This morning we met Daniel (my nephew) at a coffee shop in his neighbourhood for brunch. It is an Australian coffee shop (underlines the multi-nationalism of Berlin) and they served a very nice breakfast (and the coffee was good to). It was raining when we left and we were waiting outside for our taxi to come when a lightning strike hit the telephone/electricity pole about 15 meters away from us. The thunder struck almost immediately afterwards (not surprising because the lightning strike was right there). We could actually see the sparks from the strike. It was the closest I have ever been to a lightning strike (and certainly don’t want to ever get closer!).

We headed for KaDeWe which is the largest department store in continental Europe and only 2nd to Harrods in Europe. The displays (from the food to the kitchen items to stationery) are beautifully done. It is really quite high-end in its range and prices but worth a visit if you’re ever in Berlin. Helen and I had visited the store 24 years ago and we bought a raclette machine from there so it also held some good memories (though Helen says she didn’t remember it at all).

Back to the hotel to pack up and head for Berlin Tegel airport for our flight back to London. Berlin Tegel airport is the weirdest airport I have ever experienced (and I have experienced a lot of airports). We had to check in a at section D which required us to walk through the whole of the terminal and then exit to get to D. We boarded on time but then sat on the tarmac for an hour due to air traffic control restrictions to due thunderstorms over London and the channel. We eventually landed at about 7pm UK time and got to the flat at about 7:30pm.

Michael rushed straight off to go buy an Apple iPad for himself from the Apple store while Chloe and I went to buy dinner from Waitrose down the road. After dinner, Helen, Chloe and Oli went shopping in Oxford Street (like they don’t have 2 days to do that!) tonight and just got back about 10 minutes ago.

I’m not sure about the rest of them but I am going to bed now!

Until tomorrow

P, H, S, C, M & O (straight back from the shops to insult me while I was typing the blog got her that position)

After all the walking of the last week, we opted for a more chilled day with a little less walking. The plan was to have breakfast at a coffee shop at 9:15am and then take a Berlin city hop-on-hop-off bus tour to get a better overview of the city. The tour we chose was a 2-hour round trip and we hopped on Gendarmenmarkt (in front of the Conzerthalle). We stayed on the bus until the stop before we go on (which was Checkpoint Charlie).

It was overcast the whole morning – which was nice not having to sit in the sun on the bus – but unfortunately with the windchill factor it was pretty cold (and some of us didn’t have jerseys). It was still a good trip though the English commentary was a lot less than the German commentary particularly because the driver was adding to the German commentary. The trip does take you past all the important sites including Berliner Dom; Humboldt University (where numerous famous people including Einstein attended); Holocaust Memorial; Brandenburg Gates; Reichstag; Tiergarten; Schloss Bellevue (official resident of President of Germany) and then finally Checkpoint Charlie.

As I mentioned above we got off at Checkpoint Charlie and went into museum shop. They sell bits of the wall by weight in the shop. Pieces of concrete … I wonder how many people buy those believing it is really a part of the wall?! Could be from any random piece of concrete chopped up. Pretty good business if people are foolish enough to buy it. We did wonder down a block to a place where a section of the wall is preserved. It is the site of the Gestapo Headquarters from WWII which was destroyed in bombing and totally destroyed after the war. They now have a museum called Topography of Terror which is both an inside and outside museum. Matching in length to the piece of the wall still standing are displays talking about the rise of the Nazis, aspects of WWII, persecution of the Jews etc. We walked along and read and looked at the photos. It was quite sobering. There was so much it took us an hour to walk and read the whole thing. You finish one panel and think ‘I’ll skip the next one’ only to be drawn in by the title and then you start reading and simply cannot stop. It reminded me again to be thankful for those who fought and lost their lives in WWII for the Allies.  It was for a good and right cause. It reminded me of my grandfather who fought (and fortunately survived) in WWII.

After lunch, some of us headed back to the hotel to rest (me, S & C) while Michael and Oli went to the Berlin Cathedral and the Holocaust Memorial. Helen went to the Tiergarten and the Holocaust Memorial. For dinner tonight we ended up as the same place as last night. We really enjoyed last night and figured there was no point not going back and doing the same thing again. Coffee, hot chocolate and whiskey (for S) back at the hotel and soon time for bed.

