Report on First Night in Prague

Dates covered by report: 16:00 10/09/09 to 02:30 11/09/09
Primary Subject: Andrew Phillip Han, male, born 26/01/87, country of origin USA
Secondary Subjects: Tom, Numra, Scott, Brendan, Rod, Rafael, Niko, Pancho.

Subject arrived at HostelOne Prague at approximately 16:00 on Thursday, September 10. Subject entered kitchen to eat meal of bread and nutella and sat next to secondary subject Tom, who happened to be an astrophysicist from Perth, Australia; subject proceeded to offer advice on Astronomical highlights of Prague and ask if people were going out that night. An irrevocable series of events was thus set in motion.

Subject left hostel to go to buy Vodka and a mixer. Subject returned to hostel to hang out in basement area bar, where he was started off with a "welcome shot" given to all guests on their first night. Subject then proceeded to join secondary subjects Tom, Scott from New Zealand, Pancho and Niko from Argentina, and Numra from London in killing both his own and Pancho and Niko's bottles of vodka, as subject has earlier indicated that his reasons for staying extra nights in Prague were to "hang the fuck out." Primary and secondary subjects proceeded to drink until hostel staff closed the bar around 24:00 and decided to go out with the rest of the hostel patrons to a bar/club in Prague. Reports from secondary subjects indicate that Primary subject was very drunk and among other things began muttering to himself about "exchange rates" and "currency conversions" and how his friend "got screwed by the exchange rate" and "should have gone with the currency conversion," overheard secondary subjects calling another bar patron a "wanker" and began informing said patron that he was in fact a "wanker," and waving inflammatory single-digit hand gestures in said patrons face, avoiding getting the shit beaten out of him through the deft diplomacy of secondary subjects Tom and Scott. Around 02:00 Secondary subject and Hostel Staff member Rod took primary subject home in a taxi, but stopped on the way to grab some water. Secondary subject reported hearing a car door open and slam shut and raced outside expecting to give chase to primary subject, only to find out that primary subject had exited the taxi only to walk around the car and enter the backseat from the opposite side. Subject was then dropped off at the hostel and shoved into his bunk, not to be aroused from sleep for 14 hours.

Just got here and already don´t want to leave

Croatia is the shit. Completely the shit. Great food. Great towns. Good sights. Great scenery. Right now I´m making my writing teachers cringe at my lack of adjectivial creativity, but I´m too busy doing stuff to write well, that will come in Copenhagen, when I have more time to relax.

Travelling the Croatian coast is like looking at a woman while drinking a yard-a-rita. It gets more and more beautiful the farther down you go. I´m not scootering around Croatia, as Darko, my wonderful hostel host in Split, suggested against it. Considering that I chose to visit croatia during the only week of rain from may to October, it was good advice. So I took the bus, which was long, but beautiful almost the entire way. Its also cheaper than a scooter, but I´m still hemmorhaging money right now.

Upcoming posts on Croatia: KIMPin aint easy, the Darko guide to betting on soccer, getting shat upon by the weather gods, and much much more!

non-pictures, part 1

Several times now, i´ve been in a moment where I needed to take a picture, only to realize I´d forgotten my camera. Im sure this will become a series, so here are the first few entries.

1. Location: Prague Old Town Subject: a shop called ˝Cream and Dream.˝ The name says it all. Given the amount of cabaret shows around there, it could have been a play on words, but as a frozen treat shop, its just an hilaroius example of ˝when foreigners miss double entendre˝.

2. Location: Prague, U fagy restaurant. Subject: a hatchet hanging from the coat rack. we thought it was part of the decor, which in many traditional czech joints tends to be vintage farm tool, but this place had a witch theme and it was a modern hatchet that one might buy at a hardware store.

3. Location: U fagy again. Subject: mustard on a six foot off the ground window, and all over Tom. I can also say that I wish I had a picture of the pork knee i ate, it was on a spit and everything, very impressive. but the hilarity reached a high point when I tried to turn the pork over on the spit, only to have it come all the way around and knock the tiny bowl of mustard off the tray and onto the floor. This incident may open up a new field of physics, as the mustard, which was unspilt until it hit the floor, somehow ended up on the window and on Toms back, which is impressive since the mustard landed in front of him.

