Berlin

G´day,

And another personal "Hi, how´s t going?" to my congregation: Hello Emily (get well soon and don´t eat everything people dish for yo), Josara, Julia, Cord, Daniel, Andrew, Scott, Bill and Jan.

Well, as you might have recognised from the view, I´ve been to Berlin last weekend, visiting one of my oldest friends Heiner.
This are Heiner and me in 1993
And this is us 16 years later...still in love...

I had planned to stay from Friday night until Sunday but I kind of forgot the black-holish quality of Heiner´s kitchen...well first of all Berlin: the only real BIG city in Germany approx. 4 Mio inhabitants so it´s around the same size as Melborne but only populationwise. If you compare the area of both cities I´d reckon that Melbourne would be more than 20 times bigger. Melbournians live in small houses with front and back yards and Berlinians live in 6 or 7 storey buildings housing approx 60 parties. Typical Berlinian architecture is a six storey house with an inner courtyard...
View from the roof of Heiner´s house into the courtyard...
Jup and there is even greenery in there...
The houses in Berlin have been renovated...when I was in this part of Berlin for the first time in 1987 when it was still East Germany the houses looked all grey and ugly as noone cared for them but since West Germany won the cold war and took the poor little socialist county over and showed them the blessings of capitalism at least the houses became prettier (and around 2500% more expensive!).
This is how all the houses looked before the West took over...
Berlin street view
They are still working and renovating, in the background you can see the tower at the Alexander Platz...
another view from Heiner´s roof...this is Bornholmer Strasse
more Berlin from above
Stairway to heaven...
One of the few sign that this was East Germany...
And it was summer...

View from Heiner´s kitchen window...I love Heiner´s kitchen which is a little like a black hole. Once I get inside it´s gravity, it´s nearly impossible to leave...
well...drinking all that beer didn´t make it easier to leave but, hey I have no idea when I´ll be there next time...so I also took some pictures of some icons of Heiner´s flat which were there since 1992...
"Who will help us to set fire to this Libanese"
Seyfried (famous German cartoonist from the 80ies)
I recall how long we searched for a copy shop with a colour copy thingy to make a larger print of this Pink Floyd postcard in 93...
The banana poster on the toilet...

Well instead of leaving Sunday noon as I intended I left of Thuesday by train...
Berlin main station, you can see the Reichstag in the background...

I can only say it was fun and I look forward to see Heiner next time at my place...

That´s all for today, have fun, take care and cya