Visiting Berlin for the first time in my life (as a German)

Volunteering is not only about the work. Nearly as important as working is traveling all around the country you´re staying in and whole Europe. So, this blog entry won´t be about what I usually do on Tuesdays but about my weekend in Berlin.

Spending a weekend in Berlin at first sounds like a pretty basic thing. Especially if you are German. But for me, it was different: Although I was born in Germany, I have to admit that so far I barely travelled around in my country. -And because I am from the very countryside, particularly big cities are fascinating me.

So when me and my flatmate got invited to join a German- Czech Youth meeting in Berlin, I immediatly decided to participate. At first I actually didn´t care about the topic. I also disregarded the fact that it was not just a cheap traveling opportunity and a reason to visit the capital of my home country earlier than expected, but actually project days about german - czech history especially considering the Nationalsocialism and the fall of the Berlin wall ( it was it´s 30th anniversary) . I - and I should rather say we because my flatmate was also not aware of this- basically just realized all of this in it´s full sense Thursday evening, or in other words the day before we were leaving. But we accepted the fact that we won´t have lots of time to visit the city pretty fast because the program of this Tandem project actually really caught our interest. So on this evening we went to bed full of anticipation. At this point, we were still optimistic that there will be some time between the workshops to actually see something from Berlin. And we thought we would still have the whole Friday evening to celebrate my first visit in the capital appropiately.We we´re completely wrong with that...

When our journey to Berlin started on Friday morrning, I was full of excitement and the childish joy I always feel when I´m about to enter a big city. But my euphoria partly disappeared a few minutes before our train was arriving in Prague: Our train had delay and  we had to realize that we won´t get the next train. I was still fine when we got the information that the next train to Berlin will departure two hours later. But when I had to make the hurtful recognition that this train additionally has 60 minutes of delay, me and my roommate were starting to question the fortune of our trip. And it got even worse...

After about one hour in the train, we stopped unusally long at a small train station in the middle of the nowhere of Czech Republic. Due to electrical issues, the last two wagons needed couldn´t continue the journey and from minute to another me and my flatmate found eachother in an overcrowded wagon in company with yellow flickering lightbulbs and ironically complaining German passengers. The whole situation got even more awkward when the delay enlarged again by another 30minutes.

So in the end, me and my flatmate finally arrvied at Berlin main station four hours later than planned. No sightseeing. No party. No childish excitement. We just fell into our beds.

Satuarday then started with the program and I can say that I definitely didn´t get disappointed. I learned a lot about the last days of the second world war and the differences between the Czech and German population regarding the last transports and death marches of concentration camp prisoners right before the end otf the war. I was also moved by the captivating story of an impressive men who emigrated as a refugee from Afghanistan to Germany. If I also consider the interseting people I met and the good food I ate, I can sum up this Tandem Youth meeting as a full success.

But obviously there was no time for visiting the city during the day. So my last possibility to actually see some of all the famous places otf the german capital and experience it´s well - known special flair was satuarday night. After in a strange moment of sentimentality I gave away my last money to a guy who - probably hasn´t - lost his wallet and was - probably not- unable to get home, I was happy to meet my flatmate and some other nice people from the project at the Alexanderplatz. But one night is just too short to get any impression of this huge city. The fact that we couldn´t even reach the Brandenburger Tor because of some special event about the 30th anniversary of the fall of the wall sums up this night pretty well. Although it now may not sounds like it, we actually had a lot of fun in this night (and at the ehole weekend). We somehow ended up in the middle of a weird flashmob, met some very funny and very drunk british guys and me and my faltmate were not only one time nearly dying of laughing.

Even though we wen´t to bed pretty early, Sunday morning in the train back to Prague both of us we´re just praying t not experience the mess of our outward journey again. According to that our mood just dropped when the emotionless voice of the train speaker announced 10 minutes of delay...

But this time, the luck was on our side and we catched the train to Ostrava in the last minute. So I can say that although me and my traveling companion got seperated in the train (the wagon in which we had seat reservations simply wasn´t existing), I had weird leg contacts during the whole time because of a lack of space with the man towards me and my inner peace got deeply disturbed by loud and disgusting sounds of eating, our journey back to Ostrava was fine.

All in all I can say that I definetly not regret traveling nearly two full days two spend one day in Berlin without actually visiting Berlin. The workshops really captivated me and the few parts I saw of Berlin made me looking forward even more to visit this impressive city again in the next year...