Another scorcher of a day. There were offers of outings, but I wanted a low-key day for my last day before heading home, so we stayed in the neighbourhood. We walked to the Volkspark Wilmersdorf, a serpentine stretch of green that once saved me from jet lag on arrival in Berlin some years ago. There’s a new playground there, a huge, spectacular one. In a city full of huge, spectacular playgrounds, this one outdid them all. My favourite part was the labyrinth. Who doesn’t like a labyrinth? It was small, but definitely get-lost-able. The theme of the playground was Harry Potter, and all the characters were there, carved in wood, but the city didn’t call it Harry Potter, because they would have had to pay royalties. How omitting the name is enough to avoid lawsuits is beyond me.
Random sunbathing on patchy grass (see previous post about this aesthetic)
Family playing pétanque, or boules, or bocce, whatever it's called here. Behind that greenery is the beer garden described below
Not a Harry Potter playground
A feature that wasn’t new in this part of the park was a row of pingpong tables. At the beach yesterday, Amelia and Ezra (and for a bit, me) volleyed a pingpong ball back and forth with the paddles they’d brought for the purpose. Today, it was actual pingpong. Well, no score-keeping, that would ruin it. Ezra taught Amelia about backhand today, and she caught on right away. Somewhere in the forgotten crannies of my past, I must have played some pingpong, because my body remembers how to do it. Weird, that. I’m not good, no, far from it, but I’m not a complete newbie, either. I have a feel for the paddle, the ball, and the table. Hmm.
Ezra and Amelia
We stopped in a beer garden on the way home. This was an actual garden, of sorts, tucked behind a hedge that separated it from a major paved walkway. From that walkway, you’d never guess this was there. Sitting in there, looking at the beat-up tables, the old wooden-slat chairs, the higgledy-piggledy-ness of it, I was reminded of Mexico, or India. Katharina said that places like this could only be in Berlin; anywhere else in Germany would be all cleaned up and spiffy. Rough-cut, Berlin.
One small corner of LAAX, a shabby-chic beer garden
On my Berlin Wishlist, which, I must emphasize, was not really a wishlist, one idea was to go kayaking in Klein-Venedig. When I saw this in that off-beat Berlin article, I remembered seeing pictures of Ezra and Katharina doing that, years ago, pre-kids. They were quite enthusiastic about the idea, and thought the kids would like it.
It meant getting the car from Katharina’s mom, so K was off on the train early to pick it up. Ezra baked a spanakopita and packed it up, along with the left-over picnic food from yesterday. We all (including kids) hauled bags and backpacks down to the street and stuffed them in the back of Agnes’s little car. We set out on what ended up being about an hour’s drive, slowly slowly winding through the city, mile after mile of wide boulevards or narrow lanes, all lined with the same 6-8 storey apartments. Kinda dystopian. We passed through neighbourhoods given over to a variety of immigrants and refugees, the latest being the Palestinians. This is probably a lot better than what they left behind. One person’s hell….
The last bit of the drive took us through a pleasant neighbourhood of single family dwellings, of which I’ve seen almost none in this city, and finally onto a single-car lane with cars parked all along, a signal that there may not be space ahead. There wasn’t. Ezra dropped us off with all the gear, and drove back to find a spot.
We arrived at the boat (kayak/canoe) place to find they had no boats available. They were all booked up. But when Katharina had tried to book, the info she got was that they didn’t take bookings. I think she and Ezra were disappointed, but considering the heat, I really didn’t mind. We decided to hit the beach, which was a short walk through the trees.
None of those canoes were available for us to rent, apparently
How do I describe this beach? It was a steep, sandy hillside, deeper than it was long; golden, dusty sand, scorching hot. People occupying all the shade but one small spot, up near the top of the hillside, which we beelined towards. We settled among the ciggie butts and the burning bodies, laid out the blankets and the feast. The girls and Ezra went swimming. I spent the time people-watching. To me, it was astounding, seeing so many bodies elbow-to-elbow, at the lakeshore and in the water, apparently loving it. I guess it’s all in what you’re used to. One person’s heaven….
Picnic in a patch of shade
Busy on a hot day
Ezra and Amelia and I batted around a pingpong ball for a bit. Amelia's pretty good at it! Better than me, but that's not saying much.
I don’t know how long we were there. Later in the afternoon, we left our stuff and went back to the boat-rental place, where there was a trattoria. We had drinks — our habitual non-alcoholic beer — and the kids had sprite and ice cream cones. It was maybe 5 o’clock, which is just the right time to load up on pre-dinner sweets, right?
