Volume 2, Day 5
I had originally only booked four nights to begin with, and having gotten my fill of party central Friederichshain, I was interested in relocating to a different part of Berlin. For my last day in the IndustriePalast, I decided to spring for the breakfast buffet. It was worth it. I certainly ate a ton: muesli, yogurt, fruit, bread, butter, cold cuts, tea, coffee, juice, I ate it all. I packed up my stuff and checked out right at the 10 am cut off. The strangest thing, however, is that I only paid for my breakfast at checkout. In other words, I realized there wasn’t a system to keep people from just going into the breakfast hall and helping themselves without paying.
I needed to take the S-bahn to my new location and dragged my luggage over to the train station. I discovered a bit of a problem when I attempted to buy a ticket from one of the only two machines on the platform. The station is under a bit of renovations and there is no manned counter anywhere. The vending machines only accepted bank cards. Several people were trying to shove cash into the machines which had cash slots, but were either broken or programmed not to accept cash (theft risk?). After watching several trains come and leave as I was queuing for and unsuccessfully buy my 2.8 euro ticket, I decided to just hop on a train and see what happens. Nothing happened. At Hackersher Markt, I simply walked straight out of the station. Are Germans just extremely honest or is it really that much trouble to install some turnstiles?
I walked about ten minutes up the road, passing an old synagogue (appropriately called Neues) to my new hostel. Though I was a couple hours before check-in, the guy at the front desk said the room would be ready in about 30 minutes if I wanted to wait. I waited. This new hostel is part of a chain, and let’s say I now know to avoid it. There is no shared kitchen and we are not allowed to eat or drink on the premises because that would cut into the bottom line of their restaurant, cafe, or bar, which are more expensive than literally anything just outside the hostel. The 6-bed dorm room is a pretty tight fit and stuffy because the windows are locked.
I understand air conditioning isn’t very common in Europe, but I thought buildings would at least be designed so that you could open some windows and let the air through. It has been a perpetual struggle not to die of heat exhaustion even though it gets down to 60 at night. I swear Thailand or the Philippines are more comfortable because even the cheap room gets an electric fan.
Despite being a “travel” day, I still had the full afternoon to explore some more of Berlin, and I took a walk through Monbijou Park, enjoying views of Museum Island and the Berliner Dom. I was interested in visiting the DDR Museum that is also right in the area, but given the line of people out the door, I decided I might as well keep walking for a bit. So, I kept heading south to the Nikolaikirche. Obviously, I didn’t pay to go in, but the small cluster of alleys around Berlin’s oldest surviving building is pretty interesting. Afterwards, I swung back north, passing the Rathaus from a different angle. I went to see what exactly the Berlin Dungeon was and quickly decided it wasn’t worth paying for. I also passed the aquarium somewhere along the ramble.
I headed back to the DDR Museum, which no longer had a line to buy tickets, but was still crowded AF. Its a good museum, and I spent close to two hours looking at the exhibits. A lot of stuff was hands on, and they recreated an entire “modern” apartment.
After the museum, I headed back to the hostel to chill out for a bit, and met two of my roommates briefly. I had an appointment to meet that contact from a mutual friend at 5. We ended up grabbing a beer from a Spati and sitting on the waterside across from museums. We talked a while, C is an interesting fellow, but he had to run for a dinner appointment at 7.
I went back to the hostel to change into workout gear and returned to the park where there was a collection of pull-up bars and monkey bars and a lot of shirtless men exercising. I got in a good workout, and in an ideal world would have had a bit of a picnic afterwards. I still had a half packet of oil and vinegar salad dressing and a half box of cherry tomatoes, so I just needed a bag of salad and a bottle of water. Unfortunately, Monday was still part of the holiday, which meant that all the supermarkets were still closed. I’m completely flabbergasted by this. It’s one thing to close on Sundays, but to close for two consecutive days is insane. All the fresh food will be rotten by Tuesday morning. I tried quite a few supermarkets before giving up on the quest to eat healthy, and resigned myself to drinking tap water, which for some reason only came out hot.
My dorm had three more people in it when I returned. One guy was on his way out the door, but was chatting to the newly checked in college girls. I chatted with one or the other of them while waiting to use the shower. I was in a debate as to whether I was hungry enough to want to go out and buy food from a restaurant or whether I’d just skip dinner. About the time the two girls went out to meet their friends to get dinner, I decided that I should find something to eat.
After being propositioned, I found a currywurst stand and had an order of currywurst with fries. The fries were so crunchy and good. It was weird that they charge 20 cents per condiment, but it was cheap overall. I felt a lot better with food in my stomach (I must have been hungry after all), and decided to grab a bottle and enjoy the cool night air in the park for a bit. I sat over by the water where people were dancing to swing music. I didn’t dance, didn’t want to. I just enjoyed the atmosphere while reviewing a bit of German on my phone app.
Eventually, I headed back to the dorm for a sweaty sleep.
| Breakfast Buffet | 6 EUR |
| Dorm (4 nights) | 578 RMB |
| DDR Museum | 9.8 EUR |
| Beers | 2.3 EUR |
| Currywurst | 4.4 EUR |
| Total: | 753.5 RMB (USD 108.9) |
Running Total: 4233.5 RMB (USD 611.85)
Daily Average: 846.7 RMB (USD 122.37)