(The art of) Train Bathroom Picnicking

Our flight to Berlin was over in what seemed like no time… A few light naps and we were there, ready to go (sort of) at about 0800 local time. We got our bags held at our hostel right outside of central station. The day started out pretty gray and cool and by mid-morning progressed to miserable gusty rain. Things were not looking promising at first since a number of things we wanted to visit were outdoors, so we figured we’d try to kill time in some museums while the rain was at at it’s worst. We did stop by the Reichstag building with an idea of just getting pics of the outside, but managed to get passes to visit inside later in the day with a bit of a wink and a nod from the counter lady.

We hit up “Museum Island” after getting our evening passes with only minor issues with directions (not too much fun in gusty rain). I can only imagine how the crowds look at some of the big western European sites right now, because the museum lines were impressively long. The line just for tickets took almost an hour. We elected to just visit one of the five museums, the Neues Museum, with an eye for the main attraction: the bust of Nefertiti. We saw the recreation at the Cairo museum and really wanted to see the original. Don’t look for it in our gallery though, because they made sure to make it almost impossible to snap a pic of the think. Everything else in the museum was fair game though. Lots of plundered goods from Egypt and elsewhere. The guards there were a little too enthusiastic with rule enforcement (purses ok – backpacks even smaller than purses not ok – umbrellas not ok, and on and on). It was kind of annoying, but there’s really no arguing, it’s either nod and comply or “no soup for you.”

From there we hit up the East Side Gallery (Berlin Wall) and by that time the sun was out and things were looking pretty good. We took a lot of pics but really just scratched the surface. I was amazed with how much is still standing. We basically just covered a few blocks of the thing before heading back to central station. The Reichstag building was very impressive and the whole visit, including security screening, was pretty straightforward. Considering it was free, it really shouldn’t be missed on a visit to Berlin. We visited a couple memorials and I was really impressed by the (Jewish) holocaust memorial. It’s really a place you have to see and move through first hand to fully appreciate.

We closed out the day with a dinner at Hofbräuhaus… beer, schnitzel, weiners (Greg loves the weiners). Good times for all.

Mixed verdict on Berlin from the group though… I think we all had a good time, but the first impression seems to be that the place is a little stiff.

Today we caught a train to Prague (~4 hours), and I have to say this was one of the (probably THE) worst train rides I’ve been on. Even months in advance there was no way to reserve seats on this thing, and as it turns out it was overbooked to the point that the passengers probably could have filled two full trains. Random chance had us sandwiched shoulder to shoulder near the bathrooms for the first couple of hours. After a while we just made ourselves at home, digging out breakfast pastries from takeaway bags. Larissa just laid out with her bag as a pillow and Greg talked up a German lady who gave us the scoop on our situation. Her advice was basically to “give up on hope,” unlike the people trying to push themselves through crowds, from car to car, in a vain search for an empty seat that doesn’t exist. A few passengers emptied in Dresdon, maybe two hours in, and we strong-armed some reserved (but empty) seats for the rest of the ride. I suppose that softened the misery a little, but really, the trains in developing countries at least manage a place to sit for paying customers. I would’ve taken benches in cattle cars (like India) over sitting on the floor amongst piles of luggage.

So now we’re in Prague for a few days. Things are looking great so far… I’ll update when soon.