Back at the beach, we moved the gear closer to the lake, because the shade had moved too. Katharina had a swim this time, as did Amelia and Brookie. The girls made sand castles and sand cities, and finally we decided it was time to tackle the long drive home.
We went for falafel/donair at a little shop up on Haupstraße, the main street. We watched Berlin go by. It was dusk when we headed home.
Ezra was off work today. We’d planned a picnic for dinner, so we went shopping. For something like €50 (I checked my withdrawals, and the Euro is currently about $1.60 CAD, a highter rate than I’d though), Ez bought what would have cost probably $150 back home. Things are generally cheap here.
I nosed in some shops for a bit, was tempted by a shirt and a dress, but only bought some Fisherman’s Friend lozenges, which will get me through the flight home, when I will wear a mask. Masks always make me cough.
Ez and I went for lunch at the Café Bildebuch, a favourite haunt since John and I first started coming to Berlin. There’s a smoke-filled front patio and a fairly smoke-free back patio, where we chose to sit.
My egg sandwich, not at all like "egg salad"
After lunch, it was time to pick up Brookie at the train from camp. It was at the same S-Bahn station I’d arrived at from the airport, and the one I'll probably leave from to get back to the airport, so I recorded the walk on a GPS track. It’s 2.2 km from here, and it took us 20 minutes at a good clip. Hauling my luggage might take longer. I could take a closer train and transfer but this one is non-stop direct, so the walk is probably worth it.
By 2 o’clock, I’d put in more than 10,000 steps and had plenty more to do today. Last time I was in Berlin, I averaged 13,000 a day. At my age, 6,000 is considered the sweet spot. I wonder if I can slack off all winter if I double up my steps in summer. Nah, I know the answer to that. It hardly seems fair.
In my “Berlin 2025 Wishlist,” which I think I got from a NTY article months ago, one idea was to picnic on the Insel der Jugend. Katharina has been doing her best all week to make all my wishlist items happen. She takes the list way more seriously than I do. So she arranged that Ezra's sister Maria and her partner Francie would meet us there, and away we went. Ezra rode, with the kiddie wagon in tow, holding two girls really much too big for it. Katharina and I took the S-Bahn. Then walked. And walked. And walked. Well, I asked for it, didn’t I?
Typical S-Bahn station. Bland, but efficient
Here’s the thing about Berlin: it’s very rough-cut. That’s a big part of its charm, I think. Where other cities might have pristine gardens and smooth public lawns, Berlin’s spaces are weedy, and the grass, where it survives, is going to seed. In public recreational places, whatever grass there might ever have been has long since worn away, leaving large patches of bare, dusty ground, littered with cigarette butts and other detritus. That’s okay by Berliners. They spread their blankets in the dust and enjoy their picnics as if they were parked in a corner of paradise. In large, open spaces, people plunk themselves seemingly at random. Oh, there’s a patch not occupied, let’s occupy it. Think of yourself walking into the middle of a scrappy field and just lying down there, to catch some sun or read a book. That’s the aesthetic.
Entrance to Insel der Jugend (Island of Youth), which you can see has been re-named Insel Berlin, but nobody calls it that.
Set in the walkway leading to the Insel, there were stones naming what I presume were sponsors of the bridge. This was my favourite. Lucy is Stephen Hawking's daughter.
By the time Katharina and I had walked enough kilometers to up my annual daily step average by several thousand, the others had already found a seemly patch of dust, and the picnic was spread out. There were low trees around, and we were quite close to the river, so it wasn’t completely random. We pretended the cigarette butts were part of the natural landscape. The girls, they can make beautiful things out of anything, I swear, and we were served delectable frisbees of “pizza,” and “French toast,” made with mud, stones, tiny blossoms, and big juicy leaves. I wish I’d taken pictures of these unlikely works of art.
It was great to see Maria, after some years of crossed wires, but it wasn’t really enough time. It was nice to meet Francie at last. (I probably spelled her name wrong, sorry.)
Francie, Maria, and Brookie, with Ezra and the kiddie wagon bringing up the rear
Picnic over, while others sailed away on their bikes, Katharina and I retraced the kilometers back to the S-Bahn, and rode home watching the sun set at 9:15. Summer!
Oh, and my step count, since you’re dying to know: 21,954. That’s about half of what a Camino pilgrim will walk in a day. But I feel pretty good about it.
