Day 2

It was a long, but good day! Looking back now, I realize we saw ALOT today! The wind started blowing today, so we were much cooler (yesterday was hot!), and I think that cold front is moving on in.

Architecture:

Pariser Platz:

We started off

close to th

e apartments

seeing some embassy exteriors. The Bristish Embassy (left)was not one that I particularly cared for, but was still good to experience some Post-Modernism in person. Fake stone, bold geometric forms, and colors. Closer to the Brandenburg Gate, however, proved to be a little more interesting the more we heard about it. The Germans have strict building regulations, so there are some pretty famous architects that have built buildings in this area that do not follow their typical styles because of these restrictions. For instance, Frank

Gehry designed a bank (DG

Bank - left) with a very pla

in facade, but the interior was his typical "tricked out" blob forms - as described to us "a pearl inside an oyster". Next door was the Academy of Art by

Behnisch. (right) I actually liked

thier "plain" facade. It was well articulated. The inside, again, spoke more of Behnisch's true nature - angled stairways, floating mezzanines, light pouring in from different angles.

Potsdamer Platz:

This is a big plaza w/ several big modern buildings, a train station, restaurants, offices, etc.

We've kind of compared it to

New York's Times Square but now quite as showy. One of my

favorite architects, Renzo Piano, did the master plan for the plaza, so its been neat to see more of his work in person. This

plaza is basically tall buildings centered around a common circle

area connected by an overhead canopy structure. (left) This area is a historic place but was also destroyed during the war when the Soviets took over. The wall actually went right through this area, and they have pieces of the wall up where it once st

ood. So, redesigning this area and building it up again, even though it is modern architecture, still plays a big part in Berlin's history.

Linkstrasse:

This was probably the most exciting architectural thing for me today. This area was another plaza area in a way. There was a big arcade with shopping, the blue man group theater is he

re (which we plan on going to for a show!), and just areas for people to hang out. Alot of the buildings were also done by Renzo Piano. And although this area is not my favorite project of his

aesthetically, I loved getting to experience the details of his

work. I was fascinated by the

way he turned corners. These buildings were clad in a terracotta

material, (left) but all of his corners were filletted/curved. His buildings go to show that details are what make or break a project.

Philharmonie:

This where the Berlin symphony orchestras play. (right)The outside of the building is quite possibly one of the ugliest buildings i've ever seen, but once we went inside I was very pleasantly surprised. It was built in the 60's, so it has that dated 60's look to it. The design was inspired greatly by ship design. That was sort of an interesting thing to pick up on. Our tour guide

kept talking about how organic the design was and how th

e design pointed back to nature and music was nature - kind of this continuum if you will. The actual concert space was p

retty incredible. I like how the shape of sound began to form the building. We got to sit in on a rehearsal for a sec and experience

the acoustics. It was very nice. (almost made me want to pick up my oboe again..... almost)

Neue Nationalgalerie:

This is one of Meis van der Rohe's last buildings. The ground floor was just a huge open space, but down stairs was an art museum. The art collection consisted of a lot of German expressionism, things stemming from Fauvism, Matisse, and Picasso. The Fauvism/expressionism pieces were probably my favorite. I've taken a few art history courses this year, and although I regretfully don't remember every piece of information, I picked up on a few principles we had studied. Viewing art is one of my favorite things and is always a nice change of pace from architecture sometimes.

CULTURE

Food is always an easy way to start understanding a culture. For lunch today, Leah and I split a knuckle of lamb with some potatoes and green beans. It was quite tasty. We haven't gotten the whole ordering water (wasser) thing down yet. You'd think that would be simple, but no. After hearing someone else order ice water and it coming out like normal water, we ordered the same; however, ours came w/ gas instead of w/o gas. So, I experience my first carbonated water or perierre today. Needless to say, I'll be specifying "no gas" from now on. We went to the train station to buy some tickets tonight, and just grabbed some food there. It was the best meal I've had yet! We went to a kebap stand and ordered a doner kebap. Its basically a tortilla filled with meat, cabbage, lettuce, a few veggies, and then a few different sauces. It was really good. It came with pommes frites (french fries) also with one of the special sauces..... we keep calling it cane's sauce haha. We also decided that we needed to enjoy a genuine German treat while we were here, so we treated ourselves to some Haagen Daz and non-gassy water this afternoon .. Ha! I'm really holding out for some struedell!

The World Cup started today, and it is a HUGE deal in Berlin. Our German contact for the trip told us that people would be a little more excited than usual this month because of that. So, we may get some good soccer watching in during the trip and get a chance to mingle with some locals. Apparently they watch games on big screens around town (like 400.000 people in front of one screen!)

A small group of us are going to a small town on the northern coast of Germany called Bergen this weekend. Its a national park area, and sounds like a nice area for some more outdoorsy things. We're not completely sure what we're going to do when we get there yet, but we have our train tickets, and are leaving at 6:30 AM! We'll get there around 10:30 spend the night and get back on the train at 11 the next night (23:00 german time). We are sure that no matter what we do we'll have a good time, get to see something most people won't, and come back w/ lots of good stories! We're all pretty excited. I will update on that when we get back! Bis Spater (Until later)...