4. Location: Dubrovnik Old Town Subject: simultaneously the cutest and most wretched looking puppy. This tiny dog wandered in through one of the gates and onto the main drag, running through tables in front of restaurants, not really begging or anything, just taking a jaunt through the street. The poor thing was missing most of the hair on its tail, looked like he had been roughed up a bit near the throat, and probably had ringworm, but with his eyes and a face he could have made Cruella deVille think twice about killing him.

Quick update

I'm really behind on posts; I'm sorry, I still owe stories from
Prague, of which there are many. But the past few days have been
pretty cool.
In three days I've been to Three cities: Salzburg, Ljubljana, and
split, all of which have been very cool.

Salzburg, the home of mozart, is very pretty and has a sweet fortress.
Also, getting my first glimpse of the alps was very cool. It looked
somewhat similar to therockies except everything is green and not
brown.

Ljubljana got truncated because of a little mishap in Prague that
forced me to stay an extra day there. Tina, please forgive me. But it
has a nice river and there seemed to be a good bar scene alongside it.
Unfortunately I gave my last euros to the hostel and wasn't able to
partake in the partay, as well as knowing that I would have to wake at
5:30 to catch the train I needed.

Split has been a revelation. I now understand why people are raving
about Croatia and also realize why it's important to see it before it
all changes. The tourist parts are all really nice but the busride in
showed that there are still some parts that could use some clean up
and repair. Some of the buildings were literally crumbling before my
eyes. Then again, part of the old town sections charm is that it's
built into the ruins of a roman emperors retirement palace. And also
the seafood is excellent, tonigt I had fried calamari and anchovies.
The restaurant is my kind of place, having only 5 things on the menu:
fish, squid, prAwns, octopus salad, and French fries. I've found that
the simpler the menu, the better I like places and the better the
food. Another perfect example of this is In n' out burger.

Well, that's all until I completely piece together what happened in Prague

Kicking myself

So far the last couple of days have been a whirlwind. I can barely form complete thoughts, so I'm just going to list a few things.

1) The hostel is seriously the shit. Great people, great atmosphere.
2) I hate myself for waiting to buy a train ticket. My beautiful $40 ticket to Ljubljana must be purchased on the internet 3 days in advance. Now i'm looking at 2000 crowns, which is at least $100.
3) If the words "mock fellatio from amazonian go-go dancer" aren't the sign of an epic night, I give up. More on this later. I never thought it would be possible, but I might end up on youporn. The brazilian who took video of it hasn't said anything yet. I really should just delete it from his camera, but he might have jetted off to another country already.

On the road again

Today I left Ondrejov and the Astronomical Institute for good, or at least for this trip. I said goodbye to Viktor and Mirek and then headed off to catch the bus to Prague. These next two nights I'm staying at a youth hostel in the city, which is really cheap and so far has been really good. It's not far from things and the neighborhood itself has a bunch of stuff. The staff and people here are really friendly, although probably 75% of the guests I've met are Aussies. No judgement, just a fact. One of them, Tom, is an astrophysicist back home, so I offered to tell him about the Prague astronomical tour and he seemed really excited about that.

My number one goal for these next two nights is to get hammered and have fun. So far a good start, as I killed my flask of Stranahan's Colorado Whisky and have a free shot waiting for me at the in-house bar. The hostel seems to have a good partying atmosphere, those who haven't already indicated that they're partying seem to be recovering from a hard night last night. There are plans to go to a triple-decker club, although I have plans to hit up a mythical 5-story club in downtown Prague.

Also on the agenda are visits to Pivovarsky Klub, a bar that is rumored to have over 200 kinds of Beer, and to any winebar that has Burcak, a czech specialty. Burcak is a 'young wine' which is known for its potency and the hangovers it causes.

All I can say is, Praha, look out.

