die Besessenheit

I am slowly catching up on the backlog of blog posts that I need to write from the month that I spent travelling and being otherwise preoccupied. As anyone who as ever been in my bedroom in the US will know....

You need to squint to see what it is, but it's a 6' tall pixelated image of Spock's face made out of paint swatches I took from Lowe's. This hangs in my bedroom.

I am kinda of...

Lord. This needs a post of its own. It's a scientific poster I made describing how warp travel works. I have a 4' version in my room.

A huge Trekkie.

Today's word means “obsession” and I am obsessed with Star Trek.

I've known forever that there are Star Trek fans around the globe, and from the moment I got to Germany I started looking for a Star Trek Convention to attend. I went to one in Chicago in 2006. I skipped a week of school. I said my grandma died...again. Whatever. My professors didn't miss me that much! The convention in Chicago was a big step for me to take. Going to a convention is like taking the final step into Trek-dom, like a coming out ball for a Southern debutant. It's like the difference between having a cat and having cats, if you get my drift. There are loads of people who've seen the movies, but there is something about shelling out money, travelling, dressing up, and geeking out with other trekkies that really separates the fans from the Trekkies. That Convention was awesome, but like I said, I was scared and didn't dress up. I regret that in hindsight, because there were some awesome costumes!

He's wearing a late 23rd century uniform.

We start them young.

The woman in red is holding a tribble and wearing an early 23rd century engineering uniform and holds the rank of lieutenant. The other two are wearing 24th century uniforms. The chick is a science offices (also a lieutenant) and the dude is an engineering officer, but I can't see his rank.

Yes. That's right, this lady has blue face. She is an Andorian.

The mom is a Vulcan, but somehow her kids are not. Someone was lied to.

She is dressed up as Seven of Nine, a cyborg and the hottest plot device ever created..

This old bird is also dressed as a Vulcan, and is giving the Vulcan salute.

Another Seven of Nine, the lady was Australian if memory serves. and the dude is dressed like someone from the 23rd  century mirror universe...don't ask.

Anyways, getting back to my point. Once I got to Germany I started searching like a starved jackal for a Star Trek Convention. I only found one that was worth mentioning. It is called FedCon and takes place in Düsseldorf every year. I immediately looked at ticket prices but was disappointed to discover that they were between 109€ and 399€ for the weekend, plus the hotel. As a person living on 220€ per month, this was out of the question. Then I thought, “Oh hell, sometimes if you check the English version of a store's website, the prices are the same just in dollars.” So like with iTunes, in the States a song costs $0.99, but in Europe they cost 0.99€, and in England they cost 0.99£, which means you actually pay anywhere from $0.99 to $1.60 for the same song depending on where you live (which is utter bullshit, but if it works in my favor I won't complain too loudly). In this case, the price was converted so there was no “discount.” I did notice though that the English version of the website was incomplete and poorly written, and I thought, “well if I can't get in, at least I can help them be successful.” So I shot them an email offering to translate the website into English. Their response was “That sounds great, do you want like a free ticket for doing that?”

…

I nearly passed out.

Last month my dream came true, and I visited the convention, this time without lying to get away, and it was awesome! There were 5,000 other fans there to enjoy Trek-dom with. I stayed with the host family of a friend, all of whom are also trekkies!

I don't know if you know how a convention works, my guess is no since almost everyone I tell this to has asked me what the hell one does at a convention. Basically it's four solid days of Q&A rounds with actors and directors, presentations about SciFi and fantasy stuff (Mistakes in Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica and Mormon Theology, The End of the World in SciFi, etc), a costume contest, a merchandise room, several parties, photo and autograph session, and mingling with fans. You have to make a plan of attack before you go. Schedules are sent out in advance for this purpose. No bullshit.

