Berlin Day 1

Things started a little roughly here in Germany. Our Ryanair flight was rerouted from Berlin to Leipzig. After a few days of heavy snow and winter storms, the Berlin airport had run out of the deicing fluid necessary to clear the runways. Leipzig is about 118 miles from Berlin. The airline had no support for passangers once we landed, and simply told us "good luck". None of the other passengers seemed too angry or surprised by the whole situation. Generally while everyone was mildly inconvenienced, people seemed sure they would make it to their ultimate destination.

We found the train system that would take us into Berlin, which was confusing and difficult only because we don't speak any German. The names of cities and towns look like total gibberish most of the time. We should have studied a little bit more German before traveling. Having almost zero words or phrases makes even basic communication difficult. Once in Berlin we've found almost everywhere has someone that speaks English, but I still feel guilty for not making more of an effort to learn some German before I left.

Despite arriving several hours late, our AirBnB host was very accommodating and friendly. He's originally from Chicago, so that was interesting. The place is very nice and seems to be right in the thick of things. Here is the view:

A few blocks down we found dinner at Prater Garten. It's one of the oldest beer gardens, started in the mid 1800s. Of course, with all the snow we weren't interested in the garden aspect but we went inside and had some tasty beer and traditional German food (Königsberger Klopse (meatballs in caper sauce) and Roast Pork with Potato Dumplings and Coleslaw). A fellow dinner inside the restaurant was a tiny black poodle with a red plaid jacket.

Almost as surprising as a dogs in restaurants was that Berliners smoke in the bars. I've gotten so used to the prohibition on indoor smoking that I can't really decide which seems more taboo to my Chicago standards.