Goodbyes and a wedding "party"

Today I met with Petr Hadrava for a final time. I caught a ride to the Prague branch with the director and secretary of the Astronomical Institute. While there I gave Petr an explanation of a paper I had written for an independent study in College regarding Drosophila fruit fly researchers. There had been talk that I would give this to the Natural History and History of Science departments, but that didn't come together, so my audience was just Petr. Considering that my paper was somewhat about evalutating the careers of scientists, Petr felt that it was relevant to the debate going on in the Czech Republic, on how to justify which science programs to fund and which to let dry up.
During this time, I got an invitation from one of the women at the institute to come join a party celebrating her recent marriage. She had just returned from her honeymoon and the Astronomers were having a get together to see pictures of the wedding, give her gifts, and generally celebrate. I assumed that Petr and the Ondrejov people would be there, but I was surprised to see that I knew absolutely nobody in the room. I was touched by how welcoming these people were, to invite me, a stranger, to this get together. They had wine and traditional Czech Wedding Cakes, small round pastries with a fruit and cheese filling. They were delicious, a fact that stands even though I hadn't eaten in 7 hours and probably would have eaten a ream of paper.
Before I left to catch the metro, Petr presented me with a small booklet he had prepared that was from the 2006 International Astronomers Union Conference, which was held in Prague. It was actually the invitation they had sent out, a small illustrated booklet of a poem written by the Czech writer Jan Neruda, from his "cosmic songs." The poem was about frogs learning astronomy; the founders of the Ondrejov observatory, the Fric brothers, had adopted the frog as a symbol for their astronomical pursuits, due to this poem.

I have been deeply touched by my hosts here and though I am excited for my travels ahead, will miss being hosted in Bohemia. Of course, I still have a little bit of partying to do before I leave for good ...

Devastated by the Germans ... and I'm not talking about Poland

So, how many of you here have ever seen Arrested Development? Ok, about half. And how many of you think it's the funniest show ever and would consider backing a petition to make the model home a UNSESCO World Hertiage Site? Ok, everybody who has seen it but one. And what is your name, sir? Dullston McFunsponge, oh, now it all makes sense. And how many of you watched at least one episode on Hulu before going to bed the entire last month of College? Just me? Wow, how embarassing.

Anywho, Arrested Development is possibly the most beautiful television show ever created after Planet Earth. I've seen the episodes way too many times and continue to be amazed at how many new things I pick up on each time I watch it. Thus, one can imagine my giddiness upon finding it playing on Comedy Central Germany one night, dubbed in German of course. Aside: you pick up on so much more visually when you don't understand the words that are being spoken.

The episode that was playing just so happened to be the Springbreak episode featuring "Girls With Low Self-Esteem". If you haven't seen this episode, or the show at all, you may stop reading this post. Those who have will recall that Tobias pulls down Zack Braff's pants to see how he likes being exploited, only to find out that he is wearing cut-offs underneath. "You're a nevernude!/(?)" To-bias exclaims. Devotees may see where this is going. It turns out that the show actually features a reference to Germany and the German language. You may recall that in Season One, Tobias argues for the legitimacy of the never-nude disorder by claiming that three members of the German parliament have what they call "neingestandingnude."

As soon as I realized which episode it was, I grew almost unbearably excited. To hear the German Tobias utter the word at the end of the episode! It would be perfect, I would burst out laughing and I could tell my brother and every cute girl I met who liked Arrested Development about how I heard "neingestandingnude" in the German dubbing of the show. So I waited. I listened for nothing except the sound of "never-nude" in the German tongue. The volume was all the way up; I'm sure my neighbors were on valium or something or they surely would have knocked on my door and told me in angry Czech to turn it the hell down.

But it never came.

Nothing even close.

Just ... jabber, the words during that segment as meaningless as I then felt life to be. How could they not use "neingestandingnude"!!!!!!!!! I know, the word is not really German, but don't you think the Germans might get that joke and be able to understand the word's meaning? I guess maybe not, the Germans are notorious for taking things way to seriously, stick around for my list of German jokes, courtesy of Jeff Wagner. The simplest explanation is that the translator never actually saw the previous episode with the reference, his job was just to take the English and turn it into German. I suppose it would only be funny to someone who has seen the original show and then was watching it in German for some reason.

Oh well, I suppose this story is almost as good to tell, hope it made sense.

German jokes:

Knock, knock.
Who's there?
The police. I'm afraid there's been an accident. Your husband is in the
hospital.

A man walks into a pub.
He is an alcoholic whose drinking problem is destroying his family.

