The Wednesday before we left for Berlin Jeremy Zach and I went to a soccer game against another outmatched Spanish club whose name I can’t remember. The game was a blow out but the atmosphere was amazing nonetheless. No matter the circumstances everyone is shouting every minute of the game. After we walked home and met back up with Max before going out for the night. Thursday was spent in class and packing for our trip. Our flight left around 8 so we headed to the airport pretty soon after class ended. When we(Jeremy Zach Max and I) landed in Berlin we were told the best way to get into the city from the airport, that was a decent distance away, was to use the train system so we tried to make our way into the city. We got lost a couple times and were mixed up by the maps they had posted. We eventually made it to the Wombat(Same chain hostel we stayed in in Budapest) around 12. We got the best durum we’ve had yet from the kebab place next door. Their pita bread they used to make the durum with was filled with seasonings and meat and it was sweet. We wanted a full day on Friday to explore so we headed to bed after eating.
We got out of the Hostel at a good time and our first stop was the Berlin Cathedral on Museum Island. The Cathedral was a big green copper domed building that was old and rugged but beautiful from the outside. When we walked around inside we got to sit and listen to about 10 minutes of a mass and take in the ornate decorations from its massive organ and dark wooden details to everything else that was seemingly covered in gold. It was a beautiful church and its style was very different compared to the other cathedrals I’ve seen in the more western parts of Europe. Before leaving we were able to walk around the rim of the dome up top and take in some views of the historic city and the walk down into the crypts where there were some eerie coffins of old Kaisers and even some of babies. After seeing the Cathedral we headed to the nearby Pergamon museum. This was a really unique and awesome museum filled with rebuilt massive ancient structures. The Ishtar gate was a giant blue and gold gate from Babylon that was reconstructed to scale in the museum and was mindblowing. There was also an old middle eastern Greek town’s market gate that was preserved and reconstructed as well as an ancient altar surrounded by an amazing sculpture of the Greek Gods in battle against demons. It was awesome to see such giant structures in a museum and it was like getting to visit land marks of the past all in one building. After the museum we headed to part of the remaining Berlin Wall and the Brandenburg Gate. The history of Berlin is crazy and it was amazing to see how progressive and forward of a place it was after having been through so much. After the gate we walked through a massive nearby park and came out near the Tiergarten which is an old Soviet War Memorial. Nearby there were signs explaining the post WWII transition and subsequent division of Berlin and it was very cool to see the effects and still present soviet tanks sitting in Berlin. Until traveling to Europe I never really knew a lot about the Soviet Union or how powerful and influential they really were over the rest of the world but to see a collapsed empires still standing buildings, memorials, and cultural influences throughout a democratic and world leading nation in today’s Germany was fascinating. From the memorial we walked to the Reichstag where Germany’s Parliament meets and where a lot happened in the past from being destroyed several times to the massive rallies, concerts, and social demonstrations held on its massive front lawn. It was a very cool place to be able to not only stand in front of but also walk around inside. Our tour led us up to the top of the building where we walked up and around the giant glass and mirrored dome of the Reichstag. We had audio guides that told us the history of the building and its significance in German history. After seeing so many historical sights we headed back to the hostel and grabbed some beers to drink in the streets on the walk back and got ready for dinner. We went to a gigantic beer hall that sat around 1000 people and had a live band playing. The waitresses were dressed up in traditional outfits and the tables were huge and wooden and you shared them with however many other people could squeeze in. We got huge beers and pork knuckle for dinner and although it was a huge tourist thing to do it was still a lot of fun. Friday night we walked around and explored our area more with some beers. We ended up at an Americany club before heading home.
Saturday we headed to the Brandenburg gate to meet up with a tour of the nearby concentration camp named Sachsenhausen. Sachsenhausen was an earlier camp and its layout and policies were used to set a standard for future Nazi camps. After meeting with our group we took two trains and a bus that took about 40 minutes out to the site. We walked along a dirt road and eventually into the central steel gate with the main watchtower overhead. The gate had a sign on it reading “work makes you free”. After stepping inside and looking around at the 10 foot walls staggered with watch towers and topped with barbed wire set behind electrified fencing with a path for a guard to patrol in between, and at the thought-out layout of the camp, trying to imagine what Holocaust victims went through seemed more real than ever and so much more horrible and disturbing. Standing where so many horrible things happened and where so many people suffered you could sense a grayness over the place. The tour was very informational yet very strange because never before had I been on a tour where everyone is somber and silent and in a sense in a state of mourning. Our guide was great at explaining what happened and why exactly it was able to happen and how Sachsenhausen fit in with the history of the Holocaust and after how it was reused by the occupying Soviets and how some prisoners were sent there under both the Nazi and Communist regimes. The tour took us through prison cells, torturing areas, barracks, kitchen, morgue, hospital where experiments took place, and the extermination area where ovens and an area for execution by firing squads were located outside of the rest of the concentration camp. Each area and subsequent explanations just added more and more to the unfathomable history of the place. It was a very somber day but I learned a lot of very interesting and important things there and it was definitely a day and place I will never forget.