Until tomorrow

P, H, S, C, O & M (because he did the least today)

Given it is the 500th year of Martin Luther nailing his 95 theses to the door in Wittenberg, we had always planned to make that a stop on our European tour. Originally we thought we would take the train from Prague to Wittenberg (as it is south of Berlin) and then on to Berlin but I discovered when I tried to book the train tickets that the train to Wittenberg from Prague actually went through Berlin first. So it made sense to rather just stay 3 nights in Berlin and take the train down and back again one of the days. That is what we did today.

Our train was at 9:30am – it is only 40 minutes down to Lutherstadt Wittenberg (the town renamed itself relatively recently so important is Luther to its history). Helen and I visited Wittenberg in 1993 shortly after reunification (Wittenberg was part of East Germany) and we could see the effects of East Germany on the town at the time. It was very run down but today we got a totally different impression and it is now a quaint small town proudly celebrating its history and connection to Martin Luther and the Reformation. The whole town is focused on the 500th anniversary of Luther’s rebellion against the Catholic Church and there are numerous special displays for the event.

Our first stop was Lutherhaus which was originally the monastery that Luther took over and then became his personal house. It is much larger than I expected and you had to keep reminding yourself it was actually originally a monastery. The displays and history of Luther’s life are very informative and well done. Definitely worth the relatively low entrance fee. What struck me about Luther was (a) how hard-working he was and (b) what a huge impact he had on both Church and secular life (not just in Germany but throughout the world). I could write a blog post just on Luther (and I might still) but I’ll restrict myself for now to illustrate the (a) and (b) above.

Regarding how hard he worked, he translated the New Testament from Greek to German in 11 weeks. Admittedly he was in isolation at the time (to keep him from further threatening the Church doctrine and in particular indulgences) but it shows how he was prepared to turn difficult circumstances into something positive by simply working hard.  In addition, Luther wrote a lot challenging many of the traditional Catholic doctrines. In 1924, 15% of all the printed books in German came from Wittenberg and most of them were written by Luther himself.

Regarding the impact on Church and secular life, here are some of the impacts Luther had:

• he believed each person to be equal in God’s eyes (both men and women) and so his wife ran the household as her domain entirely (totally against the culture of the day). She was also a pretty good business woman it seems as they ended up with the largest amount of property in Wittenberg and definitely had the most sheep, goats & cows at the time Luther died (sign of their wealth).
• he introduced schooling for girls (again a totally unique concept at the time)
• he introduced a ‘community chest’ in the town square where people with wealth could contribute to those who were struggling financially (I wonder if this is the origin of the charity Community Chest?)
• he allowed parishioners to partake of both the bread and wine (Catholic Church only allowed them to have the bread)
• he stopped the use of the confessional booth and said confession of sins for salvation was sufficient and that your daily walk with God in faith was what was important
• he stopped indulgences entirely (which was just a way at the time of taking money from the poor in his view – and he was right)
• most importantly after studying Romans he concluded that we are saved by grace alone and no works at all matter

He always encouraged non-violence and even during the Peasants War in Germany he kept stressing to both sides that war was not the way to resolve the conflict and when the peasants were defeated he stressed the need for grace from the victors (though it seems this wasn’t heeded). He believed the way to change people’s minds was through dialogue and discussion and so each night he would discuss a variety of topics with the students who were living in his house (the students started taking notes and these were eventually printed in what is known today as Table Talks).

Luther also had some priorities sorted out.  He built a cellar under his house to store his wine and beer. We preferred wine to beer though he drank both. In fact his wife (Katharina) brewed the beer herself (I have asked Helen why she hasn’t been doing that for me?!).  The only annoying thing about the visit to the house was that there were a large group of Asians touring too. They were taking photos of everything and had to pose next to each picture of Luther (and I’m not exaggerating). But they also took photos posed next to random items (like a chair or a book or leaning on the railing .. see example of photo of Chloe!). They will have to spend hours going through all those photos! After the visit to his house we went to the Stadtkirsch where Luther used to preach.  We unfortunately couldn’t go in as there was a prayer service operating at the time. Finally we went to Castle Church which is where he nailed his 95 theses on the door 500 years ago. The door is unfortunately no longer there but has been replaced by commemorative doors with the 95 theses engraved on them (this was done in 1858 to commemorate Luther’s 375th birthday).

