Berlin Wall, East Side Gallery
The epicenter of World War II and the Cold War and at the same time soooo cool! That’s Berlin!
Before we travel anywhere, I always check nomadlist to get an idea of how digital nomads rate a place. Out of the 1’332 rated cities, Berlin takes 3rd place, only beaten by Canggu, Bali, and Warsaw, Poland. To compare, New York is no. 37 and London is no. 56 (incidentally, the last place, no. 1’332, belongs to N’Djamena in Chad). So it seems that Berlin has a lot to offer – and we were not disappointed.
We rented a nice little apartment in Prenzlauer Berg, which is in the former Eastern part of Berlin. There is something about the cobbled streets, the many trees and parks and little shops that give this area such a calm and relaxed atmosphere. It also seems to attract many young families – I have never seen so many babies, kids and pregnant women in any other place ever before. No wonder nomadlist describes this neighbourhood as the “baby farm”. Most of the buildings here are all well over 100 years old, including our building. We are on the top floor, which means we have to climb 6 floors on the ancient wooden stairs several times a day. I race myself up at least once a day and my PR so far is 46 seconds.
Arnom Park nearby 
Our street
We have been doing all the typical touristy stuff . We started in Potsdam, a romantic place outside Berlin and the German version of Versailles. We spent many hours walking through the enormous park, taking in all the palaces and stunning gardens:
Sanssouci palace – running up these stairs must be an excellent workout
A great place to run 
Lots of water, too
And then we continued in the heart of Berlin:
Reichstag
Brandenburg Gate 
TV Tower
Checkpoint Charlie 
My absolute favourite site is the “Memorial of the Berlin Wall” at Bernauer Strasse. It is an outdoor museum located at one of the streets where the Wall used to separate the city. It is 1.4 kilometers long with many informative panels and pictures along the way. Whole buildings had to be pulled down to make room for the Wall and people were simply displaced. It is also impressive to read about the desparate attempts to escape, ranging from jumping out of windows to digging tunnels under the Wall. I was so moved by this museum that I went twice.
Mural at Bernauer Strasse – a soldier leaping into freedom
Mural at Bernauer Strasse – fleeing while they can
Rusted steel poles where the Wall used to stand (until 1989)
View of a watchtower between inner and outer wall 
Where an underground tunnel used to be to flee to the West
The other museum I really enjoyed was the “Museum in der Kulturbrauerei”. It was about everyday life in East Germany, from early childhood education, through to marriage, career and making a home. I think I was most impressed by four essays written by 15-year olds in 1980 about how they imagine their lives to be in 2010. Their hopes and dreams were very much like any Western kid – a happy family living in peace, a house, a car and no financial worries.
One of the essays on display
A East German kitchen
Berlin is a fascinating city and there is so much more to write about! Second post coming up!
Did I mention that Berlin is a very green city? More of that in the next post!