During one of the question rounds with Dr. Frasier from Star Gate (btw, despite the name, it's not just a Star Trek convention, but a general SciFi and fantasy convention), I got up to ask a question. Now the Q&A rounds are conducted in English since most of the actors don't speak German. This means that everyone asking questions has a thick German accent. Everyone that is, except me. So I walk up to the mic and say, “I've always wondered if scifi actors...” and the actress cuts me off “Where are you from?! Not Germany.” So I tell her I'm from Kansas, and then everyone in the room laughs at the way I said Kansas. Then she said, “Boy, you're cute, how old are you? What”s the age of consent in Germany?” I then said that I'm old enough and then that I'm single. We flirted like this for about 3 minutes in front of 5000 other people. Then I asked my question, she answered, and then she asked my name. I told her, smiled, and walked away. I thought this would be the end of it. Then during another Q&A, the actor who played Doral on Battlestar Galactica pulled the same thing...sadly without flirting. After this, I was officially known as “Alex from Kansas" around the convention grounds. No less than 4 people came up to speak to me just because of this, and in the grocery store outside the convention, I overheard two different groups of people saying in German, “oh yeah that's Alex...she was right; he is cute.” So that's how I got thoroughly embarrassed at a Star Trek convention.

Ok now you can enjoy the photos.

Thunder-Thunder-Thunder Cats. HooooOOOOO!

Alien vs. Predator. They were married. and their son was a small predator.

Fry, Zap, Nibbler, and Amy

For all my friends playing Settlers of Catan, you can get a Star Trek Version now!

Fraking Toaster.

I think this might have been some sort of bondage relationship, since the slave Wraith had the collar on all weekend. There were more Wraiths, and it was hilarious to see them just chilling outside the hotel smoking a cigarette like it is the most normal thing in the world to have 20" dreadlocks, blue faces, and fangs.

One of my people on the subway toward the Convention site.

Who you gonna call?!

A Gorn talking to a Vulcan. The actual fight scene with Capt. Kirk and the Gorn is such a shitty scene. But so shitty that it's good.

More fans, along with the guy who held the talks on Temporal Logic and Mistakes in Star Trek. Both in German. Temporal Logic was a kick in the head at 9:30am. OH and the SyFy channel was there giving out goodies. One of the goodies was a condom...as if anyone is getting laid at a Star Trek Convention....

Any Mass Effect fans out there. to the left we have Shepard, and to the right we have a Quarian.

One of the Star Trek make-up artists did a tutorial that took this dude from normal to Klingon in a hour. The trick: paint the prosthetic piece blood red, and then apply the skin tone make-up.

R2-D2 was rolling around like a pimp. I'm not sure of a midget was inside controlling or if it was remote controlled.

This lady was kinda strange to talk to, but he costume was impeccable.

Sadly the only picture of me. The woman is a Trill. I am dressed as a 23rd century science officer (commander). My mom made the costume.

I am so addicted to conventions now. I am already planning my next costume. Unless my mom can either sew leather or tease leaves into a wig I may have to do this one on my own.

der Legostein

I was a weird kid when I was younger. I nourished myself almost solely with coca-cola and cake frosting, I refused to wear jeans as I was convinced they were made of metal, at the age of 6 I made napalm, and for a good two years of my childhood, my mother had resigned herself to the idea of having an autistic son. She (tentatively) was later proven wrong. Despite my...erm...idiosyncrasies? one part of my childhood was very normal. I loved to play with Legos. I still have a giant box of them in my room and my various Lego spaceships completely with Lego crew are still docked at my Lego space station.

About three weeks ago, I went to visit my very good friend David in Ulm. The goal was that I would meet his family, throw paper airplanes from the highest church tower in the world, and generally make Ulm a little insecure. We did all that of course, but then David dropped a little surprise in my lap. It turns out that Legoland Deutschland is only a hop, skip, and a jump from Ulm. My tail began to wag at the first mention of Legoland, and I got this dopey grin that I couldn't get ride of when I found out that he and I were going to visit it.