We took the train back into Berlin and decided to walk from the station back to our hotel (about 2.5 kms) as the walk takes you past the Reichstag building and through the Brandenburg Gate. The Reichstag building now houses the German parliament but in fact wasn’t used from 1933 to 1999. It was damaged by fire in 1933 and then damaged further during WWII. It was right on the border of East & West Berlin (the wall ran right behind the building). It was almost torn down in 1950s but they decided against it and eventually after reunification the building was restored and parliament moved back to Berlin and into the building from 1999.

By the time we got back to the hotel it was 4:30pm and our feet and legs were very tired. We had dinner tonight at an Asian restaurant near the hotel (we didn’t feel like walking very far!). The food was pretty good and as always the company was good again. My nephew joined us for most of the day. He was offended I didn’t include him in the sign off from yesterday so I’ve added him today (but because he was offended I’ve added him to the appropriate spot).

Until tomorrow

H (because she ordered breakfast in her broken German today from a grumpy lady and because she said no one ever gets above me .. #provedwrong), P, S, M, O, C & D

We left Prague (photo view from our hotel room this am) today on the 10:28 train to Berlin that actually left at 10:58. Prague station seems totally disorganized. About 75% of the trains were reflected as arriving or leaving late.  Ours wasn’t but left 30 minutes late anyway. At one stage the platform number of one train went up 1 minute before its due departure time and everyone had to run to get to the train. It was total chaos. When we got to our train, the doors to the carriage we were booked on were locked so we had to board through the neighboring carriage and walk through. By the time everyone was on, there were not enough seats and people had bookings for the same seats – they just sat down in the aisle and waited. No conductor in sight and it didn’t seem like anyone cared to sort out the issue.

The train was pretty slow going as well. It was meant to take 4.5 hours but it took longer (because we sat in the middle of nowhere for about 15 minutes as well). Before the Czech border no-one even checked our tickets, it was only after the Deutsche Bahn people came on the train that they bothered to check the tickets and two people behind us were in the entirely wrong carriage (which might have explained something of why there were no seats for people with bookings). The WiFi on board worked well until we crossed into Germany and thereafter it didn’t work again. And I think the Germans must have thought the train was actually a sauna because it was very hot inside. Not the most pleasant of train journeys I have had in my life but we got to Berlin eventually.

What I also cannot understand about Germany is how poor the cellphone signal is in most parts of the country. We traveled for about 2 hours on the train either without cellphone reception at all or the signal was Edge (basically so slow you can’t use your phone except to send a text message and even that will probably take 5 minutes to go through). Smoke signals would be faster. This is not the first time I have moaned about German cellphone coverage and speeds though  – if you have ever read any of my other blogs while I have been in Germany you would have heard me moan about this numerous times. South Africa (supposedly a much more backwards country than Germany) has much better coverage and speed than Germany. To prove my point I am battling to upload photos to the blog now as the speed in the hotel is only 2Mbps.  I thought maybe my cellphone would be better as it was showing 3G but alas that in came at 0.2Mbps (don’t think the speed test registered that low!).

The other thing that I notice every time I am in Germany is that all the announcements on the train are only done in German. In Czech Republic, notices done in Czech and English. The moment we crossed into Germany all the announcements done in German only until we arrived at Berlin Hauptbahnhof. The train was full of English-speaking people (I reckon 75% of the train were tourists who were English-speaking) but no announcements in English. At least I can understand the German and follow enough to be able to understand the announcements.

We are staying at Cosmo Hotel Berlin Mitte (http://www.cosmo-hotel.de/) – photo from our room window again. The area (not the hotel) was recommended by my nephew who is currently staying in Berlin. We had agreed to meet him for dinner tonight. We took a taxi to meet him and the taxi driver dropped us off and pointed down towards the river. It looked fairly dodgy and on the way down someone remarked ‘Where has Daniel taken us to’. We arrived and discovered it was a private party (with the same name as the restaurant) but it wasn’t the restaurant! And at precisely that moment the heavens opened and it pelted down with rain. We had to call another taxi and by the time we got into it we were all drenched (and I mean drenched). We had to go back to the hotel to change and then back to the actual restaurant.