This was before my last 26 steps to the bathroom and back
I was on my own for the start of the day. I planned to get out to the main street to poke about the shops, but didn’t quite make it. Since I was up at 7, I needed a nap around 1 o’clock, and used my new trick of putting on a 15-minute guided meditation, setting an alarm for 30 minutes, and drifting off before the deep-breaths part of the meditation is done. The alarm woke me up, and I thought it was morning. So refreshing!
Katharina got home from work (she’s a pediatrician) at 2 o’clock, and we set out to check off one of the several things I’d put on my wishlist for this visit: tea at a Tajik tea house called Tadshikische Teestube. We rode a couple of S-bahn trains and emerged by the historic synagogue I’d visited with John on a previous visit to Berlin. The synagogue was all but destroyed during WWII (yep, our side did that), and is now a museum, not an active synagogue. There are concrete barriers in front, and a police presence, because, well, I can’t explain why. Why antisemitism still exists, or why it ever did, is something I’ll never understand.
The domes of the synagogue on the left, television tower in the right distance
Notice the Big Ball in the Sky in a couple of my shots. While one might imagine some nefarious purpose, it's just a television tower. (That's what they'd like you to believe!) It's visible all over Berlin. My favourite story about it: when the sun shines on it, the reflection forms a Greek cross. That became known as "the Pope's revenge," because in East Germany, where it is (or was) situated, the government had removed all the crosses from the churches.
Behind busy streets, quiet passageways
The neighbourhood we were in is riddled with little interior passageways between apartment buildings which have been developed into art spaces, cafés, and artisan shops. We walked through these leafy courtyards until we came to the one where our teahouse was located. The interior was really enticing, rather like the old Afghan Horseman in Vancouver for those that remember it, but on such a beautiful, warm day, we chose to sit outside. We ordered the “Russian Tea Ceremony” for two, which wasn’t really a ceremony. The very concentrated tea was held in a tiny teapot over a samovar. This was accompanied by minuscule bowls containing candied peel, rum-soaked raisins, some strawberry jam, and flavoured sugar lumps. It was supposed to be accompanied by vodka, but we chose apple juice instead. There was a dish with a number of cookies, packaged ones, not fresh. Our server told us we were to pour a small amount of the tea in our cups, then fill up with hot water from the samovar. She didn’t tell us what to do with the rest of the stuff. We took a guess and stirred the bits into our tea, which needed some sweetening, since it was strong and bitter (in a good way.)
Waiting for tea. Note ashtrays -- people in Europe haven't caught on to the nonsmoking culture of North America. The only safe place to eat is indoors, which in effect gives the best seating to smokers. Here, we were almost alone, therefore breathing clear air.
The interior of the tea house, had we needed to escape smokers
We lingered over tea, just talking, telling stories. So good to have this time.
Our "Russian Tea Ceremony", with sweet bits, cookies, and apple juice. The little teapot on the top is full of very concentrated tea, while the samovar is filled with hot water.
Afterwards, we walked through more of the little courtyards, then out onto the park that borders the Spree, the river that runs through the city. Across the river was Museum Island, that holds a group of historic buildings: the Berlin Cathedral, the “Old Museum,” the “New Museum” (which isn’t new), the Pergamon Museum. John and I, along with Ezra and Katharina, visited these on our first visit to Berlin in 2010.
The Spree, with Museum Island on the right
It seemed like the entire population was in the streets today, drawn out by the hint of summer after some days of cool and even blustery weather. Something I love about Berlin is that it’s a living city. In other European capitals I’ve visited, the historic centres have become museums for tourists. Berlin is not like that. There were certainly lots of tourists where we walked today, but most of the people were locals out enjoying their city on a fine day.
There's that "Television Tower," spying on everyone
(I need to learn to make longer videos; 8 seconds seems sooo long when I'm recording!)
"Television Tower" with "The Pope's Revenge". Note S-Bahn train on the further bridge.
A nice restaurant before the dinner hour. Pretty sure I wouldn't want to wrap myself up in those hairy animal skins!
While we're out and about, here's a little lesson on using the Berlin transit system. First, you buy a ticket from the dispenser, then you validate it in a little red box. It's not clear (to me, without help) that you have to do that, but if you haven't validated your ticket, you are not travelling legally and could be kicked off the train if an official comes along to check. This is the same on European intercity trains -- you need to find the little box to validate your ticket.
