Ich bin ein...

Today was a very wander-y day. Barbara was working, and Erin and I set off with her helpful suggestions and maps. We had grand plans: museums, cultural sights, historical boulevards. But here's what we actually did.

We took a picture of the Doggie Day Care pick up bus in B's neighborhood on our way to breakfast:


We got on our bus an promptly got off too early, walked the rest of the way to the U-Bahn, got on, got off, switched to the S-Bahn, then promptly got off too early from that as well. Oh well. We found some very cute little stores and went shopping. We were happy.

We finally did make our way to several museums. One had a very interesting exhibition on Etruscan and Roman art. We made some new friends:


We irreverently named this guy John Travolta:


And I pretended to lead my tour group of one around town (for some reason this really made Erin I. laugh):


The gloomy day made for some atmospheric pictures - and we were happy for the lower temperatures. Here's the Berlin Cathedral, with the ever-present TV tower in the background:


I was really glad to find in the sidewalk a few of the Stumbling Stones I'd read about and heard about from Barbara's father. There's something very moving about just walking along in a shopping frame of mind and looking down to see these:


We found cute little parks tucked away in nondescript city streets, bought some little treasures at a German stationery store, and made our way back home to rest for dinner.


For dinner we were a party of 4 - Barbara and her friend Ralf took us to a small, very authentic German place about 15 minutes walk away. Now, Barbara's building is near the end of a street that dead-ended at the wall that separated East and West Berlin. So to get to our restaurant, we strolled along the park that is now in the former "death zone" behind the wall that once stood there. We saw groups of families and friends picnicking, men playing boules, a little urban farm:


and a group of Americans playing worship songs and singing:


Such an interesting scene. Dinner was, of course, great. I had pork from a Schwein that grew up near Berlin eating only herbs, Erin I. had rabbit, which I tasted and was delicious. We laughed and talked for a long time, and I relished in how lovely it is to be in a foreign country with locals who can order for you and joke with the waitress and make sure all is just right. I'm definitely going to miss that!