The next day, Sunday 24 April, it was Easter and we continued our trip to Germany’s capital city, Berlin. We arrived in Berlin at 10am and immediately visited the Easter market at Alexanderplatz. This is the most central and well-known Easter market in the city. Every year, lots of merchants come together to sell their most beautiful Eastern decorations. The market was nicely decorated with Eastern threes and craft cabins, made by the merchants themselves. We bought a lot of chocolate and it was delicious! Because it was a holiday, there were a lot of people in Berlin, but we didn’t really mind. The atmosphere was great and that’s what it is all about! After we visited Alexanderplatz, we went to the Brandenburg Gate, which is a former city gate and one of the main symbols of Berlin and Germany. When the Revolutions of 1989 occurred and the Wall fell, the gate symbolized freedom and the desire to unify the city of Berlin. Thousands of people gathered at the Wall to celebrate its fall on 9 November 1989. Almost three years ago, the Brandenburg Gate became the main venue for the 20th anniversary celebration of the fall of the Berlin Wall or ‘Festival of Freedom’ on the evening of 9 November 2009.
The Brandenburg GateIn the evening we went to the ‘Osterfeuer’ in the Kulturbrauerei. This is the most popular Easter fire in the city. There was a really good atmosphere amongst the people and after the fire there was a little party. We stayed up till 2am before we decided it was time to go back to the hotel and get some sleep.
The next day, it was Easter Monday, so a lot of things were closed in Berlin. Therefore we decided to do some sight-seeing and keep the museums for the other day. First we went to Potsdamer Platz, an important public square and traffic intersection in the centre of Berlin. Potsdamer Platz has been the site of major redevelopment projects, something you could clearly notice when walking around. I was impressed by the large and hypermodern buildings. We had a drink in a modern café nearby and moved on to Tiergarten. Tiergarten is a huge, urban park that used to be a part of West Berlin. It contains several notable sculptures and we wandered there for hours, enjoying the nice weather. The next day, Tuesday 26 April, was our last day in Berlin. There was one thing that we all really wanted to visited some day in our lives, which was the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. We all heard how impressive the monument is from people we know who have visited it and we wouldn’t wanted to miss it. The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, also known as the Holocaust Memorial is a memorial to the Jewish victims of the Holocaust. It is a 19,000 square metres site covered with 2,711 concrete slabs, arranged in a grid pattern. According to the architect, the slabs are designed to produce an uneasy, confusing atmosphere. All the visitors were really quiet and when walking through the field, I couldn’t help but remembering all the thousands of Jews who were mistreated and deprived of their lives.
The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of EuropeDuring our two-days visit we saw a lot of the city. We visited the city hall and the grand church St. Michaelis and we also visited the old warehouse district and the harbor promenade, which was a nice, relaxing walk. In de evening, we went to the red light district, which is Europe’s largest red district. I already walked through the red light district in Amsterdam, but this area in Hamburg was far much bigger. As we didn’t really feel comfortable walking there, we searched for a nice bar where we had a few drinks. As I am writing this, I started realizing that our trip is almost over. Finishing Germany only leaves us two more countries to visit: Denmark and Norway. Nonetheless, we are all looking forward visiting Europe’s northern countries!
You’ll hear from us soon!
Natalie
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