The church tower in Ulm. One of my paper airplanes reached the Danube...another one reached the police station.

See, I've always wanted to visit Legoland. The original one is in Denmark, but it's just slightly to the East of the Middle of Nowhere, Denmark, so a trip there was infeasible, and I had all but given up on the dream. I knew there was a Legoland in Germany, but I had forgotten about that one since I'd been living in northern Germany.

Legoland was awesome. I probably would have gotten a very little bit more out of it had I been an actual child, but that would only have been because I could have ridden more rides. I was beside myself with enjoyment as it was though. There are a couple of roller coasters, but since the median age of Legloand patrons is somewhere between 7 and 11, the coasters aren't too scary. The first thing we did was get on a roller coaster, which also doubled as a haunted house type thing. We all got high-fives from the roller coaster operater as we passed by. My guess is that I wasn't the first conspicuously old person to ride the coaster. Afterwards we hit up another ride themed around “Ninjago, Masters of Spinjitzu.” I have no idea what spinjitzu is, but somehow it lends itself to a bucking carousel ride that resembles a tie fighter. The seats also had wings that you could steer. This gave you just enough rope to hang yourself, so to speak. If you tilted the wings just right, you could make your experience significantly more terrifying than your neighbors'. There was another ride that was some sort of robot arm that tossed you around like a rag doll, I cut in front of easy four 2^nd graders to get the best spot.

The park also has a movie theater, which was kinda lame. Go figure. The show factory was pretty cool to see, though. Ohh wait I just remembered something about that damned factory! Ok, so the tours are in groups and are all started with a short film about Legos. We waited in line, during this wait a child and I played around by jumping back and fourth with one another. Then the doors opened, and our comeradery dissolved as I basically palmed him and two other kids into the pavement to be the first one inside. The door man was handing out souvenir Lego bricks and I stood there expectantly awaiting my Lego brick. The man looked at me and said in a dismissive tone that only the children get the bricks. I thought about arguing but the last thing I wanted was to get thrown out of Legoland over a goddamned Lego brick, so I sighed, conspicuously loud, and went inside. Bullshit. Today's blog title means “Lego brick” by the way.

By far the coolest thing about the park was the miniature world. The imagineers have recreated a handful of cities around the globe in Lego form and the amount of detail is awesome.

This is the Lego version of the Castle Neuschwanstein. To get an idea of the size,  my friend David is standing in the background taking a picture and he is about 6'2". The plants are all real. I managed to corner a gardener in the park and she told me that there are only 20 gardeners who take care of the entire park.

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This is a Lego version of Römerplatz in Frankfurt. It's not totally accurate, but Lego is an imperfect medium. Oh, and my (other) friend David, who is a Frankfurt tourguide, told me a story about a man in the Frankfurt city hall who would spy on important meetings, and on the real city hall in Frankfurt they have a small statue of him, which the Lego designers recreated!!!!

Berlin in Lego form. This is specifically the Berliner Dom and the TV Tower, which I captured in my own travels to Berlin.

The is the German Parliament. I haven't seen this technically, yet, but I will be seeing it next week. The short (Lego) woman in the snazzy jacket can be no one other than Angela Merkel (a fellow Ossi, I might add)

This little gem was found in the recreation of Schwabenland, I had to photograph it since both my aunt and David's mom are named Sonja.

I liked this mostly because I utterly hate pigeons. The woman's book says "Pigeon recipes"

Oh lord. Ok, so hooking is legal in Germany, and the city of Hamburg (recreated here) is famous for  the Reeperbahn, an area dedicated to quite literally hookers and blow. So the Lego imagineers recreated Hamburg, complete with hookers.

No, this isn't New Orleans. This is Venice. The ships in the model really do float and travel along the canals. David (the first one) noticed that the 'Italian' music playing in the background was utter gibberish.

