CENTRAL EUROPE 2011
Day
3
September 4
Sunday -
BERLIN
We
got up early - 7:15 - in order to get ready for church.
We had bought some great pastries last night so we ate in our apartment,
even drinking our instant coffee again.
We walked over to the Berlinerdom. The
usher must have known we were Americans as she took us to a special seating area
where we were given the order of service in English plus ear phones so we could
hear the prayers and sermon in English. That
was very nice. We later learned that
the interpreter was a young woman from New York. 
The
Berlinerdom (see
model) is considered a state church and Protestant, but the service was
very liturgical, following the tradition order of service similar to the
Episcopal service. There was a Eucharist where people came forward to receive
bread from a lay person and then moved to one of several Lay Eucharistic
Ministers – just like in our church. The
pastor was Dr. Petra Zimmermann. Also
present was the bishop, Dr. Wolfgang Huber, who delivered the sermon.
The music was wonderful, a large organ and a sizable choir.
The setting for the service was The
Missa brevis Sancti Joannis de Deo
in B-flat major by Joseph Haydyn.
FOR HISTORY, DETAILED DESCRIPTION AND MORE PHOTOS SEE
DAY 2.
The
couple sitting in front of us were from Minneapolis.
He was a Lutheran pastor. We
talked for a while after church.
We
went to the Humbold Box for lunch. This
is a newly constructed odd shaped five story building that is on the site of the
former Berlin Palace which is directly across the Unter de Linden from the
Berlinerdom. It will be torn down
once the palace is rebuilt.
DAS
BERLINER SCHLOSS (THE BERLIN PALACE)
The
ground stone of the original palace was laid in 1443.
It is unsure what this palace looked like but it is assumed that it was
more of a fort than a palace. Parts
of this original building remained intact until the final demolition of the
palace in 1950. In 1535,
Joachim II selected Berlin as his main residence and had the palace rebuilt in a
more modern style. The golden age of
the Berlin Palace began in 1688 with Friedrich III’s ascension to the throne.
Over the years, various changes and additions by succeeding emperors were
made. The building was damaged
during World War I. The People’s Naval Division was stationed in the palace
rooms. During World War II, parts of
the building was gutted by fire.
Even
though it was damaged, it was not destroyed and was shored up and used as an
exhibition space for a 1946 exhibition. It
was finally decided in 1950 to demolish the entire building.
It took over four month before the job was finally accomplished.
On
July 4, 2002, the German Bundestag voted to reconstruct part of the Berlin
Palace and house a “Humboldt Forum” on the site.
It is scheduled to be inaugurated on October 3, 2015 – the 25th
anniversary of German Reunification.
There
was a nice indoor and outdoor café on top with a wonderful view of the
Berlinerdom - almost eye level with the towers.
We ate outside. My wife had a
lamb meatball which she said was wonderful.
I had a yellow curried wurst with a vanilla and curry sauce and sweet
potato fries.
In the gift shop they had a model of what the new palace will look
like…a duplicate of the old one. Of
course I bought one. The salesman said I would finish my model long before the
real one is built. The building had a wonderful display of models of the early
buildings. There were museum on the other levels.
The
Berlinerdom and Humboldt Box are right on the Spree River, so we took an hour
long boat trip. The river was really
crowded with tour boats. It
was a most enjoyable trip. They
furnished ear sets so you could learn about what is along the river in the
listeners own language. We passed
the Berlinerdom, some of the
buildings on Museum Island, the Tiergarten and other significant landmarks.
We
were a few minutes walk from the apartment so we came home to leave the model
kit. We had a 4:00 engagement today to meet my friend, Dieter Marx.
There
is an interesting story of how I got to know Dieter Marx.
In the spring, I was referred to the Chesapeake &Washington Heart Care
for a routine stress test. It was
located in a new office space. The
walls of the waiting room and the halls leading to all of examination rooms and
offices were covered with poster size prints of famous European buildings.
We have visited most of them plus there were the buildings we were going
to see on this trip. The staff
thought that I was going to move in since I stayed so long studying all of the
prints. Dr.Bertele gave me
the email address of the company that produced these beautiful prints.
I contacted www.LIDIARTE.de
and had a wonderful response from the owner and creator of these prints,
Dieter Marx. He sent me his catalog
which I would suggest everyone have. It
is beautiful and would equal any coffee table book.
Not only did he have the poster size prints which he had drawn and his
associate, Susanne Mocka had colored, these prints could be order in post card
size. Since I have no more
walls free for large prints, I ordered about 50 post card size prints. Thus
began a correspondence with Dieter, who also had spent time on my website.
He knew that we were going to be in Berlin, so he invited us to come by
and visit him. There is a
little more to this story. Not long
after my evaluation visit to Dr. Bertele, he called me to inform me that he had
found an extra framed print of the Frauenkirche in Dresden, and would I like to
have it. I was in his office, 15
miles away, before he hung up. We
hung this print in our dining room, where it remains today next to my model of
the Fraunekirche (see
model).
(The
print above is Deiter's rendition of the Frauenkirche.)
Dieter
had given us directions on how to reach his flat.
We took the metro from the Hackescher Market stop near our apartment,
changed trains and got off in Charlottenburg area of Be
rlin.
We walked several blocks in a very attractive part of what had been West
Berlin.
I had originally thought
that he had a shop or store, but his business is from his flat which is on the
fourth floor of a lovely building. There
was no elevator so we climbed to the top. He had an interesting apartment which
was on the roof. We had a wonderful
visit for about an hour. It was
really great to meet him in person and be the recipients of his kind
hospitality.
We
started walking back to the metro but decided to stop in a delightful outdoor
cafe called Mar y Sol. We had drinks and two tapas.
We got back on the metro, changed trains and went south to Potsdamer
platz. We saw the Sony
building…very modern as were most of the new building in that area.
We stopped in the Marriott Hotel sidewalk café and had dessert.
We
headed home after trying to figure out the right metro, but we made it home
safely. We are really tired
tonight.
