramatic.


After the break we managed to score some seats very close to the stage and watched the orchestra from close-by. I enjoyed to see the clarinet players in action. The symphonie they played was unknown to me: Symphonie Nr. 4 by Bohuslav Martinu. After the concert we biked to the hostel, tired but happy.

Sunday 19 April
This night was horrible. The three Italians arrived at 11:30 when we just went to bed and they all snored. I did not sleep at all! They left at 4:30 and made a lot of noise doing so. The downside of sleeping in hostels....I listened to the same Empyrium album over and over, the only way I could evade the snoring sounds. At 5:30 am I gave up and stayed awake until we had to get out at 6:30 am. We took a shower and had a hasty breakfast. We asked the guy from the hostel where we would have a good chance of catching a ride to Hannover and he advised us to travel to the suburbs near the [115] highway. Our only transport costs for this trip were: 1,30 for a subway ticket! We stood waiting for one hour, the longest time during our whole trip. At last, a German couple took us to Magdeburg, with 190 km/h (118 mph) in their luxurious Audi. That was fast! There we made our only hitchhiking-mistake of the trip. We accepted a ride offered to us by two Hungarian guys. They drove a BMW, but looked shabby. Plus we couldn't understand them! They might as well be criminals and we didn't enjoy the 1 hour ride they gave us. I was holding the map on my lap all the time, tracking where we went. They dropped us off at the gasstation I asked them to, so all was well. We learned from this though: if it doesn't feel right, don't get in.
After this ride we had a good score with a direct trip back to the Netherlands. I didn't like this ride though, because I got very tired and the people we were driving with were Jesus-freaks playing Jesus-music in their car ALL THE TIME. I was too grumpy to talk to them, but thankfully Heleen (who managed to sleep in our last night) did the talking so I could be the grumpy biatch. I was very happy to get out and be back in NL. Our last ride was with a Turkish (though Dutch) couple. We had a very cool chat with them; the woman was very nice! We had one of those talks about cultural differences, but in a very friendly and inquiring way. The woman also told us she finally got pregnant with IVF treatment, and I really enjoyed having such a connected feeling and open conversation with someone that I didn't know and also is from 'another culture', so to say. They dropped us off at Utrecht University (our second home, haha!). From there on, it was only a short bus-ride back to our bikes!

Conclusion: Hitchhiking RULES
All in all, hitchhiking is something I can really recommend. Don't believe the horror stories other people are telling you! If you don't trust someone, don't get in the car. Open up your positive energy and you can end up having very nice conversations with people you don't know (like we had with the Turkish woman) and even connecting with them. For me, this hitchhiking trip proved that there are so many awesome people out there, willing to take strangers in their car. I found one thing particularly funny. Most of the people that took us, never took hitchhikers before. Maybe they liked the fact that we were female (= harmless?), but when we got in and talked about hitchhiking (which happened in all occasions except with the Hungarians) they were asking us: 'isn't it dangerous? aren't you afraid that you will meet dangerous people?'. I didn't reply to them that I thought that if it was so dangerous to go hitchhiking, then why would they not be dangerous since they were taking us with them? There's this whole mystification about hitchhiking that it's so dangerous, only because a few horror stories are circling around in the world. But life itself is dangerous. Hell, you can trip and fall from your stairs and be dead. You can get stabbed on the street. I don't want my life to be ruled by fear, and the hitchhiking proved to me that it's not scary or dangerous at all if you do it sensibly. I spent 50 euros on a weekend in Berlin, and that's mainly because generous people made it possible that I only had to spent 1,30 on transportation costs from my home in Utrecht to this awesome German city!


Heleen hitchhiking

Berlin Part I

One of the things that I've wanted to do for a long time was hitchhiking. Last weekend I finally got to do it, with my friend Heleen. I wanted to visit Berlin in my week off, because I'm going to write my bachelor thesis on the reaction of the Dutch government to the building of the Wall in 1961. I wanted to see the Wall and visit the Mauermuseum. I was short on cash though, so I wanted to go either alone (by train) or hitchhiking.

Heleen came to my place last week and I told her "I think I'm going to Berlin next week".
-"With whom?", she said.
"Alone, probably".
-"Oh, I can come with you!".
"Ok, awesome! Shall we try to hitchhike our way there?"
-"Ok, sure why not!"
And so the plans were made and we set the date on friday 17 april. We had to come back on sunday 19 april, because I had to work on monday again. Effectively we would only have one day in Berlin; short I know. I really wanted to go however, also because the hitchhiking would be part of the experience.

Thursday 16 april
I was stressing quite a bit this day. Had to work in the morning and then had only a few hours to buy the neccesary stuff like: wetties, a map of Germany, a guide (borrowed it in the library), food for the first day. In the evening I was trying to pack my bag, but I was so nervous for the hitchhiking that it took me three hours just to pack my 20 liter yellow backpack (I didn't want to bring the big one just for three days). I called Heleen and we made sure that we weren't bringing the same stuff (like shampoo and showergel) that would take up too much useless space. I decided to wear the same pants for three days and just bring clean underwear and shirts. It all fit in my backpack at last. I think I walked up and down the house for two hours, bugging my roommates with silly questions ("name some silly things you think I'll forget" they="toothbrush" me="oh crap, thanks!"). I'm such a dumbass when it comes to packing. I can forget the most silly things, this time I managed to forget a towel. That sucks balls if you sleep in a hostel that doesn't include such things. I went to bed at 11 pm, the alarm set at 6 am. I was quite nervous for the big adventure!

