“Berlin is more a part of the world than a city.” – Jean Paul, Writer, 1800
A wild restless storm envelopes European capitals every spring. Not morphing climate, yet a terrible force, chilling as the advent of an eleventh Biblical plague.
Vast swarms of discordant school-kids from every parish above sea-level alight on the sacred sites of tourism: it is Spring Break and we are the terrified recipients of this adolescent apocalypse.
We are in renaissance Berlin. Tender green buds nurse on warming sunshine and lengthening days.
Civilized. Trains run on time. Music pulses in the veins of this clearly repentant city. Glorious baked goods and extra hot beverages warm memories of another era.
In Mitte (Central), inventive shops and outstanding food expand cosmopolitan tastes.
There are bicycles and man-buns. English seems to be the native tongue in cafes, as well as fluency in Java, C++, and Python.
We reside for two pleasant weeks at Hotel am Steinplatz, jewel of quiet taste in leafy Charlottenburg.
Once the center of West Berlin, Charlottenburg is our nourishing village providing all that a contemplative life requires: morning saunas, cozy coffee cafes with fresh roisinenschnecken (raisin-cinnamon swirls), fragrant steaming Pho, tender Viennese schnitzel, toothy pastas, creamed marinated herring, consoling warm borscht, and vitalizing salads blessed by local farm-to-fork councils.
Bach’s celestial notation and Marlene’s perfectly fashioned strudel may be the architecture of Heaven…
All images captured on iPhoneX. Click on any pic to ride the photo carousel:
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