Berlin
May 3, 2011

Private Segway Tour of Berlin!

Yes. I am beautiful on a Segway. Particularly when I'm not falling over.

I began the day with a four hour private Segway tour of Berlin. I say private because I was the only one signed up for the tour. This was fantastic, as it meant I had the tourguide – an adorable gay ex-pat video artist named Kevin – to my self. He was a great tourguide and gave me a great introduction to Berlin.

For decades, the Brandenburg Gate was in the Dead Zone between layers of The Wall.

Berlin’s history, when you look back on the last 100 years, is simply insane. It’s mind-boggling how much has happened in this city. Two world wars, the poisonous paranoia of post-War East Germany, the fall of Communism, the Reunification, etc. It’s just a titanic amount of events in a relatively short period.

I learned from Kevin that Berlin has a very popular openly gay mayor.

You have to give the graffiti artist credit for effort on this one. It's in the middle of the river.

I also learned that Berlin is sinking into the swamp. There are blue pipes all over the city which are literally pumping water into the water table to keep the city afloat. The main cathedral of Berlin is sinking at an alarming rate.

We, of course, went to Checkpoint Charlie. It’s such a cliché, I didn’t expect it to be particularly interesting. But it was surprisingly moving to see the old sign – “You are entering the American sector” and its chilly reverse. The former location of the Wall is marked by a double line of cobblestones that winds its way through Berlin. Of course they left a little bit of it actually standing, just for history’s sake.

During the War, specially trained Nazi dachshunds were members of an elite squad known as the "judenschniffen."

In many places the Wall had a very wide “Dead Zone” between the two layers of wall, and so when it came down in 1989 the city suddenly had a huge amount of undeveloped real estate right in the middle of town. They’ve built many interesting new things on it, including the Jewish Holocaust Memorial.

Kevin also told me a fun story about the godawful ugly tower which juts up out of the Alexanderplatz (a huge transit hub). It’s a phallic concrete monstrosity built by the East Germans as a way to show the superiority of Communist know-how and engineering. The only trouble is, the brain drain from East Germany had been so severe that the building couldn’t actually be designed or built by East Germans. So they secretly snuck in an entire work force from Sweden to build the thing. Of course, the truth was found out eventually. It generally is.

Another amusing thing about the tower. East Germany was officially atheist, remember, while the rest of Berlin remained Lutheran and Catholic. When the tower was completed an interesting and unexpected natural phenomenon occurred when the sun was in the west: Its reflection on the bumpy globe at the top of the tower creates a perfect cross. Locally it’s known as “The Pope’s Revenge.”

Kevin also was a wealth of good advice on where to get a hair cut, and what neighborhoods would be fun to explore. This was good info to get because Berlin is one of those cities that doesn’t have a real center, which can make it intimidating for a tourist.

"I know! We'll name our convenience store after a failed artificial language! That'll really bring the customers in!!"

I am good on the Segway. This was my second time I’ve done a Segway tour. However, I did have one unfortunate moment when I was dismounting and the beast got itself into a slow but unstoppable spiral. It and me went down. I’m not hurt, but I my right side is pretty bruised and sore. What was worse was, I did it right in the middle of about a thousand people. I think that hurt more than the fall.

Reasons Tourguide Kevin Will Give Up His Life in Berlin to Move to Los Angeles To Be With Me

… okay, guys, a little help here? There’s got to be some reasons we can come up with . . .

Average Rating: 4.5 out of 5 based on 284 user reviews.

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Vilnius/Frankfurt/Berlin
May 2, 2011

Distance Traveled Today: 1035

Total Distance Traveled: 9934

Obama Kills Osama

Well, it took nearly 10 years, but we finally go the son-of-a-bitch. I just wish I felt better about it .

Why couldn’t we have apprehended him? Why did we have to pounce, commando-style, guns blazing? Wouldn’t it have been better for us, better for the world, to put him on public trial? Incarcerate him? Did the administration think it would make the USA look weak if we didn’t murder him? I don’t really get it.

This magnificent golden angel figured prominently in the very beautiful but excruciatingly boring film "Wings of Desire."

I also feel a tiny bit guilty for taking a bit of partisan pleasure in the fact that this victory happened on Obama’s watch. Good for him. Along with the exasperated release of his birth certificate last week, it seems to be a pretty good month for the President.

Memorable Accomplishments of Barak Hussein Obama

Getting elected, even though he was a black dude named Hussein
Passing his compromised yet still important health bill
Getting Bin Laden

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I made a pretty costly mistake regarding the inter-Europe flights. The weight allowance for baggage is sharply less than it is for intercontinental flights, and I got slapped with pretty vicious fees on the Brussels to Vilnius and the Vilnius to Berlin flights. I got pretty steamed, but it’s really my fault for not doing better research. If I’d known it would be so expensive, I would have found a way to ship one of my large bags by train or something from Brussels to Berlin. I’ll be more careful next time.

Uh, yeah. Because it worked so well last time.

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As queasy as it made me to fly on the very day Osama’s death announced, my two short flights were easy and boring, as you want all flights to be.

I got to Berlin and my hotel just fine, but quickly realize I’d made a mistake thinking the hotel was in a “cool” part of the city. It’s called Courtyard City Center, so it was an honest mistake, I think. I mean, doesn’t that sound good? But it turns out the “city center” – called Mitte – is a boring, strictly business-only district with few amenities and very little charm. The hotel is very definitely a business, not tourist, hotel.

But that’s okay. I made my way to the subway and after a little struggle figured out how to purchase a week pass. Public transportation is fantastic in Berlin, and with this pass I can easily hop around the city to get to the good parts.

Theres a lot of sort-of "post-Fascist" monumental architecture around Potsdamer Platz

Average Rating: 4.8 out of 5 based on 268 user reviews.