Did you hear about the blonde who jumped out off a bridge?
She was clinically depressed and took her own life because of her terribly
low self-esteem.

Why do women fake orgasms?
Because they want to give men the impression that they have climaxed.

Two men are sitting in a pub.
One man turns to the other and says: 'Last night I saw lots of strange men
coming in and out of your wife's house.'
The other man replies: 'Yes, she has become a prostitute to subsidize her
drug habit.'

Why is there no aspirin in the jungle?
Because it would not be financially viable to attempt to sell
pharmaceuticals in the largely unpopulated rainforest.

I can has cheezburger?

I've found it. The only thing that is actually more expensive in the Czech Republic than it is in the United States. But first, some storytime.

Yesterday I took a daytrip to Kutna Hora, a town about an hour from Prague with a beautiful cathedral and a grotesque church decorated with human bones. The train schedule worked out that I would have to wait around a long time before I could take the bus home, so I decided to do so in Prague rather than this small town, where everything was already closed because it was Sunday. As I was walking around, it hit me that I hadn't eaten anything in a while so I grabbed a cheap baguette sandwich, which was not nearly enough. It was at that moment that I started jonesing for a cheeseburger. I did some mental math and calculated that it had been almost a month since I'd had two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, onions on a sesame seed bun or some variant thereof. The same sandwich stand had a "cheeseburger" for only 20 Kc, a little over $1 so I immediately bought it, only to be utterly disappointed. It turns out that the Czechs call anything on a hamburger bun a burger, so it was a "cheeseburger" in the most literal sense - cheese on a hamburger bun, nothing else. Come on!
I ate it, but the cravings only worsened, my appetite for All-American goodness only grew exponentially with time. I decided that I would not leave a matter as important as this to the amateurs, I was going to go to the pros, which led me to this stunning realization: McDonald's in the Czech Republic is ridiculously expensive.

Let me repeat that: McDonald's is really expensive here.

Like twice as expensive as it is in the states. Of all the things, I never expected Mickey D's to cost an arm and a leg (especially since that's about the quality of meat you're getting). I expected that Bourbon might be more (it's not, actually cheaper depending on where you go). It's not just cheeseburgers; you can get a burger at a pub for $5-6, like you can in the states, but specifically McDonald's, a BigMac is like $6 for the burger alone. Double cheeseburgers, my late-night go to at home, are the worst, running about $3 each. And they charge extra for ketchup!!!

I can only imagine that McDonald's is cashing in on the American brand. For the same reason that Olive Garden has the gall to charge people $10 for their spaghetti, McDonald's can charge these foreigners three times the market value of a Double Cheeseburger. The beef patty I had was even thinner and tougher than I'm used to in the states. In a sense, I should be grateful, these foreigners are most likely subsidizing my Dollar-menu binges back home, allowing the Double Cheeseburger to remain on the menu when it clearly should be selling for more than $1 (that, and Americans' insatiable desire to drink soda at fast-food joints, where the profit margins are ridiculous).

But yes, the cheeseburger did the trick, I'm probably good for another month, but I'll have to go to something stronger, maybe a quarter-pounder.

5 things I didn't realize I would really miss about College

1. Becky the Trainer and the training room in general. Damn my irritable IT band, I really could use the elbow of death right now.

2. Greenprint. Despite the fact that you're somehow always as far away as possible from the nearest terminal, getting free printing whenever you want, at a reasonably convenient location, is really nice when you think about it. Also, my printer at home only does like 5 pages/min, and doesn't do duplex.

3. Need 1 or 3 blitzes. I'm really missing the constant availability of at least one person I knew with whom I could hang out. Even at 1 am on a Sunday night (technically monday?), I would have a 90% chance of finding someone who wasn't sleeping or studying. I thought that even though there wouldn't be dozens of people I knew all with pretty much the same schedules and within 5-10 minutes walking distance, I at least wouldn't be starved for people to hang out with. But now that I'm spending 98 % of my time hanging out with myself, I'm really missing the ability to share time with people, especially when there's so much cool stuff to share here.

4. My library account. Talking with Petr has really gotten me interested in reading work in the History of Astronomy, but I don't have access to scholarly journals through Jstor and the like anymore. Who knew I would want to ever look in Jstor again?

