Day 2: Let's get this (exercise) started.

Day 2 -- Friday, May 28th, 2010

Today was action packed--our first full day on tour here in Berlin. This morning I was terribly excited for breakfast after experiencing dinner yesterday--the chefs here at the hotel are absolutely phenomenal, even better due to the level of service shown here.

8am started our first lectures here, which were fairly interesting apart from the faint smell of throw up lingering in the room. My relaxation ended somewhat post-lecture--apparently, we were instructed that we needed to be changed around for the concert this evening at 11am--which meant walking all across Berlin in my dressy clothes. I guess I had trusted the list to only pack one pair of dressy clothes, but apparently I'll be in them a good portion of the time--we have 2 concerts tomorrow!

 All of us set off at a blistering pace--due to our professor's very quick stride. I thought I walked fast, but he walks fast...all the time. What makes it worse is that the pedestrian red lights spread us out--if you're not right with him, you can get a block or two back in a hurry.

Our first stop of the day was the Glemalderie (sp?)--a maze of Renaissance and Baroque paintings. The problem is that we have 6 essay type questions to write up on each of the important paintings we see each day--finding each one is trouble enough, but attempting to fill out all the info is practically impossible. At this museum I only covered 1 painting of the 7 we needed to do, which left me in a somewhat discouraged state.

Off to a blistering lunch break--1 hour is normally quite adequate. However, locating/traveling/ordering/eating dinner in a foreign city is quite a task. We barely made it back in time to start at the New National Gallerie (sp?), where we spent another chunk of time. I made the mistake here of not really trying to fill out the data about the 4 paintings--when we actually had much more time at this museum and I could have. Honestly, this art course is quite challenging for me--I can appreciate art, but analyzing art quickly is not at all up my alley. That, combined with my weak skills at memorization leading to a low score on a test most made 100+ on, and it's not looking like a very fun class.

After a quick walking tour which made us pass by a memorial to the Jews killed during WWII (above) and at the Brandenberg Gate where I got the group photo done (right), we were on our own. Andrew, Jonathan and I ended up waiting in line for quite some time to see the dome on the top of the German Parliment (two photos below). Security there was extremely strict--Andrew got stopped for a few minutes while he tried to converse with a German security guard who saw his multi-tool with a razor on the end in the scanner. It took a while for Andrew to know what he was talking about, and another bit for him to find it--entertaining, nonetheless!

After the dome we quickly stopped by a cart selling pastries with Nutella and bananas (in my case). Delectable. Then, off to dinner; we ended up eating at the same place we ate at for lunch--a hole-in-the-wall operated by one very nice gentleman. Very good, and best of all, decently cheap :). After running into some fellow Tech people, we walked a few blocks to the Berlin Philharmonic (photo below). The building was very stunning, and the music was amazing. However, after all the walking, lack of water fountains, and little rest, I struggled to not nod off--Andrew and I aided each other in this regard, and it worked quite successfully.

A train ride home with our professors, and we're back at the hotel after 11pm. It'll be another long journey tomorrow, but there's grace for another day. I just want to keep a handle on that Art class--it's intimidating right now, as I have one of the lowest grades in class. 

Over and out for now. Have a good evening!

Jonathan

Andrew