Germany Part 1
Drove down to Germany over the last week! 2 parts of the journey- first 2 days in Berlin (capital) and the next 3 days on the FairyTale Route from Kassel to Hamburg.
BERLIN
Plenty of painted bears found around the town, it is supposed to be the city 'mascot' of Berlin. Its said that the bear was chosen as the Berlin symbol because the German word for it "Bär" is quite close to the sound of the word Berlin. Well, reminds u of the handpainted lions in Singapore?
The icon of Berlin- the city gate to Berlin
The wall which separated East and West Berlin in history. Most parts of the wall have been demolished ("Fall of the Berlin Wall" signifies reunification) , but parts of it are still standing. The one behind me is the longest stretch and is currently being restored.
The most famous crossing along the Berlin wall was Friedrichstraße (Checkpoint Charlie), which was restricted to Allied personnel and non-German citizens.
Holocaust Memorial- a memorial to the Jews killed during the Holocaust. It looks like only concrete slabs on even ground on first sight.. until we actually walked into the 'maze' and found out how high and deep the slabs were:
Some of the other beautiful monuments around town..
Look at the long queue to visit the interior?
The glass dome inside was breathtaking. There was a spiral walkway on the inside circumference of the dome. If u look closely, u can see tourists standing at the top of the dome. The small picture on the top right was taken from the top of the spiral walkway.
Some sights in the city...
There was a big fair on Sunday morning, right in front of the Brandenburg Gate..
And the best part of the Berlin tour, I saw this huge poster:
Disney's Beauty and the Beast musical!!!!!I HAD to watch, even though its in German!!
The musical was great, it had all the elements of a successful musical- humour, romance, beautiful sets, great choreography, strong vocals... Belle was by Leah Delos Santo, a Philipina as well. I would have mistaken her for Lea Salonga.. do all Philipinas sing so well?? Here's some of the stage pictures..
Though I totally enjoyed the musical, would still love to catch the Broadway version for comparison if I have the chance, hee hee..
Yar, just 1 hour away from our hotel.. there was a HUGE traffic jam along the expressway. The waiting and stopping along the expressway caused the engine temperature to soar... imagine our horror when smoke started billowing out from the bonnet.. (no pix coz we were too shocked by what happened)
It certainly wasn't very glam to be stranded along the road shoulder with a smoke machine, during a traffic jam when cars were hardly moving. Add on that it was a Swedish carplate with 2 Chinese.. we became the road exhibits for the next few hours.
The jam did not clear for several hours, and close to midnight, the German police came and asked us to move out of the road shoulder. After alot of gesturing and explanation that we cannot move when it was still a jam, they then decided to clear the path and lead us out to the next closest exit. (Imagine, a Swedish carplate with 2 Chinese, plus a German police car complete with flashing blue lights and beebo beebo.. )
Since the police told us the jam will not clear for the next 3-5hours, we had to seek refuge at a petrol station until the next morning.. and only reached our hotel at 8am..
Akan Datang for Germany Part 2.
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