Berlin Abenteuer!

Hello!

So I just got back from Berlin. First of all I love that it only took a simple train ride to get to Berlin. It's great how easy it was to get there and how casual it was being there. My sister kept saying "what's touristy that would be fun to show you?" haha! It was great.

So for a while I had planned with friends to go October 11th to go to Berlin. One of them was sick so I went with just one. That was fun but the weather wasn't amazing. It was literally the only day I have been here that it has RAINED and I mean RAINED. Lucky me right? She took me to the Ritter Sport store and to a HUGE book store, where I bought Harry Potter 6 in German. She took me to The Brandenburger Tur and Checkpoint Charlie, where I got to see the Berlin Wall. That was awesome. We walked around a lot, in the rain, and ate at Subway. You know how Subway always has that same strong smell every time you walk in? Well so do German Subways. I shut my eyes and imagined being back in State College at a Subway there. Then I met back up with Samantha, my host sister, and we made the adventure to her grandparent's apartment. We got lost. Very lost. We looked outside the street train and saw forest. That was bad. You shouldn't see forest in a city, typically. We made it, and right before it got really dark. We originally planned to go to a movie at midnight but decided we didn't want to get lost. We were asleep before 11 so maybe it was a good idea.

The next morning, super pumped, my Host Grandma told us all of the places Samantha HAD to take me. Once we got into the heart of Berlin, we went to see the Neptune Fountain and look inside a church. Churches here are BEAUTIFUL but after four or so I've noticed most are the same looking, except the Cathedral I went in. That was amazing, breath taking really. If I sat in a service there, I wouldn't be able to pay attention. I'd literally be staring at the ceiling, mostly because it's amazing.

We were both happy that it was a beautiful sunny day. Our next mission were some new shoes for Sammy. She had only brought heels and her feet hurt. Our dad had warned her before we left but being the typical teenager, she didn't listen. We found some shoes in Alexa, a HUGE mall like building. It was in H&M where we found some cheap, nice, flat shoes. On our way out, we ran into a Build-A-Bear. The five year old Emma inside me jumped up and down. We made a bear named Felix. He has a shirt that says "I love Berlin" It was a blast and Samantha promised not to tell anyone. She laughed at me the entire time and took pictures. We had fun. We went to the Cathedral I was talking about and it was amazing. It was free for me (yay for being under 18!) but Samantha had to pay 4 Euros. Upon leaving she expressed that it was 4 Euros well spent. I believe it was called Dom. Pronounced Dome. It had a big Dome but the signs said "Dom" and had "Cathedral" in italics underneath it. I am throughly confused. So the sanctuary was breath taking. The Organ was so amazing, with paintings and statues and gold details all around. The dome was magnificent and the entire church was the most beautiful church I ever saw. I was so taken away. Samantha lead me down stairs where they had a whole ton of caskets of famous people in History for Germany. We're talking really old caskets here. Most were very intricate and gold, with intricate mini statues all over. It was incredible. I did not take any pictures, mostly because I wouldn't want someone taking a picture of my casket. One thing I was weirded out by was, those people are still in there. It's not just an empty casket. Weird but interesting. Now when I read all the plaques I regreatibly had no idea who the people were (Sorry Mrs. Saylor and Ms. Delafield) except I did recognize "Nameless Princess" and wondered if it was a famous one that was there or just "a" nameless princess or "the" nameless Princess. I'm not sure. These plaques were in German and my reading is much worse than my speaking, which isn't saying much. Sammy translated most things for me. Another name I recognized was in a rather ordinary casket. It was a simple, dark gray rectangle. Otto Von Bismark said the plaque. Now I thought it was incredible when I was near the Berlin Wall, but this was amazing.

We then walked up a BILLION stairs and got super sweaty by the time we reached the top. The staircases kept getting smaller and smaller until we reached a spiral staircase in which was steep and got smaller and smaller as you climbed. At the top was the base of the Dome. The view of Berlin was INCREDIBLE. That was worth the climb, even with my cardboard build a bear box and back pack.

We walked around for a bit, wondering what to do next. I can't remember what all we did but it wasn't too exciting. We went back to Alexa and looked for a poster for Sammy's boyfriend. We looked at a lot of scarves (Sammy's obsession) and rings (my obsession). We looked a movies and shoes and what not. It was nice bonding time with Sammy. We talked a lot (in English) and it was just nice walking around. We decided to go see a movie and went into the Kino, deciding to see the next movie showing. It was "Kill the Boss" or as Americans know it "Horrible Bosses" It was AMAZING! I didn't see it when it was in America so seeing it new and fresh was amazing. Now that I'm understanding a bit more, it was so much fun. Sammy was laughing more though, getting all of the jokes. A few times she had to lean over and translate a joke for me. That was great.

We headed back to her Grandparent's apartment, not getting lost this time. We got there and they were excited to hear about our day. I was excited to go to bed. They enjoyed hearing about Build-a-Bear and Samantha enjoyed telling them. Having not eating lunch and not feeling like eating dinner, they were feeding me cut up fruit and were insisting. Something about Grandparents it just great right? It was amazing being around them, especially because I miss my grandparents so much. We watched TV and I finally had to excuse myself to bed. I am just so tired all the time without waking all over a city and climbing a billion stairs!

The next morning (which was this morning) we went shopping, agreeing to meet Oma and Opa at a Chinese restaurant. We went shopping and Samantha picked out an outfit for me. It included a scarf, gray shirt, gray sweater, and stretchy dark jeans. It was comfortable and looked great. I also found myself a new ring. Its super fun! We had lunch and headed home, missing our train. The next train was 45 minutes away so naturally we went shopping. We walked around and looked a rings and scarves. I found another ring I loved but resisted, and I'm starting to regret it. We got on our train and headed home.

I had a blast!