BERLIN woop woop.

On Wednesday morning Audry and I went down to “The Burg” to meet up with Andrea and Martin (a student and professor from the keramik department). Martin drove us to Berlin because the students were having an exhibition at the History museum there. The drive took about two hours and we got to see a lot of the German countryside or “landscape” as they seemed to call it. We got to the city and the interesting mix of new and old architecture immediately impressed me. We came into the city on the west side and traveled straight through to the Brandenburg Gate, which was the entrance from east to west when the Berlin wall was still standing. It was very interesting to see, and they told us that only the highest government officials were allowed to pass through this gate. We went straight to the Zeughaus, which was where the exhibition was being held. After much waiting and watching the doors finally opened and we were allowed to bring the art, or “kunst” inside to set up. Audry and I weren’t much help, but finally Andrea took us by subway or “ubon” to meet Bella, our host for the next few days. Bella is Johannes’ girlfriend and she lives in Pankow, an area in Berlin. Her apartment was very nice and comfortable. She was a fantastic hostess. Bella wasn’t expecting us so soon, and she already had plans to go to a party the night we got there. Luckily she was able to take us with her to the party and after we got settled in we set out to find the Kunst School in Pankow for the party. Audry and I felt a bit out of place because we couldn’t speak much German and didn’t quite know what the heck was going on. It was all good though and a little later we were on our way back to Bella’s and headed to bed.
The next day Audry and I were lucky enough to do some sight seeing on our own and got to take lots of pictures! That night was the opening of the exhibition at the museum as well. We walked in and immediately a woman came up to me and said that I looked American in my North Face fleece. She was actually a former ceramic graduate student from OU, Heidi. She and her husband were glad to talk to us about everything! Heidi is doing a residency in Berlin for 2 months with Thomas Hirshler and Kaja Witt who Bella is actually doing an apprenticeship with right now. Audry and I were lucky enough to go see their studio and gallery in Pankow and it was absolutely amazing!!!! After seeing it I really want to study German and come back and do a residency there!!!




On Friday Audry and I set out for a little more shopping and sightseeing. Much to our surprise, all of the stores were closed because it was Good Friday! I was sooo upset. I really wanted to spend some Euro. We found a little café and sat down to have a snack. I just want to say that it was the fanciest diet coke and carrot cake I have ever had. As we moseyed our way down the street we came across an English speaking tour. We snuck to the back of the tour to listen in a little bit and the tour guide welcomed us to join because it was a FREE TOUR!!! YAY! We got to see a lot of the amazing things we had already seen, but this time we had them explained to us! In English! Bonus: I fell in love with the tour guide…his name was Chris. Unfortunately, Chris liked to talk a lot and we were running late to meet up with Andrea so we had to duck out as soon as the tour was over. We just hung out with Andrea and Bella for the rest of the day/night. We got some delicious Indian food and headed back to Pankow. For the rest of the night we just hung out and watched an American movie in German, interesting. Saturday was our last day in Berlin and Audry and I were again left to do some sightseeing on our own. We got to go into a beautiful church and much to our surprise, we could climb a million stairs to the top and go outside to look out and see the whole city.