5. The Homeplate salad bar. I seriously thought that there was no way I could possibly miss anything about Dartmouth Dining Services, except for maybe the quickness with which the Homeplate lady can check you out (this I already started missing at certain points during Senior Spring, when lines sometimes went all the way past the silver milk cow). But when you have about 3 square feet of fridge space, it's hard to get enough ingredients make up a good salad. Plus you have to cut and wash everything yourself.

Feeling good

after being in somewhat of a rut lately (bad sleep schedule is only the start) I decided to go out to dinner tonight. I had three options, the pub in town, the other pub in town, or the pizza place. I decided on pizza, since there is a limit on how much meat in sauce with potatoes and rye bread one can generally take. I'd been to Pizzeria Pietro before with the Hadrava family (on a beautiful weekend tour of the village) and I'm somewhat against the place, since they don't have any Czech beers on tap, only Stella Artois (which is Belgian). But anyways, it's actually a good place; I can think of very few establishments back home where you can get a Stella and a 12" pizza (with toppings) for less than $10.

It had been a while since I'd eaten so the beer hit me quickly. At this point I decided I would stop by my apartment, drop off the leftovers and head back up to the institute with a bottle of wine to catch a movie streamed fresh off the internet. My plan now it to get hammered and watch some trippy Japanese animated movie; I've settled on "Howl's Moving Castle" by the legendary Miyazaki. If you have not seen any Miyazaki works, I suggest you get yourself to either your local video store or wherever you have your netflix queue and dial up either "Princess Mononoke" or "Spirited Away," Miyazaki's magic is for everyone to enjoy.

P.S. I like the Templarske Rulandske Sede (Pinot Grigio) better than this Irsai Oliver I'm drinking.

P.P.S. Viktor says if you're drinking Czech wine to get white, as it's not sunny enough here to grow good reds.

Are you ready for some fotbal?

Since the retirement of Michael Jordan, I've pretty much only followed two spectator sports teams: my beloved Green Bay Packers and Wisconsin Badgers. Technically, it's three teams, since I follow Wisconsin football and basketball, but essentially it's all the same: same songs, same shirts, same Wisconsin pride. Recently, I have added Liverpool FC, which plays the other kind of football, but I have always been troubled by the fact that I don't really know how I became a fan. I have little chance of ever seeing them play, I have no connections to Great Britain, and I only know two other people who are fans here in the United States. I suppose the best explanation is FIFA 07, for Xbox, which is a little upsetting.

Also inexplicable is my desire for a second soccer team to cheer for. However, my Liverpool alliegance prevents me from choosing a Premiership team, and Liverpool's stature as a European giant prevents me from choosing another big team, like Juventus or Barcelona, in case they played each other in the Champions League. However, this trip to Europe has given me the opportunity to see soccer teams that have no chance of ever playing Liverpool and I believe I have found my new team.

Enter: Bohemians 1905. Finally, I have found a soccer team that I have valid reasons for liking. Bohemians 1905 is a Prague based team that competes in the Gambrinus Liga, the highest level of Czech soccer (reason 1: local to where I'm staying). Bohemians 1905 is not to be confused with Bohemians Praha, another team in the Gambrinus Liga, from Prague no less, which share the same colors and emblem. Wait, what? Yeah, it turns out that several years ago the team went bankrupt, was demoted to the second league, and sold it's brand to another team in Prague to get money. Which brings us to reason 2for liking them. Eventually the fans got together and bought the team, so, like my Packers, the team is entirely fan owned, which is way cool and is reason enough to adopt this team. Getting back to the colors and mascot; reason 3, they play in green which is another link to the Pack and their mascot is reason 4: a kangaroo. Many years ago the team went on a tour of Australia and were given kangaroos as gifts. They donated the marsupials to the Prague Zoo, but kept them as their mascot.

So now all I have to do is see a game. Of course, they haven't had any home games while I've been able to visit Prague, but there is a chance on September 12 to see them in Prauge. Of course, this means that I'll have to choose between seeing Salzburg, Austria, or seeing Bohemians play. Looks like we'll get to see exactly what kind of fan I am.

