Friday, November 1, 2002

this was part of a memorial to a destoyed Jewish neighborhood

the wall is gone...some art outside the Checkpoint Charlie museum

coffee ad amid the jumble of the city

part of a dramatic work of art in the new Jewish museum

"I determine who is a Jew."
Hermann Goering

My friends didn't get their money changed yesterday. But they found out where to do it. That's our first stop. It's the main bank or something.

They wait in a line to go behind a certain numbered door at the bank. The security isn't as tight as I had thought it would be.

We go one U-bahn stop away and walk around Checkpoint Charlie Museum. We've all been inside before and we just take pictures outside.

Then it's on to the new and much-hyped Jewish Museum. It is amazing, inside and out. We view the artistic parts and the Holocaust history parts. We don't have time for the complete history exhibits. We have a snack in the museum and head out to a chocolate factory. I'm not that interested in chocolate. But I buy a souvenir box for some friends at the factory store.

We have to make a couple of U-bahn changes to get back and we do it pretty easily.

LG's cousin picks us up and we go for a coffee and cake with LG's old German teacher. Old as in from when she lived here. Old as in, she's in her seventies, I think. She's entertaining and insists on paying for everyone's coffee and cake. She brings the class roster from the class, pointing out when LG was absent. (Hmmm...looks like she went except when some friend was visiting. Guilty.)

We bid her goodbye after a good long visit.

It may seem that we never stop going to KaDeWe. We decide to go to the food hall and eat dinner at one of the counters. I push for the one serving Paul Bocuse recipes. It's a little pricey, but delicious. I treat everyone to a glass of champagne. (Paul Bocuse label...the waiter tries to convince us that Paul makes champagne but we think someone makes it and labels it for him). I treat everyone to an entreé and I have kidneys with a cognac and mustard sauce. Delicious. I'm not sure I've ever had kidneys before except maybe in a giblet gravy. Now I have.

LG wants to make a purchase of some canned paté de foie gras and we find that and she buys it. Then we make a phone call to LG's landlady from when she lived here. We go out in the rain and walk to find a bar where she will meet us for a drink. We have a good time talking with her. Getting out among real Berliners is fun. A dog somewhere in the place keeps yelping like someone is stepping on him. Usually dogs in bars her are quiet.

We walk back in the rain, get lost briefly but I fetch out a map, LG a light and we get found again. Back to the hotel and some sleep.

JUST TYPING
Walking in the dark.
And rain.
Glad for the anorak and its hood.
Glad for a map.
Glad for the toasts in my belly.
Far from home and yet at home.