We headed back into Berlin after about a 5 hour tour and went to the West side gallery where the more of the wall covered in some really great graffiti stands. Nearby we wandered into a Rasta shanty town and watched the sunset. After we went to a place called white trash for dinner. It was a multi leveled restaurant with a pretty awesome live band performing in the basement that we went down and watched after eating. Saturday night we wanted to experience a real German club so we went out to a giant warehouse with a club inside with several huge rooms. We went down to the bottom floor in a room playing the weirdest music completely filled with fog from fog machines. It was a bizarre yet really hilarious and cool experience and we had a lot of fun.
Sunday we checked out and walked to the Jewish Holocaust Memorial. It was a giant field of concrete slabs some 15 feet high and others 2 feet high that you could walk through. It was an eerie yet beautiful monument and below it was a museum that detailed how the treatment of Jews progressed throughout the 30s until post WWII. It was another emotional yet very informative reminder of what happened. Berlin was an awesome place and it was great to see first-hand just how much the place had been through and even so how great of a country Germany is. The constant reminders of the past although haunting have been used by Germany to accept what happened and admit and learn from everything that happened to move forward and prevent anything from the past from happening again. The policy of owning up to the atrocities that happened in the past is one a lot of other countries could learn from.
Sunday night we were back home in Barcelona after another awesome adventure.
Monday was Will’s birthday so after class we went to see Wes Anderson’s Grand Budapest Hotel at a theater in Gracia. The movie was awesome and I loved it but it was in English with Spanish subtitles so for most jokes you could hear the majority of the Spanish speaking audience let out a delayed laugh after either reading the joke and processing it or translating what they heard, just a funny observation. Tuesday Max Evan and I had tickets to the Champions League Atlectico Madrid v FC Barcelona game. It was a huge game and one of the biggest of the season so definitely the biggest game I’ve ever been to or ever will get to go to. The energy was unlike any sport game I have ever been to, regular or post season. At game time 17:14 everyone breaks out their Catalan flags and begins chanting for independence which is amazing to see and be a part of. This happens because 1714 is the year Catalonia lost their independence when Barcelona fell to Spain on September 11. We trailed the majority of the first half 1-0 and at half the entire stadium pulls out tin foil wrapped Bocadillos from their coats and starts munching down. It was like clock-work and you could hear the crumpling and then look around and see EVERYONE eating a sandwich. About 10 minutes into the second half Neymar put in an awesome goal and the place went freaking nuts! We were all so hyped and enveloped by the energy. The next 15 minutes after the goal were a completely different game as no one stopped screaming or cheering and the players had a new energy and 100,000 people behind them. The game ended in a tie but it was absolutely amazing.
Wednesday was a normal day as was Thursday which I spent packing for my trip to Granada in southern Spain with IES and Max, Zach, and Jeremy left for Rome. Friday morning we had to meet at the airport by 6 am. I planned on taking the train but I was 5 minutes late so I missed it. Luckily, I ran into Wit at the train station who also missed it so we split a cab to the airport. There were 50 students and 4 IES instructors on the trip. I “knew” about 20 people going in but by the time we left we were all a family it was great. Especially because it was later in the semester so we all had at least some friends going but got to meet and branch out and hang out with such a diverse group of kids it was a great trip. From the airport we took a bus to our 4 star Hotel in down town Granada. Me and Will shared a sick room. We had a “family room” type setup with a couch and table and sitting area and we each had some damn comfy beds. Our day started with a tour of the city. We were split into two groups and I went with the Spanish speaking guide. We had some time to get breakfast so we sat outside and ordered bocadillos in the main square. Our tour took us by the historical monuments in the city and then up and through the winding streets built into the side of the hill overlooking the Alhambra and the Sierra Nevada in the distance. We had beautiful weather and the city was even better. It was the Spain you would imagine seeing in a movie or on TV. It was really chill tour as we would leisurely stroll along the streets soaking in the sun and the city and stop every now and then for a talk and a longer stop to enjoy the view of the Alhambra and mountains behind it. The vibes of the city were completely different than Barcelona. It was a much chiller place and no one was in a rush to do anything and everyone had a smile on their faces. We stopped at the end of our tour and had a tapas lunch on IES at a restaurant with everyone. After we headed back to the hotel for a nap break and then the running club met up. We had about half the crew there and some new people showed up which was great. We went around the city and up on a trail where we got turned around a couple times on the hilly terrain and ended running along the canal that runs through the city. It was a fun and laid back run and we had a lot of laughs. We finished off by going on the roof of our hotel and doing a push-ups and abs. After our run we had a buffet dinner in the hotel and then about 15 people came into our hotel room because we had the family room space to hang out and have some beers. There were people I have hung out with before and other people who I had yet to meet and we originally planned to go out and experience some night life but we were all having so much fun we just stayed in all night. We wandered up to the roof of the hotel after a bit and ended the night at burger king.