I am no fan of Munich, but even I have to admit that this recreation of Allianz Arena is pretty baller. The whole thing is about 7 feet across, and glows at night. They had to design a special kind of brick that was translucent in oder to get the proper effect.

der Kleingarten

Today’s word means “small garden”, specifically the many small gardens that often make up community garden plots in Germany. But 24 year-old men aren’t really the typical demographic for gardeners, so in order to understand why I give a damn about small gardens you will need some biographical background on me.

When I graduated from Drake, withdrawal from school hit me hard. For the past 17 years, I had had some sort of class Monday through Friday and then all of a sudden nothing. Cold Turkey. It was a rough time, but I decided that maybe, as an adult, I should cultivate a hobby or two that didn’t involve school. Day drinking, I later decided, did not count as a hobby. I tooled around with computer programming, cycling, crochet, and lots of other stuff, but none of it was that fulfilling. I managed to hold out about 3 months before I caved in and enrolled myself in a class. I’ve always loved plants, and I decided that the Iowa Master Gardener Program with its 60-some hours of initial coursework would kill two birds with one stone. Namely, I could get back in a classroom and get rid of my shakes, and I could also cultivate an interesting new hobby.

In the master gardener classes, I looked…out of place. The average age of the other master gardeners is somewhere in the high 50’s, and the gender balance is heavily skewed in the feminine direction. Despite this initial awkwardness, I loved it there! Some very very interesting people are master gardeners. It ranged from jovial high school chemistry teachers to no-nonsense FBI field agents, and, though their personalities are varied, they are all welcoming and affable people. I got involved with the committee that built and maintains the gardens at the State Fairgrounds, and before our first meeting, I sort of expected it to basically be an old ladies’ tea circle. When I got to the restaurant, the other gardeners were already there, and the restaurant had run out of beer because of them. Needless to say they are a fun group of people. So, this is where my interest in gardening and consequently in the small gardens of Germany comes from.

OK, so down to business. These gardens I mentioned, they are everywhere. Since most German houses are built close to each other, there isn’t space for a yard. As near as I can tell, there isn’t a German word for “yard” meaning just a space of grass with a garden around a house. “Hof” is close but is more of a courtyard or farmyard. Consequently, many homeowners will lease a small garden space on the outskirts of the city and plant a garden there. They usually aren’t single gardens, but rather several hundred together. These garden clubs are beautiful, and the area around my dorm and work is filled with them.

Most people build a small house on the garden property to hold tools and whatnot, but some of the houses are more luxurious. In this case they function more like a small cabin or a ‘dacha’ (a Russian word that I learned recently and for some reason find really cool). The garden areas are very serene places and the people clearly put a lot of work into the gardens. Some people use them for vegetable growing, but mostly they are just for visual enjoyment.

I don’t know how popular this type of garden is in the rest of Europe, but the conditions that led to them in Germany aren’t unique to Germany, so my guess is that other places would have them too. If you know for sure about this, let me know. I’m curious.

A path through the garden near my job.

This gardener has a garden filled with several thousand tulips.

German "Ordnung" made real.

This is the path I walk to work everyday. It's gotten so much prettier since then.

Robben knüppeln

In Europe there is an EU-wide university exchange program called ERASMUS, which I will probably end up dedicating an entire blog post to later on. As an American I can't be part of Erasmus, but I've ended up falling in with the Erasmus students here. One of the nicest things about being a foreign student in Germany is that even the tiniest universities have groups of native students that organize programs, excursions, and parties for the Erasmus students. My first week here in Rostock, I stumbled onto the weekly Stammtisch from the LEI, the local Erasmus organization. A Stammtisch is technically a table in a bar that is reserved for the regular guests, called the Stammgäste, but in this sense it is just a weekly meeting point. At the Stammtisch I learned more about the programs that are put on for the Erasmus students, including one that went on about a week ago.

