Oct. 11, 2010

Wow! From the little that I got to see of Berlin, I loved it. Berlin, Germany’s capitol, is 8 times the size of Paris. In other words it is a huge city! Viewing the wall for the first time, I wondered more than ever what the real purpose of it was. This wall was up for nearly 30 years, but why? It amazed me as to how Germany could have kept this up for so long. Among the many things that struck my attention, as we walked around and observed part of the wall that was left standing, was the area in between the West and East walls called “No Man’s Land.” In this strip of land there once stood a church. It was right in between both sides, but from pictures I could see that they tore it down. I never found out why unfortunately. So little time and so much to see. To the left is a picture of me standing in part of the wall monument. Soon all of the wall will erode away and all that will be left are memories. 

We went to the Pergamon to see some old Greek, Roman and Babylonian ruins... It seemed so out of place in Germany. Mystery that... Here we have Berlin, a huge city filled with Germany culture, (because it is Germany) and out of nowhere there is this gigantic museum filled Greek, Roman, Islamic and Babylonian artifacts. Random right? That is what I thought. It just so happens that in the late 1800s and early 1900s the Turks in Germany asked the German government if they could build their own train station. Permission was granted and the Turks new land possession grew and grew. Nazi Germany was using this railway to smuggle in ancient artifacts from all over the world. The good thing is that today we can enjoy an amazing and random museum. Above is a picture of Athena winning a battle against the giants. She is grabbing the tuft of a giants hair to the left (that was said to be the only way that giant could be weakened)