Purchase tickets here. This local took a long time figuring out how to do it, so don't expect it to be easy. Know some key words, like "fahrkarte" for ticket. Otherwise, just poke at the screen, and eventually something will happen.
The validation box, this one attached to what looks like a mini fire hydrant.
Expect to share your ride with bicycles.
Amelia was at a birthday party from after school until 7 tonight, which is how Katharina was free to spend time wandering with me. We picked Amelia up at the party venue, an apartment like this one, where about a hundred kids emerged. Well, maybe not quite a hundred, but it might as well have been. Parents, mostly fathers, were there to pick up their kids. I was struck by the big smiles as they spotted theirs among the throng. I am struck generally by the strong sense of family I get, watching people here. Maybe it’s not different from home, but at home, people are mostly in their houses and yards, whereas here, because people live in apartments, families are out and about, and their affection is in-your-face visible. I don't have any photos of that affection -- you just have to imagine it.
I do now have some shots of some of Katharina's family members, from their visit yesterday. Maybe you can see the affection in these.
Katharina's mom, Agnes
And Katharina's sister, Theresia, and husband Damien
With everyone at work or school or camp, I was on my own for much of today. I was happy to take a down day. I spent the morning like I would at home, playing through the NYT games and puzzles, reading some news. I’ve been news free since leaving home, so I only stuck my toes in. I’m not about to dive in fully. I mean, how stressed out do I want to make myself?
I walked up to the Schoneberg Flohmarkt, an outdoor market that operates Wednesdays and Saturdays. I knew I was getting close when I heard the vendors shouting. I was looking for fruit and berries. The strawberries are in season and are spectacular, and there were also raspberries, cherries, nectarines, and I wanted all of those. I stopped for cherries, and the vendor shouted, “Eins Kilo?” and, not knowing on the spot how to ask for half, I said yes, and got the kilo. I stopped for raspberries, which came in small clamshell packs. The price was €2 for 2 packs, so I thought, but the vendor hauled out a case of 6. I said no, but he shouted, “Zwei Euro!” and I said okay. I started to catch on to this game, and when it came to nectarines, I asked for four, just four. The guy looked at me like I was out of my mind, but he sold me just four. The strawberries came in baskets, so that was simple, just one basket. This was early afternoon, close to wrapping-up time, and vendors wanted to get rid of stuff. I think at the end of the day, you can pick up food for free, or almost free.
On the way home, I stopped in at the discount store again — this is like a Winners, but smaller, and…European! I found a linen shirt I liked, and I was pretty sure I needed it, so I bought it. Souvenir, right?
Once home, I made a big fruit salad for the family, and served myself a bowl of it with yoghurt. Lunch.
Katharina got home with Amelia, and shortly after, her mom Agnes arrived, followed by sister Theresia and Damien and their two little ones, Frida and Valentine. So nice of everyone to come by! We ate Katharina’s rhubarb cake and drank tea or coffee. It was 6 pm. Why not have tea and cake at 6 pm?
I took Ezzie, Katharina, and Amelia to dinner at a tapas place around the corner. I have always wanted to go for tapas, but they are few and far between where I come from, and in the distant past when I encountered them, I couldn’t afford to eat there. Tonight, with too many Euros burning a hole in my wallet, I “insisted” (family joke) that we go and feast on the little plates of Manchego cheese, grilled peppers, beans with grilled tomatoes, shrimp, calamari, little filled croquettes, and of course patatas bravas. Everyone was delighted — yum!
Being that yesterday was a holiday, Amelia had today off school, and Katharina had today off work. Yeah, I know, that doesn’t make sense. Brookie was off in the morning for three days at camp with her Kita-mates, ages 4-6. So we three elder women went … shopping!
I needed (“needed”) a couple of things. There’s a discount store near here where I have found great socks on previous trips. I realized when I was rinsing out socks this morning that almost all the socks I brought on this trip came from here. So I had to go back and get some more, right? Found some great ones! I also found a nice non-hooded hoodie in a super soft fabric, so I had to get that, too. It didn’t hurt that the price was €17, and that the original price, marked in a number of currencies, was $92 Canadian. I would never have paid that for it, but I’m pretty thrilled at the bargain.
We rode the bus to Potsdammer Platz, where there are a couple of huge shopping malls somewhat indistinguishable from North American shopping malls. Katharina and I bought bags in the Uniclo store. And we shopped and shopped for shoes for Amelia and found some pink runners she liked almost enough to buy, but not quite. We came home, and two of the three of us were satisfied, while the other was merely tolerant. But not complaining — I swear she never complains!