In Warnemünde there is a seal research station, and we just had an excursion to go see it. Today's word means “seal clubbing.” Not this kind of clubbing:

But rather, this kind:

Rest assured we performed neither the kind of clubbing with the baby seals. But I digress, calling this place a „research station” is sort of like saying that diet caffeine-free coke is coke. Like, it's technically correct, but it gives a false impression. The station is at the end of a breakwater in the yacht harbor, and I'm walking down the ever-narrowing peninsula expecting some sort of giant laboratory complex for seals, and yet I am not seeing anything of the kind. And instead of assuming that the “research center” isn't a giant laboratory, I naturally assume that there must be some sort of secret underwater tunnel that takes us to the lab or a ferry to get a hidden offshore research platform, and I have got myself all hyped up for some sort of Fortress of Solitude style lab. Then I notice that our group has stopped and is waiting at the gangplank of some normal looking ship. Crestfallen does not begin to describe my emotional state. Since I work in a lab, I sort of naïvely assume that all science looks like this, which is not the case.

The "research station" is basically a ship with a netted-in area around it where the 10 seals can play...bummer. But still, baby seals are on the agenda and that can easily make up for the “research station” being a tugboat. We meet our tour guide, and she looks just like an older version of a friend of mine from Tübingen. 

Our Führerin...can I say that?

The tour is in English, which I assume was really hard for some of the other students to understand. The tour guide told us lots of cool facts about seals, including a little gem that I thought was interesting. Apparently when the seals hold their breath, they don't fill their lungs with air?! Right, I was confused as hell. As I understand it, the little devils are some how able to dissolve more oxygen in their blood, which is good because if they held their breath like we do, they would get the bends as they surface. Also, seals have fingernails, which is just wild. One of the seals in the “research station” is nearly blind, but somehow this isn't a problem (crazy!) because his whiskers are a good enough replacement for eyes.

Basically I learned that seals are fucking crazy. The don't hold their breath with the lungs, blindness is “no problem”, they can identify individual humans, and they can sleep underwater. They are almost as freaky as octopi/octopodes/octopuses.

Because this story can't end normally, I also have to relate the story of my return trip from the “research station.” All along the peninsula there are enormous boulders and signs telling little kids (and presumably adults too) NOT to climb on the stones since they can be slippery. Since it hadn't rained, I silently thanked the signs for their concern about my well being and then began to jump from stone to stone, I made it probably 100 yards and then started to get cocky. Instead of jumping to a stone, calculating my next jump and then going further, I decided to throw caution to the wind and just run along the stones. That worked for about 10 more yards until I rolled my ankle.

(Mom, put down the phone, I'm fine! No need to call the FBI, this time) My ankle looked hilarious for about 2 days, not unlike the leg of a baby elephant. But since then it's gotten better, still a little swollen on the back outside side, but I'm babying it and whatnot.

So that's the latest and the greatest, readers. Until next time!

Straßenkunst

Ok Leute, I alluded to making this post earlier, and now I’m finally gonna do it. I’m finally gonna release my cache of street art photos that I’ve been hoarding like an Appalachian farmer hoards his beautiful harem of inbred daughters.

I had a year of art history in high school. I remember it being one of my more challenging classes, since in reality it had very little to do with art. The teacher herself consistently made fun of the course’s content, which was mostly human geography of Europe and naked paintings of virgins, by calling the class “AP Maps and Boobies.” Regardless, I worked like a dog for that class, and as a result it made me sort of hate high art. I mean, I could never achieve something as technically skillful as painting the Mona Lisa, but that doesn’t mean I think it looks good. I’ve always been drawn to sort of lowbrow entertainment: Roller derbies, lewd stand-up comedy, the musical stylings of GirlTalk, and pulp science fiction. So, when I came to Europe and saw the amount of graffiti and sticker campaigns here, I was captivated and starting photographing it.

Graffiti along with these sticker campaigns are to me a mixture of political speech, egoism, vulgarity, art, and advertising. Graffiti can be simple or complex, boring or thought provoking, direct or metaphorical, etc. Anyways, enough of me rambling. I promised pictures and I’m going to deliver.

