Berlin – Attempting to Thwart Jetlag

Day 1
Thursday, October 29, 2015.


We arrived in Berlin to a cold, sunny morning. John, who hadn’t slept, headed straight to bed. Hearing that light and movement are the best antidote to jet lag, I went with Katharina and Ezra for a walk down the length of the Volkspark Wilmersdorf, a narrow green space that begins in the east at the end of Belziger Strasse and ends about two kilometres westward. The trees were in full fall splendour, quite different than in my previous visits (always summer), and there were lots of leaves to kick up on the paths. Like a lot (all?) of parks in Berlin, this one, in addition to waterways, sports fields, a mini-golf course, has its share of monuments, fountains, and statuary, but my main impression was of a long picnic-worthy grass strip bordered by leafy trees. Our trail went along the edge of the trees, and circumnavigated the park. From one pond-side path, I could see the tower of the Rathaus Schöneberg, where Kennedy made his famous “Ich bin ein Berliner” speech.

Carl-Zuckmayer Bridge for pedestrians and bikes forms the roof of Rathaus Schöneberg U-Bahn Station. Pretty cool for a train station! The rathaus tower rises in the background. Photo credit: urbanrail.net.

Many Berliners were out and about. The neighbourhood consists of block upon block of 6-storey apartments, and the residents really use the parks. Katharina told me that Berliners will come even in the freezing winter to picnic, sheltering against a sunny wall of the Carl Zuckmayer Bridge that cuts through the park. I look at the proliferation of 3-storey condominiums springing up along commercial corridors in Vancouver, and wonder if we’re not making a big mistake, under-densifying, other than in the downtown core. The Berlin model of dense residential areas with abundant parkland seems really livable to me.



I didn’t carry my camera this first day out, hence the stolen photo above, but for the curious, images of the park can be found here.


In the evening, Ezra had to work, so John and I went with Katharina to the Italian restaurant, I Due Emigranti, just a few steps down the street. Food we accept as Italian (or any other nationality) in Canada is not always interpreted in the same way in other countries. The food here was good, but my minestrone had no tomatoes, pasta, or beans, such as I would expect, but rather was a salty broth with cubes of potato and carrot. In my exhaustion, it was about all I could handle, anyway.

So, Day 1 down, we went to bed right after dinner, hoping to sleep our way into this time zone.




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