Sunday, October 29, 2023
Czech Yourself, Part 1
Prague was great. Very pretty, good transit system, fantastic museums and nice people. So there's that.
See, big cathedral on a hill with a castle, ornate Gothic bridge. They're bringing it.
Said bridge had these stunning statues all along it. There were also giant mobs of people for much of the day. People remain my nemises.
We went to this wild "American-themed" restaurant that had this mosaic of Marilyn Monroe. I think it was from the Byzantine era.
They gave us latex gloves to use while eating. Or performing medical exams, I assume.
No doubt about it, that's a big cathedral. You can fit a whole lot of God in there.
Lots of very nice stained glass, too. One of the benefits of not getting bombed repeatedly, I guess.
The castle had this torture equipment in it. Or maybe it's Peloton, who knows?
I love the expression on this dog's face in a painting in one of the palaces. He is all of us.
Several fancy libraries in Prague. But they don't carry Teen People, so don't even ask.
Many flavors of Pringles were on offer. I'm especially jealous of the "Cheesy Cheese," because why do we only get a single cheese here in the US?
Saturday, October 21, 2023
Berlin Stories, Part the Last
Moving on after this, I swear. Only as far as pictures of Prague, but still.
My view is that most great art gets mistaken for a skatepark at some point or another. It certainly happened to Rembrandt.
This great art did not pose a skateboarding risk, but was also not to be touched.
This was one of the checkpoints between East and West Berlin. Is it bad that I immediately thought it looked a bit like my office? Style is cyclical.
This was an art installation at the Jewish Museum. It was highly impactful, but not hilarious in any way, so we'll move on.
There was a Munch show going on while we were in town. Which was not quite as hot of a ticket as Taylor or Beyonce, but did have it's own appeal.
This is a section of the Berlin Wall that they left standing. Presumably as a warning to other walls that they shouldn't try to mess with reunified Germany.
We should all pay better attention to deception. American politics has proved that.
There's a part of the wall that they've turned into an art gallery, and it's pretty amazing, aside from the aforementioned risk of deception.
This was a play on Guernica. Which did not turn out to be a terrible idea, perhaps in this case only.
We had a traditional German meal before we left. With the stipulation that there be no sauerkraut involved. I'm cultural AF, but I know my limits.
Saturday, October 14, 2023
Berlin Stories, Part 2
More pictures from the trip! Whether you want them or not!
This is Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church. It was bombed all to heck during the war, and they decided to leave it that way as a reminder. I use my iPhone for that, but this is a lot cooler.
This is the inside of the modern chapel they built to accompany the bombed remnants. I love me some stained glass with my religion.
This is a ballroom at Charlottenburg palace. Apparently, when they were restoring it, they asked people to vote on what kind of fresco should go on the ceiling. Then they went with the one people didn't vote for. And I'm really glad, because I think it's pretty, and generally people have bad taste.
This is the outside of Charlottenburg. It's not in my top five palaces, but it's pretty solid.
At the DDR museum, they let you virtually try on East German clothes. I think I look pretty good, aside from the fact that my head isn't really sitting on my neck.
More East Berlin. The TV tower is one of the tallest structures in Europe. Also a great place to overhear Americans having ridiculously misinformed conversations about world history.
So, this is not the real Checkpoint Charlie. The real one was torn down and then later they built this one as a tourist attraction. Which worked, because there was a line twenty people long to take a photo there. Note that I did not stand in the line, but took this one from the second floor of the Wall Museum nearby.
This is from the Wall Museum. This lady hid inside a hollowed-out speaker to escape from East Berlin. Which is great, until you want to listen to music, and it's like, oh wait, there's a lady in here.
Speaking of ladies, the lady on this poster for a "virtual reality experience" that we did not participate in seems to be having a great time. Something's going on with that hand, though.
This is the victory column in the Tiergarten. More stair climbing. They should make this a Peloton class.
Sunday, October 08, 2023
Berlin Stories, Part 1
We were in Berlin! It was pretty heavy at times, but also great.
This is Berlin Cathedral. Yes, like pretty much everything in Berlin, it suffered bomb damage during the war. See how this is already pretty light and fun?
They've reconstructed part of the Gates of Babylon in Berlin's Pergamon Museum. Which is good, because I don't think there was room in my basement.
We climbed 250+ steps to the top of the cathedral, and were rewarded with this view of the Soviet-era TV tower. Now I think it mainly helps them air Friends reruns.
The Altes Museum is, true to its name, full of a bunch of old stuff. If you like Greek and Roman statues, well, bless your heart.
The Neues Museum didn't really have new stuff in it, though. Except probably in the gift shop. Coffee mug technology wasn't super great in the early 1900s.
The Neues Museum had a special exhibition on the Secessionists. I just thought this lady looked cool, like she'd be fun to hang out with, if she'd take off her golden helmet for a minute.
This is the Reichstag. It kind of burned down at one point, got bombed a lot, was caught up in the whole Berlin Wall thing, and then they decided to basically build a whole new building with a big glass dome inside of it. So there's that.
Here's the inside of the dome. There's an audio tour that plays automatically as you walk up the ramp. It gets real mad at you if you walk too fast or too slow, and you kind of end up in a fight.
This is the Brandenburg Gate. Lots of history happened here, good and bad. But nothing more important than us taking this picture, I don't think.
This is the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. As you walk further into it, the ground slopes downward and you're basically in a labyrinth. No sign of David Bowie, though.
Wednesday, October 04, 2023
Foreign Dispatch
We just got back from our vacation in Berlin and Prague. It was, of course, amazing. Things got off to a less than propitious start when a tropical storm hit the east coast just as we were flying out through DC, but as it turned out there were no delays, and German customs was the single most efficient thing I've ever seen in my life. Five minutes, seriously. And still somehow mildly chilling.
We arrived on the day of the Berlin Marathon, which I do not necessarily recommend. There were some serious crowds and we saw people wearing their marathon shirts and medals every single day of the trip, including in Prague and the Munich airport. It's the laundry situation there that I am struggling to wrap my head around.
But Berlin has lots of great museums, solid restaurants, and an admirable grasp of its highly troubled history. I don't know that I've ever had a vacation that involved quite so much soul searching, and not just of the "should I really eat another schnitzel?" variety. We visited the site of the former Gestapo headquarters, which now features exhibits that thoroughly walk you through the question of what the hell happened. And we walked a good portion of the Berlin Wall's old route, which is now part museum, part art gallery, and all reminder of some pretty fucked up times for humanity. What can I say? We love to party.
Prague, for its part, took us a bit farther back in history, with its well-preserved Medieval streets and buildings, which were not overrated. We also found an enormous modern and contemporary art gallery, which I would seriously consider moving into, were it not for the language barrier and relative dearth of soft spots for sleeping.
There were, of course, all sorts of international incidents created, including a rather nasty business involving a just-opening cafe and an urgent bathroom need. But there will be time for all of that, as well as photos galore. Consider this a golden age of blogging.
