Will, Ben and Nevil

Nikolas kindly put us up for our remaining three days in Berlin. He lives in Wedding (a Berlin district, not perpetual nuptials) in an amazing top floor flat that he’s been evolving for almost ten years! Wooden floors, wood burning heaters in every room, and the best selection of spices I’ve seen outside of mum’s nuclear fallout preparation pantry. We quickly discovered where the spices came from as the shop down stairs stocked them in bulk alongside hair extensions and coconut milk. I (will) attempted to create a classic english dish and succeeded in making a suitably bland pumpkin curry.

We could see much more of Berlin when it was actually daylight and made the first proper use of the bicycles that we’ve been carrying around with us. Ben learnt all recorded German and central European history in a large museum whilst I explored Berlin’s corners and entirely rebuilt neighbourhood of consulates. Saudi Arabia wins my vote for the architecture prize, although that’s not counting the Norman Foster dome on the Reichstag which was well worth the queue in the cold for. You can look down through the glass and see the politians making decisions, signifying the transparency of democracy and the openess of the German paliament. Very honourable. The free heavyweight pamphlet/small paperback which describes everything from the material of the seat covers in the debating hall to the percentage of people in parliament with Kenyan grandmothers almost makes you realise why politians don’t tell us everything. ITS BORING.

The extensive queue to the dome introduced us to another Berliner, this time someone under 25 actually living in the West of the city. She took us to a brilliant example of the annoying German habit of taking an idea from somewhere else and making it much, much better. Italian food that you pointed at the ingredients for and watched being cooked. Ben especially liked the swipe card we were each given to bill us for what we were eating, and the flashing, vibrating disc that when brought back to the table magically told him his pizza was ready.

It started raining a couple of days later, so after I’d quickly done the Bauhaus archive we decided to head for the famous German coastline…