Friday 17 april
During the night, I woke up several times, fearing that I had slept through the alarm. I got up at 5:45 because I couldn't sleep anymore and took a shower. I was trying to eat something, but at this point it wasn't really succesful. Nervously I ran through all the things I migh forget in my head and could think of nothing more. I biked to the soccerstadium in Utrecht to meet Heleen there. At the stadium is an official hiking spot and we figured that would be the best place to start our trip. It turned out to be the perfect spot. Heleen had made signs, and the first one we used was Amersfoort (a city some 30km east from Utrecht). We both were nervous and put our thumbs up, curious how fast we would get a ride. The second car stopped. The second! It was a woman driving to work in Amersfoort. It was the first time she took hitchhikers with her, so we both had 'our first time'. We chatted a bit about hitchhiking and after the short 25 minute ride she dropped us off at a big gasstation. There we decided to go for 'active hitchhiking', which means that you go up to people to ask for a ride. This was also very succesful. Within 10 minutes we found a guy that went all the way to the German border. This guy, Gert-Jan, was very cool to talk to. During the 1,5 hour trip we never stopped chatting and we had a great time. He dropped us of at the last gasstation before the border with Germany.

This place was not so crowded so we were wondering if we could get a ride quickly. We put up our first German sign: Hannover. The first van already stopped. It was a Dutch guy, Ronald, offering us a ride to a little town before Hannover. We almost couldn't believe our luck. This guy was also very nice and again we chatted all the way. Hannover is already 2/3 of the distance to Berlin! At 11:30 we were there, only 4,5 hours on our way. If you would go by car yourself from Utrecht to Berlin it would mean a 7 hour drive. At the rate we were hitchhiking we went at the same speed.

The gasstation where Ronald dropped us off was big and crowded. We were hoping to catch a ride soon, but this time it took a little longer. We combined standing with a sign with asking. Some people wanted to take us with them, but their car was full or they were going the wrong way. We didn't mind standing for a bit though, we already felt lucky enough. After 15 minutes or so, a Dutch couple parked their car. Heleen boldly asked the woman if they were going to Berlin. "Yeah, but I have to talk with my husband about taking us with you. We kind of need our days". We were both pondering about what 'needing our days' would mean when the man passed us by and said "you can come with us. We are going to downtown Berlin". We both looked at eachother with big smiles on our faces. This was an überride! All the way from Hannover to Berlin centrum!

The couple, named Fred and Ria, had experience with hitchhiking. Fred did it when he was younger, and they took hitchhikers with them sometimes. Most of the trip I slept though, I was so tired from the short night before. If we hadn't had traffic jam (that took 1,5 hours) we could have been in Berlin at 3 pm. Now, they dropped us off at the Holocaust Memorial at 4:30 pm. We got out and thanked them happily. We were in Berlin centrum and it had cost us 0 euro... We were really euphoric and high-fived eachother.

After walking through the Holocaust Memorial we bought a map of the city and asked where hostel The Three Little Pigs was at an info-point. I found this hostel on the internet, and it looked very nice. It was also very close to Checkpoint Charlie and the Mauermuseum that I wanted to visit. After an hour of walking we found the hostel and checked in. We shared a room with three Italian guys. They were morons that didn't speak English. In general I dislike Italians, because they are noisy and don't care about it. Luckily, the first night they were out all night long. When we got up at 8 am in the morning the next day they still weren't back. We made pasta for dinner in the common kitchen, drank a very bad German pilsener and went to bed at 11 pm. I slept very good, because there were no snoring Italians in the room. How different would that be the next night!

Saturday 18 april
We got up at 8 am and ate our breakfast in the common room. We decided to rent the pink bikes from the hostel. I hate pink, but the bikes looked cool. They were actually very good, especially the saddle (the saddle on my own bike gives me pain in my butt after 15 mins <_<). I wanted to do at least the following: Visit Checkpoint Charlie and the museum there, drink coffee at Starbucks (there's only one Starbucks in NL and it's at Schiphol airport), eat at Subway (there's no Subway in Utrecht, though you can find them in other places in NL), visit some other landmarks.

We biked to Checkpoint Charlie, and I was kind of dissapointed. It was clearly a fake thing, the site as it used to be was not preserved. There were two fake guards in front of the fake house and for 1 euro you could take a picture with them. Argh. Oh well, the museum would be better, I hoped. But it really wasn't. It was kind of outdated in the sense that the museum itself wasn't modern. The collection wasn't set up in a logical way, everything was in disorder. There was too much to read and not enough to see. The guy who set up the museum, Hildebrandt, is a legend, but I found the museum really oldfashioned. They should make it more in harmony with modern times: more interaction, more kids-friendly for example. We took our time reading lots of the information, but it was just too much. We decided to leave the museum to drink a coffee at Starbucks. I really enjoyed my soya cappuchino, it always makes me happy to have a vegan option.

Now that I had visited the essential, we were looking at the map and in our guide what to do next. I saw the Philharmonie, near Potsdamer Platz and wanted to see if the Berliner Philharmoniker might be playing something interesting tonight. We biked there via the Brandeburger Tor, the Bundestag and Potsdamer Platz. The Philharmonie is an interesting building, with modern shapes. We went inside and looked at the programme. This is when I went crazy. They would be playing the Cello Concerto from Dvorak, one of my favorite pieces and on my to-see wishlist. The thought of being able to see one of the best orchestras in the world play this awesome cello concert made my heart beat superfast. I just HAD to see this!

[End of Part I, going to write the rest later]

For the pictures go to: HERE