Berlin Day 1 29th May 2013.

The Berlin we see today is very different from the one of my last visit. So much has been built that it is hard to compare. But the wall has gone and once again it is an open place where travel is easy and the military are not to be seen.

We take the bus, then the train from our camp site on Schwielowsee Lake via Potsdam and arrive at the Berlin Haupbahnhof. There is something of a quiet, unhurriedness about it all. The doors close slowly and smoothly, the bus/train moves off in a sedate, carful manner, people move to seats quietly and unhurriedly, the train seems solidly new and firm. The Hbf is all new, build of steel and glass creating an airiness within which people and trains go about their business: and there is a lot if it going on!

We walk form the station, previously in the GDR, across the Spree River, and onto the Reichstag/Chancellery plaza. Tourists are everywhere, many wanting to climb to the Reichstag cupola but we just wander and look at the people, the queues and hope the rain stays away. In 1989 where we sit was a Trabant car park. Now it's outside the USA Embassy, all protected by huge steel posts and guards, steel fences and CCTV.

Just beyond the gate we find the new Roma and Sinti memorial situated in a small clearing in some trees. It is a sign of the times that Germany can now publicly face up, to its past crimes. Berlin has many memorials to groups who suffered in the Nazi past. Walking around the closed in memorial the sounds of a violin echoed through the trees. There is no 'tune' but a series of notes, perhaps just sounds that hang in the air. Other sounds coming from the city - police sirens, people talking, birds- coincide accidentally with these recorded sounds you are in the Cageian world of chance operations. Its almost surreal but there is also the silence of an understanding or even shared moment of distress at the horrors of the past. And of the way some societies and some people treat these people today.

We move on to the Jewish memorial. This consists of 2711 different black stones in a large grid. I have not found an explanation for the number blocks except that the idea was to create a space which ahd no set route in or out. Underneath this monument is a documentation room, once an underground bunker that contains details and quotes from a wide range of sources detailing what happened to some named individuals and families. It is very sobering and challenging to attempt any comprehension of what happened then.

Returning to the daylight, we slowly wander back to the Hbf and the journey home. Missing our bus at Potsdam Hbf and with an hour to wait went shopping as we must eat! And we enter the world of a sort of cheap food shop but not quite as cheap as a Netto supermarket. On leaving, having selected sausage, salmon and Sauerkraut, it find it doesn't take Visa! In fact this becomes a commonplace that Visa is not accepted in many shops, and even a bank! So we pay cash: unheard of with us but we have no choice.

So home for a late supper.