We eventually arrived about 45 minutes late at Spindler Restaurant (https://www.spindler-berlin.de/) and so by the time we finished eating it was 9:30pm. The restaurant is rated Top 10 trendy places to eat in Berlin (well done Daniel on selecting it). After dinner, we went to seek out ice creams for desert and then walked back to the hotel (and got back about 10:40pm). Our clothes are still seriously wet (they’re going to need a day to dry it seems).

For some reason even though we spent most of the day on the train, we are all pretty tired.

So until tomorrow

P, H, M, S, C, O (she lost her ranking today based on not understanding why Michael wanted to sit next to me on the train so we could watch cricket on my iPad)

Breakfast was included in our room rate at the hotel and it was a pretty good spread including fruit (a lot of varieties), eggs (scrambled, boiled and fried) and usual extensive selection (for Europe) of breads, rolls, meat & cheese.

We headed for the Museum of Communism after breakfast. Ironically it is situated in one of the Palaces which it shares with a swish casino and downstairs is MacDonald’s. It is a street with shops both ways and those included all the major chain stores like H&M and even a Hamley’s.  Communism long ago it seems. It wasn’t the best museum I have ever been to and given how much they charged (190 Koruna per person which is about R115 or just under $10). But we did get a bit of history of Czechoslovakia especially post-WWII which was helpful in understanding the country a little more. The most interesting part was a video that was playing perpetually of the civil unrest in the 80s that eventually lead to the fall of the communist government. It only took 10 days of protests (17-27 November 1989) for the communist government to resign and Vaclav Havel (a political writer, dissident & philosopher from 70s) to take over as President and he also presided over the separation into Czech Republic and Slovakia and then became the first Prime Minister of Czech Republic as well.

The other thing that struck me about the museum and movie was the brutality of the police against their own people. But then again who am I as a South African to be surprised by that given our country’s history. The video did make me wonder how a handful of policemen can dominate thousands of people. If the people just turned on the police they could have easily dominated them given their numbers. But fortunately the protests were very short-lived and democracy restored. It is also clear that capitalism became firmly entrenched very quickly thereafter despite all the communist propaganda (some of the cartoons against America in the museum were pretty good). It seems the Czech people never really believed the propaganda and their love for America was restored quickly (as evidenced by the number of Americans in Prague and the American brands).

We had hoped to go the National Library (because it has a beautiful interior) but it is closed for renovation (like a lot of things across Europe). We decided to walk over the Charles Bridge again (and it seems every other tourist in Prague had the same idea). We wanted to go the place on the other side that were making Trdlo (they are places all over Prague making them but we liked the look of this place from last night). Trdlo is like a rolled donut and you can put things inside it (like ice cream, strawberries & cream or savory ones with sausage and fries). We had our’s with ice cream inside.

We then walked along the river (but on the other side of where our hotel is) which takes you past some of the palaces which are open to the public.  One of them is the Senate building.  We didn’t go into the senate (though I believe you can) but we did wander around the beautiful gardens outside. Both yesterday and today are actually public holidays in Prague.  Yesterday was ‘The Day of Slavic Missionaries Cyril and Methodius‘ (they brought Christianity to the area in 863) and today is ‘Anniversary of the execution of John Huss’ who was a Reformer that was burnt at the stake on 6 July 1415. Huss was significantly influenced by reading John Wycliffe and spoke out against the corruption of the Catholic Church. Martin Luther was influenced by Huss as he read Huss’ sermons as was astonished that he had been burnt at the stake for heresy when all Luther could see was his clear defense and exposition of the Bible. He was burnt at the stake 102 years earlier than Martin Luther nailed his 95 thesis to the door so in fact he was pre-reformer.

I hope you’re reading these blogs and being suitably impressed by my history knowledge I’m building up.  While Prague isn’t my favourite city it hasn’t stopped me from learning about Czech history & politics. What was also impressive today was that O also learnt an important thing (or at least displayed her learning). While M & I were discussing the start of today’s cricket, she asked ‘Is it an important game’ and just from a look from me she immediately corrected herself and said ‘oh that’s right, every cricket game is important’ … finally something worth promoting her for on the blog. We had also finished walking around for the morning so that gave me some time to watch the cricket and relax in the hotel room. The photo shows the nature of a symbiotic relationship – H leaning her kindle against my iPad while I watch cricket!