Saturday we had to be up early to head to the Alhambra for our tour. We had breakfast in the Hotel and then took an army of cabs paid for by IES to the Alhambra. We went with our groups from the previous day and started our 4 hour tour. We walked from the castle walls to the interior palace and surrounding gardens. It was mindboggling how huge and how much detail went into creating the place. It was at one time a Muslim leader’s palace so its design and architecture resemble that culture however it was later taken over by Spain and preserved. The Alhambra is the most visited place in Spain and it is easy to tell why. Our leisurely pace and exploration of the entire place was so relaxing and it was a wonderful place to spend the morning and afternoon. Just strolling through the gardens hanging out with everyone and learning about the history of the place made it into a perfect day. To be honest I don’t remember too much about the smaller details from the tour because I was so busy just hanging out with everyone and laughing. After our tour we got free time to get lunch where we sat down and got tapas. We got sucked into a tourist trap and didn’t really get a good lunch experience but we made up for it on Sunday. After lunch we met up for an optional tea tasting where we went into a tea shop and hung out for an hour. It was a really cool little building and the tea was amazing. Another thing making Granada so cool and unique was the influence from the Muslim population that has lived there longer than the Spanish because of the fact the two cultures decided to avoid war and live side by side when the Spanish took over southern Spain. After the tea tasting we had free time so a couple of us just wandered around the streets exploring. We came upon some street performers in a tiny square playing flamenco surrounded by cafes with tables and chairs outside filled with people. We found a seat on some steps and enjoyed the local flamenco and the sun. It was an awesome experience of southern Spanish culture and a great and relaxing afternoon, in true Spanish style. Unfortunately we couldn’t sit there forever and had to head back to the hotel and get ready for a soccer game against IES Granada. We painted our faces with the colors of the Catalan flag to rep Barcelona and walked to the indoor court. We got rowdy and my voice was gone before the half. Everyone who wanted to play got a chance to go in so I put in an embarrassing 10 minutes on D but it was a fun and lighthearted game. (I enjoyed cheering more anyway) We ended up losing 7-6 but everyone was a good sport and left with a smile and the Granada kids agreed to show us a night out in Granada.
We returned to the hotel for dinner and then got ready to go out. Everyone came to our room again to start the festivities but we eventually tried to go back to the roof which ended up being locked so we moved into a section of the hotel where 3 people had rooms next to each other. We were hopping from hotel room to hotel room as a huge group and pretty much all of us went out as a mob together. We went to a shot bar whose drinks were very similar to Chupitos but cheaper and with a better layout. Then we made our way to a nearby club before walking home and having a rap battle in the hotel room. It was an awesome night and we all went out together as a big family. I was hanging out with people I never would have otherwise in Barcelona and we all had a great night.
Sunday we had to check out and then headed to an indoor Spa/Arab Bath which was perfect. It was a dark cave like building with candles all around and 3 different temperature pools. We each got to get a 20 minute massage which I got before going in the baths. It was the only massage I’ve ever gotten and it put me in ultimate relax mode. After I just chilled in the baths for a couple hours and added to the theme of relaxation of the weekend. When our time was up and we had to switch with the other group we went back to the hotel and got changed in the luggage room. About 10 of us went and got tapas and sat outside. We sat at the table for 2 hours and just ordered 4 beers each throughout the course of the meal. With each beer the policy in Granada is you get a free tapa so we didn’t even bother ordering food and just drank and got free food. It was an awesome afternoon and we spent it in good company and with good food. After lunch we met up with the larger group again and went on another tour. This one was of the church containing the bodies of the first king and queen of Spain, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella. We got to look at the tombs of the first king and queen of Spain with their crowns and scepters which was pretty mind blowing and amazing. In between tours we had to switch buildings and wait an hour to get in to the next one so we got gelato from a well-known place nearby and sat on the street next to a girl playing guitar and singing. She had a beautiful voice and it was a pleasure listening to her sing in Spanish and English. People were gathering around her and complimenting her as she went by. It was such a chill place and everyone and every moment was so relaxing and enjoyable there. Our final meal in Granada was Kebab on the streets and then we left for the airport. We got to the tiny airport pretty early so we all went outside and sat in the grass and played an iPhone game heads up. It was another great group activity and we all had a lot of fun enjoying our last moments in Granada. Our flight was quick and easy and I was back in Barcelona, after probably my favorite weekend of the semester, and for the first time I was wishing I was somewhere else.
Joe Fernandez 