When it rains, it pours

Adding to my recent rash of troubles is the fact that my laptop charger is beginning to go kaput. some of the insulation on the cord is wearing out and the wires apprently have started to fray a bit, meaning they don't connect, meaning the current doesn't go all the way through, meaning my laptop can't charge. It's touch and go now, which sucks, because I don't know how many Apple stores there are in Prague or Croatia and even if I found one, chargers are like $60, plus they may be even more here, with value added tax and shit.

ugh.

Photo of the Day

This is Ondre, the son of one of the Astronomers here at the institute, Petr Skoda (seen at the bottom). The photo is from the demonstration by the Czech Academy of Sciences (again, more on that later). Briefly, the demonstration was about cuts to funding basic research, and the demonstrators were wearing donkey ears to signify their rhetorical question "you think you can make donkeys out of us?" Yeah, I didn't quite get it either, but it was funny to see all these people in donkey ears.

Ondre was also at a barbeque I attended at the Institute, a goodbye party for Danka who is going to Thubingen. He spent most of the time singing the riff to "Smoke on the Water", which was completely lost on the Czechs, but which I, as would any Guitar Hero, recognized immediately.

dern dern derrrrrrn, dern dern dun-uhhhh, dern dern derrrn dern derrrrrnnnn.

The Czech out Line

Third in the Series

Yesterday I went to Prague to hang out with Petr Hadrava, but this story is about the way back. There was a demonstration held by the Czech Academy (more on that later) and Viktor was in Prague for that, so he was able to drive me home. On our way out, he told me we would be stopping at the Hypermarket. I assumed this was the TESCO, which I had already been to, but Viktor informed that this one was even bigger than TESCO. Perhaps it was the way in which is was laid out, but I was amazed at just how much stuff there was.

Background:
The Hypermarket is certainly an experience to be had. Even though it is very in tune with American-style consumerism, it feels strangely foreign. For some reason which I haven't been able to determine, we don't really have anything like it in the States. It might be best described as a Sam's Club or Costco that was operated on a retail rather than wholesale basis, containing about the same ratio of food to non-food items. It's not like a super Target or Wal-Mart, because the hypermarket is more grocery store than anything else, but you can buy clothes, electronics, office supplies, etc if you so desire. I suppose the "hyper" part can also be due to the smaller stores that invariably share the same building but different cash registers. A florist and tobacconist are usually good bets, as is a deli or small restuarant.

This hypermarket literally has almost everything you could want to buy (except for Balsamic vinegar glaze, which TESCO does have and I've been trying for a week to get my hands on). This particular one, Albert, had like four different meat/deli counters: one for beef, one for sausage, one for fish and one for cheese. They had more different kinds of salami than my grocery store back home has of different kinds of any deli meat; their beer section alone was bigger than the market in Ondrejov; their yogurt aisle was more like a museum, showcasing all the different styles, flavors and brands one could buy (who knew there were so many kinds of Activia?).

I picked up some vegetables, some cheese and a type or roll with cheese and ham baked into, as well as some Becherovka, a Czech liquer.

That's about it, gonna end this post abrubptly. Guess that's what happens when you have a good title for your post, but nothing to back it up.

Revisiting Berlin: City of History, Beacon of Modernity

Without the World Championships, I doubt if Berlin would have made it onto my itinerary for this trip to Europe. When asked about it, people would tell me something to the effect of "don't go there, Berlin was completely bombed out during WW2 so it's all really new." I would like to publicly that this is a ridiculous reason not to go to Berlin. I believe that this kind of statement, which I heard from several people, belies an improper attitude that Americans have about travel and reflecting on my time in Berlin really helped me think through why I am travelling in the first place and why I want to travel in the future.

