It’s 11 pm and I’m tuckered out. Completely.
My day began dubiously. I awoke at 7 am ready for my run. I dressed, ate and readied myself. I grabbed the key from the kitchen table and…couldn’t figure out how to lock the door behind me. Being American, I assumed you simply put the key in the door, turned the latch and then went about my way.
Not exactly so.
Thirty minutes later, I figured out how to lock the door, freeing me from the bonds of the house. (This required a serious feat of reverse-engineering that I won’t share with you because I had to figure it out and if you come to England you will have to figure it out too.) I headed out with a vague notion of where I might go. Katz showed me the head of Endcliff Park, which sits at the bottom of her hill, but I didn’t know much beyond that.
As it turned out, there was some kind of race – although it was quite small – in the park so I happily ran along side several of the (sprinting) participants, who inadvertently showed me the way through Endcliff Park and into Bingham Park, the next in a series of parks that are connected together.
That’s good news for me as I have a long 15-mile run on Sunday. But the day was just beginning.
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I arrived in Gatwick airport with little trouble.
The S9 from Bornholmer Strasse, now a direct line to Shonefeld airfield, makes getting to the cheaper flights in Berlin so much simpler. There’s no more transferring at Friedrichstrasse, Germany’s largest central train hub (and a confusing nightmare of epic proportions unless you happen to know what you’re doing, which I do not).
The EasyJet airline staff was great, making the flight and ensuing travel easy as well. (Although note to self: I can buy my Gatwick Express tickets on the plane – or on the train – and Oyster travel cards are $1 cheaper on the plane. Also: I keep forgetting that people speak English. I’ve already ordered in German once – zoinks — and pointed at a menu without speaking because I forgot.)
My hotel, the EasyHotel down the street from the Victoria Street Underground, is really just a hostel. There’s a double bed, which takes up the entire room and a small bathroom that has a toilet and shower (which is separated by a rounded curtain that pulls out). It’s quite efficient, but definitely light on amenities. Unless a bed, toilet and shower are amenities to you.
In which case, it’s full of them.
I dropped off my bags around 930 pm (21:30 to the damn Europeans) and headed to Trafalgar Square. I walked past Buckingham Palace to the National Gallery (in Trafalgar Square) and thento Leicester Square for a late night croissant and cappuccino. (Note: the English drink tea for one very good reason. They cannot make cappuccino. I have forgotten this.)
I returned at 0130 and duly crashed. As there is nothing else that can be done in the hotel.
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If you’ve ever traveled outside the country – whatever country you would consider be outside of in relation to the one that you are inside of most often – you know there the horrors of Travel Day.
Whenever you book a trip, you essentially give up an entire day when you’re moving from one location to the next. It’s like going out in Los Angeles. My friend Tim, who until recently was the film editor at the Los Angeles Times, used to say: no matter what you do in L.A., it takes an hour to get there and you start by throwing $50 out the window.
Exactly.
But I’ve grown accustomed to the trials and tribulations of traveling in a place that’s Outside so I plan accordingly. Today, I’m going from one Outside (Berlin) to another Outside (London). That means extra care. I brought an extra $50 of local money (I spent mine today after I forget to check my bags), I showed up early (in case I get lost or forget to check my bags, forcing me to queue a few times) and I stayed calm as things began to unravel ever so slightly around me.
I stayed Zen, that is, until the Germans asked me to step out of line and invited me to step into the back room.
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I’m obsessive when it comes to tracking things. As I’ve traveled Europe the last few years, I’ve kept a list of the places I’ve visited and enjoyed. (Mostly cafes as that’s what I like. Mostly.)
Feel free to browse around. Many of the PEOPLE on the map are friends. Some are interesting places of work. Others are just towns. The coffee cups and beds are cafes and hotels.
Also: if you have any good cafe recommendations (or interesting places), I’m also open.
View EuroTrip in a larger map
Time flies.
The first part of my Euro-adventure is nearly over. Tomorrow at 630 pm Central European Time (that’s +6 to those on the East Coast) I’ll board a plane to London. I’m always amazed at how quickly my time in Berlin flies. And how easily I find settling into a routine with John and Aimee.
To be sure, I miss my desk and my home life. I miss the freedom to roam as I need to and the autonomy of my own space.
But it’s an even trade-off to be in Europe.