Berlin. Above "Take what you need!" The options are "Love, Hope,  Faith, Trust, Endurance, Courage, Understanding, Peace, Passion, Beauty, Freedom"

Frankfurt. This is the main character from a fairy tale, Struwwelpeter. Basically the kid misbehaves and is punished (hilariously) by the universe.

Hamburg. This one is part of a political message. I like that it doesn't explain itself well.  I mean the creator of this could have spend pages explaining precisely what she means, but instead I get to consider and find my own meaning.

Karlsruhe. Very often the graffiti is cynical and critical, but  I guess the point of art is to change society not reinforce it.

Krakow. Like I've said, Europeans love their bikes, and there are a ton that are just abandoned all over the place. This one got a knitted cover added to it.

Krakow. Given that Poland is so Catholic, I thought this was an interesting bit of art. My best guess is that the penis was added later...

Krakow. In addition to being cynical, the graffiti is more often than not political. My guess is the Cameron and "shock and awe" weren't randomly added.

Mainz. "Animals free you must" I'm not entirely sure what the Anti-Fa organisations even stand for. Apparently everything.

Neubrandenburg. "Skinheads against Nazis" To answer your question/confusion, there is/can be a difference. But really keeping track of the different subcultures from the 70's is a full time job. Skinheads, Mods, Punks, Antifascists, blah blah blah. It's a very interesting topic, but it's sort of like reading up on conspiracy theories: Interesting but really pointless.

Neubrandenburg...duh. Like I said, a lot of the stickers are simple advertisements. Certainly some group made them and they have a deeper meaning or motivation, but in end effect they are little more than advertisements.

Neubrandenburg. Again with the Antifascists. I really don't understand them, so if someone wants to explain what they are for/ against, other than the obvious, I'd be very appreciative. 

Neubrandenburg. Word.

Neubrandenburg. Haha. What can I say, I like the lowbrow stuff too. It used to say "exit"

Rostock. "It's our right to block Nazi marches.  Don't give an inch to the fascists. Neither in Dresden nor anywhere else." The translation was rough at best, it's more eloquent in German, trust me. Even though East Germany is supposedly more opposed to foreigners, I think they Germans make a bigger deal out of this problem than it really is. At the same time, I don't know how to separate German directness and racism. I mean the word "Neger" is still sort of accepted, and rap music is sold as "black music", which, by and large, it is, but still I find that racist and Germans don't bat an eye.

Rostock. "Choose a path" Another open ended one.

Rostock. Nothing very special about this one, this is just the name of the train station.

Rostock. "War is god's way of teaching Americans geography." I thought this was utter bullshit! Since most Americans still can't find Iraq on a map! This one was written in the picture above.

Rostock. "Just go fuck yourselves. For respect -- Against hatred and homophobia" This message was, of course, brought to you by the Green Party...duh

Rostock. A surprising amount of the graffiti is in English.

Berlin. "I'm from pussy, you Kreuzberg." Ok this one takes some explaining.  First of all, normally it would read with the words pussy and Kreuzberg switched around. Second, Kreuzberg is a part of Berlin. A really shitty part of Berlin. Like don't walk around in Kreuzberg alone or at all if you are a girl. Also, good luck finding an intact piece of glass there. So, the sticker is a play on how offensive/uneducated Kreuzberg is (because they said pussy), and also a joke about how hard Kreuzberg is.

Tübingen? This is from a while ago. Tübingen also had a graffit war between two teams to see who could tag the most with the most slogans. The teams were "Falafal" and "Currywurst". I think Falafal won, but they slogans would pop up out of nowhere.

Tübingen? Not much explaining to do here.

Bratislava. I laughed at this one for literally 5 minutes. In hindsight, it wasn't that funny, but I still like it.

Friederisiko!