I think that the issue of "history" is largely behind why people said what they did. A main reason to go to Europe is to experience history in a way that we can't back in the United States. After all, Western Civilization has only been in contact with America for 500 years and its real hallmarks, especially architecture and the arts, have only been on a level comparable to Europe for 300 years, at the most. European culture, however, is incredibly old by comparison and thus one must go to Europe to experience this history. However, Berlin is not worth going to, since the physical vestiges of its history have been largely destroyed thus inhibiting our ability to experience said history. I find a problem with this, because it assumes that 1) nothing important to history has happened in Berlin since 1945 and on a deeper level, 2) we should go to Europe only to experience that which we do not have access to back in the Unites States. Obviously assumption 1 is ludicrous; the two most important issues of the 20th century were intimately tied to Berlin . But in America our understanding of World War Two is too often limited to Pearl Harbor, D-Day, and the Holocaust, and I would be most people have little understanding about how the Nazis came to power in the first place, which is tied heavily to the history of Berlin. Also, concerning the little thing called the Cold War, it wasn't until I came to Prague and Berlin that I truly began to grasp what it meant. For example, throughout my elementary school days, I always wondered why the atlases and pull-down maps in my classrooms always boasted that they were up to date, as of 1993 or something. For me, Russia and Krygystan and even the Czech Repulic had always been their own countries, but of course only a few years earlier the maps looked totally different. Although I was alive in 1989 when the Wall fell, I don't think that I or many others my age truly understand what it meant; the transition to Capitalism seems so swift, our memories don't let us realize what the world was like at the time we were born. Regarding assumption 2, I think it comes at odds with my own personal reasons for travelling. Sure, I admit that I can go to New York, or LA, or even Milwaukee to see modern buildings, but that I can't see a renaissance villa there. But this assumes that Berlin as it exists today is not by itself worth visiting, which I now think is entirely untrue. I believe that travel is worth doing because it not only shows us how the World was, but what it is and what it can be.

Berlin is a modern, global city and for that reason it deserves visiting for the same reason one visits Tokyo, Dubai or Sydney. Berlin, to me, was a great example of how Europeans are living modern life. The architecture and transportation in particular seem to be a prescription for how we should live urban life in the 21st century: there are places like Potsdamer Platz, a bustling hub in the middle of Berlin where people live, work, and play; the S-Bahn and U-Bahn provide an efficient way to get around the entire Berlin area in sleek, clean trains. Designated bike lanes on the sidewalks make owning a car almost an outdated idea (but make walking in them to avoid the pedestrian traffic a dangerous one). There are people who clearly have ties to places all around the globe, but have chosen to live in Berlin. On one of the nights I went out, we went to a club that had a Latin-Mexican band playing, and much of the crowd was singing along in Spanish. The global influence on Berlin is perhaps best shown in the two most popular street-food items, Currywurst and Doner Kebab, both which got started in Berlin. Currywurst is almost exactly what it sounds like, bratwurst with Curry powder, usually served with ketchup and a roll (and even french fries). Doner kebab is a bit harder to describe, but I like to think of it as a deep-dish version of a pita sandwich; clearly different from gyros, clearly something that could happen only in Berlin.

There does exist a tension between history and modernity in Berlin. You can see it at the Jewish Museum, where the uneasy history of Germany's Jews is presented in one of the most talked about buildings in Modern Architecture. You can see it at Checkpoint Charlie, the U.S. Army checkpoint along the Berlin wall where huge illuminated billboard type portraits of American and Soviet soldiers look out on their enemies' former domains. Perhaps my favorite example of this tension exists at Tacheles, which is possibly the coolest place in Germany. Tacheles used to be an old shopping center, originally built in the very early 1900s. it survived two wars and communism, but not without a little cosmetic damage (apparently bullet holes are visible places. Since 1990 it has been home to artists, a busy club scene (where I saw the Mexican band, there are at least three other clubs on site) and probably a squre mile of graffiti, all of them squatters. The owners of the building have an tenuous peace with the residents, but at the beginning of 2009, the building's future as a playground was put back in jeopardy; making money is still the name of the game, in the end. But the parties were still going on the Tuesday night I was there, so go while you still can.

Some cities manage to display both modern living and the glory of the past - London and Paris come to mind - but since this is my first trip to Europe afterall, I will probably concentrate on the History there. Therefore, I'm glad I got to experience what I did in Berlin. So go to Berlin, grab a beer and a rostbraten, and sit back and enjoy the eurotrash music. But seriously, it's everywhere.

Bites on my ass update

I now have reason to believe that fleas are actually the cause of my discomfort, as I have not found any physical evidence of bedbugs. Fleas are smaller, thus more likely to escape me finding the little ass-flesh eaters, but they still have the same pattern of several bite marks all in a row.