Berlin, Germany: Inside the Reichstag

Continuing on with my European photo journal; from Dortmund I travelled to Berlin, which is about 5 hours east by car. I didn't take a train or bus to get there, instead I did what the Germans do by using the mitfahrgelegenheit.de car-pooling website. Its a free site that allows you to search for anyone travelling from A to B, and gives you their phone number and e-mail to contact them and hitch a ride for a small fee. This might sound a bit weird and unsafe-sounding, but it worked out for me (at least for this time), and I was told that many Germans use this system for travel with no problems. There were other travellers along for the ride to chat with as well; a German girl, a Cameroon guy, and a very stoner-like teenage driver. Although the car was jam-packed, it was a fun experience. The Cameroon guy didn't like the driver though in the end, as he dropped us all off in a
suburb of Berlin rather than downtown, which is where the Cameroon guy needed to be in order to catch a flight that evening and we were running very late. Basically this carpool service is unreliable - the stoner punk arrived at the meeting point 1/2 hr. late in this case, he accidentally over-booked for one seat so he had to turn away one girl who needed a ride, and basically ignored the Cameroon guys' need to be dropped off a little closer into town, even though he said he was driving into Berlin. I booked another carpool to travel to Dresden and though I arranged everything with a non-english speaking German, I know I was in the right place to meet but he never showed up! I called his cellphone but he wasn't picking up. So a warning to those who wanna use this service: don't count on it if you're catching a flight! It was very cheap though, I probably saved more than 50% of the cost of a train ride.

Anyways, Berlin was a really cool and happening city to be in. I was only there for 2 full days, which definitely was not enough time to see everything. 3-4 days would've been worth it. I ended up only scratching the surface of tourist sights like the Reichstag, Brandenburg Tor and the Berlin Wall ruins. The transit system was VERY efficient and clean, rivaling anything in Japan. We can only dream of having a similar transit system in the T-dot.

Dresden (in East Germany) is in stark contrast to ultra-modern Berlin, is very traditional and keeps its old style architecture and personality. You can see cobblestone roads, antiquated Soviet-era cars that are still running, and the old town district was really nice and not heavily crowded with World Cup tourists. I stayed for only one night, and that was good enough for me but I'm sure I missed out on a lot that the city had to offer.

Click the photo above to see what I saw in Berlin and Dresden! Or else click here if you've had enough scroll wheel exercise today.