The daily ice cream. Amelia's was bubble gum.
Worker made of Lego, Amelia for scale. This picture's for Flynn, my Campbell River grandson.
I played a bunch of card games with Amelia. I don’t have anyone to play games with at home, and one of the things I look forward to with my grandkids is playing games. It’s a perfect way to build my connection with them, too. They usually beat me.
Katharina made a yummy Thai-style noodle soup for dinner. With Brookie gone, the evening was notably quieter than usual. The girls get to giggling and rumpussing together. Alone, Amelia is so peaceful!
Today was a national holiday in Germany, celebrating the Pentacost. Holidays here mean that no stores are open. Sundays mean the same, so for this Sunday-followed-by-a-holiday, people had to stock up on supplies ahead of time. Ezra went to shop Saturday evening, and found a lot of empty — really empty! — shelves in the supermarket. He managed to make a really delicious vegetable melange for dinner last night, though.
After a bit of “what shall we do” back and forth, we decided today would be a good day to go to the zoo. The Tiergarten in Berlin (“tier” means “animal” and the “garten" part is obvious) is pretty amazing, but I’ve been there twice before, and the kids were curious about the other zoo, the Tierpark, where they'd never been. A two-zoo city is explained by the fact that the city was split in two for some decades. The Tiergarten was West Berlin’s zoo, and the Tierpark was East Berlin’s.
Getting there meant taking a number of S-Bahn (the mostly above-ground train) and the U-Bahn (the mostly underground train) and a bunch of walking in between. At least, I think we took both the S and the U, but it was all so convoluted, I may have lost track. You can get from anywhere in Berlin to anywhere else in Berlin using the fantastic public system of trains, buses, and trams, but it takes at least a Bachelor of Getting Around to figure out how to navigate it.
One of the S-Bahn stations
Walking
Sandwiches at a bakery. Note reasonable prices (€1 is worth about $1.50 Canadian)
The zoo itself, as its name might suggest, was more park than animals, a forested area covering 160 hectares (400 acres.) We did a lot of walking! Aside from a few of the animals you’d expect at a zoo, like monkeys and tigers and bears and giraffes, it seemed that most of the animals were deer-like creatures I’d never heard of, or cow-like creatures I’d never heard of. We bee-lined to the polar bears (yes, pretty sad), wandered through some educational rainforest displays, and then climbed up a hill to the Himalaya section, which housed, among other fauna, a pair snow leopards. Like most of the other big cats at the zoo, the snow leopard we saw was asleep. I dunno, bored? Probably.
I think the girls preferred the sculptures of animals to the animals themselves.
Some sort of cattle
Cheetah
Snow Leopard
An aside: I don't know how they made that hill. There are no natural hills in Berlin. The only other Berlin hill that I know of is Teufelsberg, which was made from the rubble that was the city at the end of WWII.
I’m conflicted about zoos, but as public opinion has turned to concerns about animal welfare, zoos have repositioned themselves as bastions of conservation, breeding and protecting endangered species. I don’t know if it’s enough to counter the more obvious purpose of entertaining homo sapiens, but it’s a step in the right direction. Even so, I’m not sure the big cats would agree.
We spent hours at the Tierpark, including having a bit of a picnic there. The girls were on scooters, when the adults weren’t carrying the scooters. What was amazing was that I didn’t hear a word of complaint the whole day, about 8 hours from the time we left home till the time we were back in the neighbourhood for our dinner out. The kids covered the same ground we did, some 10 km of walking, and just trotted (or scooted) along happily. It’s a walking culture here; maybe that explains the lack of complaining. But I was impressed.
Back in the home turf, we went for dinner across the street from the apartment, at the Perla Jonica Trattoria. I have to go there for their pasta with fresh truffles, every time I visit, . The pasta is house made, rolled in a huge round of Parmesan which they set aflame with some sort of alcohol, then covered in shaved truffle. Man, I could go for it again before I leave Berlin!
After dinner, we all rolled in to the apartment (well, climbed the six flights of stairs), where Katharina and Ezra made the last preparation for Brookie's time at camp for the next three days. One of their traditions is to send along kisses, I mean actual kisses planted on pieces of paper.