I remember hearing someone say that god never closes a door without opening a window. I don't really believe in god, but if this quote is the case, 1) god must have an astronomical energy bill, and 2) god was on my side last week. Last week my plans to head to Erfurt for Easter totally blew up in my face. It was clearly through no fault of my own, but who's interested in placing blame? As fate (or a perpetually window-opening god) would have it, the day those plans fell through, my friend Caro invited me to spend the weekend with her and her boyfriend in Potsdam. Needless to say, I readily accepted.

Before heading to Potsdam, I knew precisely two things about the city. First, through a fairly simple mnemonic device I remembered that the last major post-WWII conference regarding the fate of Germany took place there. And second, from my several trips to Berlin, I remembered that a metropass including Berlin and Potsdam costs a full €2.30 more than a regular Berlin metropass. The €2.30 alone has been enough to prevent me from seeing Potsdam despite having been in Berlin at least 5 times.

I caught a train on Thursday afternoon and headed toward Potsdam to see Caro and her beau, his name is Joe (haha that rhymes!). The train station I got into was called Park Sanssouci, a name which I consistently mispronounced as Park Sarkozy, and it's right next to the Palace grounds in Potsdam. The Palace is great, but also overrun with tourists. The Palace, which doubles as a university lecture hall and of course student bar, is currently being renovated and spruced up because the man who built the castle, Friederich the Great, is about to celebrate the big 3-0-0. And Potsdam is going ape shit about this! The festival is called Friederisiko, a combination of his name and the German word for “Risk”. They're even building a new castle. Apparently the old one wasn't good enough. There is an art exhibition, and this whole shebang is slated to last 6 months.

My first night in Potsdam we went to see a Nirvana tribute show in Lindenpark, which is right next to where Inglorious Basterds was filmed, btw. The music was great and the atmosphere was really chill. I have to admit though, that I expected more of a Nirvana “show”. Those of you who know me know that I can't stand Courtney Love, and I fully stand behind the theory that that shell of a human killed Kurt Cobain. I had my fingers crossed that they would have paid some tired old hooker to impersonate Courtney Love and walk around the concert shouting obscenities at the crowd, spilling drinks, and that at the end she would reenact how she killed Kurt. But alas. After this we stumbled...erm walked classily to a campus bar in Potsdam, where we met two dudes from Cameroon. In typical German fashion a debate followed, where the Cameroonians, who by the way both live in Germany now, described the immigration problem in Germany. Let me repeat this: Two people from Cameroon, who immigrated to Germany, believe that immigrants are a threat to Germany....

Whatever.

The next day we set out to see the Teufelsberg (Devil's Mountain, in German). I didn't quite understand why were were doing this at first, and I should have asked for clarification earlier when I heard phrases like “...but the watchman is really lax” and “just an abandoned military installation”. Despite how it sounds, the place was baller! It's an old American radar station and listening post on the outskirts of Berlin. You have to climb through a chain link fence ringed with razor wire to get there. Though somehow there are mothers with children in strollers all over the place. Germans are a tough folk.

You Go Girl, indeed

This was our posse. The floor would occasionally just open up into 10 foot deep pits. This area was relatively safe.

The smallest of the four domes. You can climb inside and enjoy a great view of Berlin.

I'm not gonna share too many pictures because I'm saving up for a post later about graffiti and street art in Germany. After Teufelsberg we hit the town, and be damned if we didn't meet those two Cameroonians again!

Saturday we nursed our hangovers and checked out Potsdam. We found the villas where Stalin and Truman lived during that post-WWII conference, and we also found the Brandenburger Tor...the other one.

The Potsdam Brandenburger Tor, which is the one actually in Brandenburg.

The Berlin Brandenburger Tor, which is by and far more famous.

On Sunday, of course, we painted Easter eggs, like normal college students do on weekends, and then I hopped on a train back to Rostock, because that evening there was an exchange student party, but that is a story for another post...