England, though, will be something else. I’ll be bouncing around the country. My weekends will involve trips to visit friends (in Sheffield, in Brighton and maybe a third location to visit another Loveland-ite), and my weeks will involve city runs, cafes (Bar Italia in Soho) and visiting with playwrights at The Soho Theater.
It’s a radically different lifestyle than here. One I will need to adjust to quickly if I’m to keep my running life together.
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Sunday morning came — complete with 100 degree summer weather — and Mike, Yonette and Kim were preparing to leave. Kim and I snuck off for an early breakfast and coffee, though, before the rest of the crew emerged from yesterday’s slumber.
We had a great time, a nice change from hiking all over the city yesterday. And the streets were mighty quiet. It felt like we had the city to ourselves for just a bit.
We spent a few hours chit-chatting over cappuccino before the trio checked out of their apartment.
The thing about East Berlin is this: it’s the cheapest place to live in the cheaper major capital European city because, well, they are still re-building the infrastructure of the town. This is the view in the courtyard where Mike, Yonette and Kim stayed. Despite the construction, the interior was pretty nice. (Although their shower was inconveniently placed off the kitchen.)
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Back in high school, my friend Kim and I hung out. A lot. But life happens and we end up taking different routes and sometimes we find ourselves losing touch with people.
It’s that very old tale for the two of us. Fortunately, we live in the digital networked age and we found each other again. So when I arrived in Berlin, Kim – who now lives in Southern Germany with her husband and six children – decided to come see me.
She gathered her friends Yonette and Mike, rented a car and secured an apartment room and made the 7 hour drive to Berlin.
Saturday, we hung out for the first time in 18 years. It looked a bit like this.
***
We got an early start to the day. Things were looking good so we decided instead of catching the S-Bahn, we’d walk even though we knew it was quite a long way. I may have under-estimated exactly how long it was. In my defense, the ladies looked gorgeous so maybe I wasn’t concentrating enough on the map.
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**Update**
John told me tonight the “bar” we were at was a building site that’s only open during the World Cup. Which is the kind of thing that happens all around Berlin. Empty spaces become garden bars. For, you know, however long.
**
I’m quite the typical America soccer fan. I played growing up (although I played keeper so my actual soccer skills are limited to catch, blocking, punting and drop kicking). I watched the English Premiere League on Sundays on PBS (which maybe makes me more atypical). I’ve followed, from a distance, Major League Soccer. I always watch the U.S. Men’s National Team play. And I know the North Carolina women’s soccer team produced a slew of national team players over the years and several NCAA championships.
Oh, and I was really good at FIFA World Cup for the Nintendo from 1996-1998 when Andy and I would play to see who had to drive to What-a-Burger to pick up breakfast.
Which is to say I know enough about the game to enjoy it, see what’s happening on the field, but not understand any of the tactical and psychological games.
Yet I’ve found myself in a strange place: in Berlin during the World Cup as the Germans marched towards what looked like an inevitable championship.
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I’ve land-locked myself in Berlin.
Since I never quite refresh my four years of high school German, I can understand almost nothing that’s being said around me. Consequently, I stick pretty close to home most days because I don’t want to be “that guy,” wandering around saying: Ich spreche kleine Deutsch. Auf English, bitte.
I speak very little German. In English please. Of course, most people speak English here. Still, I feel ridiculous coming to another country and expecting them to speak my language.
Running, though, has forced me to get out and explore the city. I left America bound and determined to continue my marathon training, but I was dubious about the chances of me finding mapped out places to run my set distances. The Garmin GPS watch solved that problem. Now I can just run without worrying about following a course.
And that, as was once written, has made all the difference.
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I have a theory about life: You’re friends with the people you’re friends with because you all hang out in the same place.
I have no scientific proof this is true, but I live in America where scientific proof matters less than faith. So I’m going to let this work for me in this case.
I say this because whenever I travel it’s inevitable that I will meet people with whom I have some connection, some friend in common, some location of interest. Something that goes beyond mere coincidence. And this happens almost every time I go somewhere.
Take yesterday’s brunch.
John and Aimee have a great social circle of English-speaking writers and travelers. One of them, Suzie, offered to make us brunch at her lovely flat in the (near) top floor of a building nestled together with others the result which then created a cute urban backyard as seen from her balcony.
But this isn’t a story about urban backyards or amazingly tasty brunches (which is odd considering the title of this piece. Sorry McGuffin.)
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