Late afternoon we headed for the other side of the river and up the hill to the metronome in Letna Park. It replaced the statue of Stalin that was built there in 1955 only to be taken down (actually blasted with dynamite) in 1962 when the process of de-Stalinization was taking place across Europe. It stood empty for many years and then eventually in the 90s the metronome was erected in its place. The views of Prague were pretty good from the top though it did require climbing about 200 steps to get there.

As we had pretty much skipped lunch, we decided to have an early dinner and picked out a place right on the side of the river (mainly because we could feel a cool breeze off the water … it was 29 degrees here today). Nothing special in terms of food – more like pub food (burgers x 2, ribs x 2, prawn pasta x2). Stephen and I did try out another local beer (pilsner this time) which was good.  We have had 4 different beers in 4 days between Austria and Prague and all of them have been good. Another walk across the Charles Bridge as we headed back to our hotel (this time was the emptiest it has been but it was still pretty busy) and no doubt an early night for most of us.

Until tomorrow

P, H, O, M, C & S

We left at 7:30am from the flat for Heathrow to get our BA flight to Vienna. We had some breakfast in the BA lounge and by the time we were finished it was almost ready to board the plane. I used air miles for the flights and could only get 3 business class and 3 economy class seats and so O, M & S were in economy where you get no food on the flight at all so they went to buy some lunch and drinks for the flight before we boarded.  We left a few minutes late but landed early into Vienna (at around 1pm). The guy at passport control was the grumpiest guy ever … matched US passport control guys (or at least my experience of them). He insisted we each come one at a time even though everywhere else in the world you go together as a family. Not the best start to an arrival in Austria but it wasn’t going to affect our view that much.

We took a Uber to the hotel from the airport (needed a van for the 6 of us).  We are staying at Motel One Wien Staatsoper (https://www.motel-one.com/en/hotels/vienna/wien-staatsoper/). It is perfectly situated for us and even though the rooms are slightly small and there is no in-room safe or coffee maker, the hotel’s position makes up for that and the quality is quite good.  It was recommended by the branch manager of the Vienna office of the company I work for and it was a good recommendation.

We went on a walking tour before dinner. As you can guess from the hotel name, we are very close to the State Opera House in Vienna. From there we walked to St. Stephen’s Cathedral (St Stephen definitely isn’t with us on this trip though). As usual the Cathedral is shrouded in scaffolding as they clean & renovate (as you’ll find for many European Cathedrals). From there we went to Mozart Haus which is now a museum to Mozart. It was where he lived while in Vienna and where he wrote the music for Marriage of Figaro (opera). It was until recently known as Figaro House (for that reason).

I learnt more than I had ever known about Mozart (my knowledge was limited to the movie Amadeus which I realised I had forgotten anyway). I didn’t for instance know that Mozart was a Freemason, nor that he was a big gambler (he lost over half his earnings on gambling and he earned a lot), nor that he was that well paid for a young man (who died young too). He earned more than professionals living in Vienna and was closer in earnings to some of the royalty of his day. I also learnt that Figaro was a political statement against the elite of the day (like most musicians over time he used his music to protest). For the times, the apartment he lived in was quite spacious and again showed his wealth (the rental was about 50% of what the average middle class person would earn in year).

By the time we finished at Mozart Haus I was starving and following the restaurant recommendations of my colleague (branch manager in Vienna again), we walked to Lugeck Figlmuller which is an Austrian restaurant specialising in Wiener Schnitzel.  You probably need to make a reservation to get in but we were fortunate that we got a table so long as we finished before 8pm (it was 6:30pm so we thought that perfectly possible). We went totally local including local drinks – Lugeck beer for men and Pear (C), Apricot (H) and Rhubarb & Raspberry (O) juice for ladies. We all went for Wiener Schnitzel and none of us regretted that decision.  It really was very nice Schnitzel and the service was excellent as well.

We were so full we went for an after dinner walk on the way back to the hotel. Vienna is a very beautiful city. The buildings and parks and particularly striking. We walked past a lot of museums, the national library, Burggarten, Hofberg etc etc. It is an easy city to walk around despite the throngs (and I really do mean throngs) of people milling around (especially near the Cathedral).

It was a really good afternoon and enjoyed by everyone (Chloe even declared she was feeling really happy).

Until tomorrow P, C (because she’s so happy), H, O, M & S (S should actually be on his own line after today after amount of irritating he did – he was taking the view he was already at the bottom so why not make the most of it)