A Series of Tubes, part 1

Things have been crazy hectic here for the first few days, and I still don't have regular internet access. I'm sitting in the program building stealing bandwidth from 'Motorola,' because I can't access the FU network yet. I thought Germans were supposed to be efficient. This update is going to be broken up over a couple of posts, since there's a lot of stuff I want to put in here. Anyways, on with the show.

My host family is ridiculously nice. Dorothee and Tom Lennert are helpful, knowledgeable, and friendly. just this last Friday, Tom told me stories about living with the Berlin Wall, and then we watched a video on the fall of the Wall. It was wicked interesting (something I've noticed - I say wicked a lot more here than I do in the States. Maybe it makes me feel more American). Both Tom and Dorothee speak excellent English, which is helpful, since I speak poor German. I'm staying in their youngest son Felix's room, which is twice as large as mine at home (or any dorm), and has a gigantic loft bed which is nice and comfortable. I haven't gotten much sleep though.

During these orientation days, they organized a ton of stuff for us. On Thursday, there was an excursion to a bar in the Kreuzberg district (not all of us), Hannibal, so we could get to know the city a bit better. It was really fun, and I got a chance to talk with some of the other students. Hannibal is already a sure thing for all of us. By the way, German beer is far and beyond any beer in the US. Some of us went out walking around afterwards. I wish I had my camera with me, because who did I see painted on a fire station mural, but Flava Flave. Yeah.

On Friday, the whole group went on a boat tour of the Spree, narrrated by Dr. Dirk Verheyen, the director of the program. He's a cool guy. I've got pictures, but Flickr won't let me upload all of them, though. I'm working on that though. We went northeast on the river, and went by loads of refurbished Soviet industries. We also went by the Reichstag, the Berlinerdom (Cathedral), and other offices and monuments. It was all pretty interesting. What was even more interesting, though, was the graffiti that lines the walls, bridges, and buildings that went along the Spree. There are some seriously talented people in Berlin. Part of the Wall was also visible from the boat, so I took some video of it. That'll be uploaded later.

Saturday, there was a tour of the historical center of Berlin, on Unter den Linden and the Museen Insel (Museum Island; It's exactly what it sounds like) with narration by Dirk. We saw the Brandenburgertor (the Brandenburg Gate), the Deutchses Historiches Museen (German History Museum), and Humboldt University, to name a few. Again - interesting stuff, lots of pictures, no way to upload them all without lots of free time. There were some refurbished Nazi buildings on the tour also. Goebbels' office was turned into the offices for the Department of Labor, and Hitler's Bunker (where he committed suicide), was turned into a parking lot. Hitler's office? You can get peking duck there now. The last part of the tour was through the Holocaust Memorial. Which was far less...solemn than I would have liked.

After the tour, Alex, another student, and myself went to a flea market back on the Insel. It's a different atmosphere then in other shops and markets I've been in. Generally, if you don't ask about something, the vendor is content to let you browse. It's far less aggressive, on the whole.

I'm going to cut this one off now, but I'll update this post and the following ones with pictures when I have the time.