I spent the weekend in Berlin. And honestly, it was nice. I didn’t have a schedule, I didn’t rush and I think that may have been a wise choice for my body right now. I think it hates being rushed, hence the whole being sick in Venice thing. When I’m rushed I’m just irritated. Then my body corresponds with that. I’m mostly making this up because I know whatever made me sick in Venice was probably food. No amount of stress can possibly do that to my body.
Friday in my humanities class we went to the Jewish Museum. It is such an amazing and moving space. Mike had gone there while I was in class one day while he was here. I think he got a better experience than I did. I was stuck in a group of 15 with a tour guide. The tour was fine, but there is just so much stuff there that he clearly couldn’t cover it all, but I was usually interested in what he wasn’t talking about. It was hard for me to get something out of it. Mike had recommended getting the 2 Euro iPod guide that takes you through the museum and you can pick and choose what you want to hear about. I personally wish that was how we did things. I am thinking about going back on my own time. It was another space I felt rushed through and like I missed a lot. So if time allows it, I will definitely be back there.I have to say one of the eeriest but really cool spaces in the museum was the void in the middle of the building. Right now
there is an artist installation in the void. I’m not sure if it’s permanent or not to be honest. But we were all looking at it and taking pictures and the guide near by came up to us and told us that the artist intended it to be walked one. Basically the void was filled with these flat metal faces that lined the floor. Naturally, we walked on it. That was probably one of the creepiest experiences I have had. Not only are you walking on faces, but all you can hear is the clanking of the metal moving as people walked on it. It was eerie, but definitely a moving experience.
Saturday, the sun eventually came out late morning. I decided it would be a good thing to take advantage of. I hadn’t been up in the dome of the Reichstag yet and I was waiting for a sunny day to do it. So I grabbed Chris and Joe upstairs and we went. Norman Foster has to be one of my favorite architects by now. The dome was really neat. Just really cleanly designed. And it was the perfect day to do it. You get a great view of the city and get to see cool architecture at the same time. I’m down with that.After that we walked the trek down to Victory Column. Now if the Nazi’s had never moved the Column our walk would have been a lot nicer. But I won’t complain about things I can’t do anything about! So after the long walk we figured we had to go up in it. Whoever designed that was not expecting it to be a tourist attraction that’s for sure. The only way up is by a narrow spiral staircase.
Spiral stairs are a lot harder to walk up than you would think. Especially when people are also trying to come down at the same time. Can’t say it was a great experience. But eventually we got to the top and got another nice view of the city. My claustrophobia kicked in eventually and I thought it best to head back down. Going down left we much less winded than going up that’s for sure. All in all, it was a nice day. It was good to do some touristy things for once and not be in studio while I’m in this great city.Today, I can’t say anything great happened. I tried to go tourist shopping, or any kind of shopping really. Clearly I wasn’t thinking because today is Sunday. Europe is basically shut down on Sundays. Shopping on Sunday was definitely an American invention. I ended up in studio for a long time, not really doing work, but catching up on the internet and talking to Michael via web cam. We have an exciting relationship right now.. I know.
This week will probably be pretty busy school wise. I have to give a presentation on Wednesday and in terms of studio I think I’ve been behind in that this entire semester. School and Europe just don’t mix well. We leave for Barcelona with the entire group on Thursday. I have to say I’m excited for that, although I dread the fact that they will run us dry through the city and expect us to see all the great things the city has to offer. I hope this city stays up later than Venice does though. It would have been nice to actually have had time to do some real shopping in Venice. It was hard when you got out of class at 5:00 and the stores all closed by 6:00. Fingers crossed this time around.
