No photos this time, will have to put them up later.

Arriving to Berlin was an event that almost didn't happen. Although I thought I gave myself plenty of time to get from Annmarie's to the Central Station in Amsterdam, over an hour, it turned out to be only just enough. Thankfully I had my Eurail pass so all I had to do was run to the platform, scan the schedule to make sure it was the right train and jump on. 6 hours later I was in Berlin.

Unfortunately the next night I was robbed of 150 euros as I slept in the hostel. Yeah it finally happened. Statistically it was only a matter of time but I'm normally quite careful with my money, it was even in my bag under my bed when it got taken. Luckily they only took the euros and left me my credit card and ATM card so it's not a total loss. And they left my my Eurail pass which is great, cause I would have probably killed someone if they had taken that. The local Universities just finished up their Spring Break or whatever the hell they call it over here and they were mainly students in the dorm room, so it was probably some retarded student who mistook the floor under my bed for his parents top drawer. It's possible, people make mistakes all the time. The thing that tears it is that I know exactly when it happened during the night.

But besides losing all my cash at hand Berlin is great, I've seen so many museums it's been a whirlwind of antiquity. Thus far I've seen the head of Nefertiti, classical Greek ceramics, Warhammer 40,000 statues, sex carvings, SS uniforms and parts of the Berlin Wall. I was also able to buy a small chunk of the Berlin wall from an old couple on my walking tour which in my opinion, is about as authentic a memory as you can get.

It turns out that Berlin has its own Sex Museum, and right by my hostel. How convenient! It's not as extensive as the one in Amsterdam but at least they had a fairly good exhibit on Asia, even including all the infused rice wines I've been tasting throughout SE Asia. So that was fun, going by they displays and saying to myself ' I've drank that, that, that, not that, that . . .' I wonder if anyone heard me.

I have learned more about German history and seen more of Berlin in a few days than I had planned, thanks in part to the day tour that I took. It was with Insider Tours and for a 4 hour walking tour covered a lot, skimming the surface on places like Hitler's bunker, the Soviet War Memorial and other important monuments that can be covered in a day. I felt guilty for spending such little time at internationally recognized places like Checkpoint Charlie, but that's why I have 5 days here to go back and fully appreciate them. Having said that, 5 days is definitely not enough time to explore this city. Of course, unless you live in Bridgeport (population 836) 5 days probably isn't enough time to explore any proper city. There's also a huge plaza called the Sony Center in Berlin which is less than a decade old and houses lots of restaurants, and IMAX theater and a normal theater where they show movies in their original language. I got to see '300' in English, something I've waited a long time to do. I'm going to restrain my fan-boy urges and just say that it's the most entertaining movie I've seen in years . . . which isn't saying all that much when you think about the kinds of movies I saw in Vanuatu like 'Red Scorpion' and 'Rambo', god how they love their Rambo in Vanuatu. Sure 300 isn't completely true but what Hollywood movie isn't? And it's based on a graphic novel, inspired by a movie based on actual events. And as it's a Frank Miller graphic novel, the visual style is of course going to take some liberties and be bat-shit-insane (which I will be abbreviating to BSI from now on for the sake of brevity). I would just love it if Frank Miller and Greg Capullo worked on a book together. I would have said Miller and McFarlane, but they already did one and are doing another.

Today I went to the Berlin Zoo to see Knut, the new polar bear that is shown twice daily. I waited in the que like the rest of the people and was in the next group to see him. Then 30 minutes before he was scheduled to go back inside Knut left. What? I managed to see the top half of him leave as the German guy in charge said Knut wasn't feeling well and had to go inside. He also wouldn't be making another appearance today. So that sucked as Knut has become a kind of reunification bear, bringing East and West Berliners together like the World Cup did. I spent the rest of the day wandering around the zoo finding all my favorite animals. There was no binturong however, cause they are my all-time favorite animal. Their name means 'bear cat' so that makes them a cross between the king of the jungle and godless killing machines.

Tomorrow I leave for Dresden for a couple days and then Prague. I know little to nothing about either of those cities except that Dresden got fire bombed to hell during WWII and Prague . . . I know nothing about Prague. People say it's cool but I still have to read about it in my Eyewitness Guide book.

Unfortunately the only donuts I found in Berlin were Dunkin' Donuts which are tasty, but not what I was looking for.