A low-key day today. The weather was cool and windy, with the threat of rain occasionally made manifest. We stayed close to home. After hanging out most of the morning, while outside was all Sturm und Drang (yes I know I'm not using the reference correctly), we ventured to a local park where the girls practiced roller blading. Amelia is quite graceful, and Brookie is working her way there. I could see Brookie’s improvement practically by the minute, and I expect a few more hours will have her flitting like Amelia does up and down the paved pathways.
Had to add this fellow here, because I'd forgotten about these birds: he's a Hooded Crow. He speaks the same language as our black crows at home.
We dropped the roller blades at the apartment, then walked/scooted/cycled to our favourite ice cream place, by Viktoria-Luise-Platz, and ate the huge scoops of ice cream they call “small” there. It’s not gelato, I have to say, but delicious nonetheless. I think that was lunch? because it was a long while before we were hungry for dinner.
I woke up at 6 am, feeling like, oh, nothing happening, may as well just doze, then I remembered — it’s travel day! While last night I didn’t feel like going anywhere but home, this morning I was excited to get to Berlin, to see Ezra, Katharina, and the girls. Wahoo! It’s nice when the timing turns out to be perfect (despite fantasies of highjacking the boat), and to be exactly ready when one stage of a journey is done and the next stage is about to begin.
I dressed in jeans (gasp!), mainly to lighten my bag to conform to Croatia Air’s weight restrictions. We had a typical ship’s breakfast that included just about everything anyone could want in the way of breakfast. I ate more than usual, knowing I wouldn’t get a proper lunch, since my flight to Berlin would be at 1 pm.
The Four Pipsqueaks: Gill, Mallory, myself, and Jane; a sub-group of the Canada 8. You have to be 5'2" or under to qualify
We had to be off the boat at 8:30, bags and all, so that the crew could clean and prep for the next bunch arriving at noon, just as we did last week. We had to carry our bags across the five other ships strung together with ours. We sat on a stone wall alongside the string of ships, just as we has sad last week, when we were waiting and wondering about the adventure to come. I figure we were probably sitting today among some of the coming week’s passengers. And we were probably sitting last week among the previous week’s passengers. It’s an infinite loop, isn’t it?
Carol and Bettyanne were taking a bus to Zagreb at 10:00, and I was taking an airport shuttle bus, also at 10:00. Jane, whose husband was to arrive at the airport from Canada at 11:30, decided to go with me and meet him at the airport rather than hanging around waiting for hours in Split. I was happy to have the company.
One last latte
We all had one last café latte, or some version of it (well, Carol had fresh orange juice) in a basic café beside the bus station. Said goodbye to my new sisters, saying we’d look forward to our Pender walks with the big group, so we could huddle and reminisce.
Jane and I have some friends in common. We found out a couple of months ago. Elly, my previous bike/travel partner, mentioned that her good friend Mike Theilman’s sister-in-law was also going to be doing a bike and boat tour in Croatia around the same time as me. That sister-in-law is Jane! I also consider Mike (along with his wife Maren) a friend, though we don’t know each other well. Yes, the world really is small.
Anyhow, Jane's company made pleasant the 40-minute through the suburbs to the airport, which is a rather beautiful, airy building. I had to check my bag, because it weighed 9.8 kg even without my jeans, and Air Croatia’s allowance is 8 kg. It was totally unnecessary, since the plane was only half full and the bins were almost empty, but since it was a nonstop flight, I figured they probably wouldn't lose the bag. Jane and said our goodbyes.
Split airport
In row four there were only two passenger, myself and that woman. My bag could have had a seat, for goodness' sake!
Aerial view of Split. If you know what you're looking for, you can see the Riva. I notice that our ship has sailed, as have the six others it was tied to.
Clear skies and clear views ended about half way into the flight, and when I landed in Berlin, the air was fresh with recent rain. I swear there used to be one guy in the bowels of the Berlin airport, getting all the luggage from the planes to the carousels, it was that slow. They seem to have hired extra help, because I only waited 20 minutes. Ezra, Katharina, and the girls timed their arrival perfectly, getting to my exit just as I came through, bag and all.
We took the long S-Bahn ride to their neighbourhood and walked ten minutes to home. The girls were shy at first, but then re-introduced me to their stuffies, and showed me their drawings, and compared the size of their feet to the size of mine, and all was good.
We went for Indian dinner at Yogi Haus, just down the street. The cost of dinner for five was not much more than I was paying for just myself in Croatia. Berlin is still reasonable, in an increasingly pricey world. It's good to be back.
