"deutschland.uber.alles@hotmail.com" USED to be my email for years. Until it got blocked by hotmail for spamming ._. ofcourse it wasnt me, but these unknown jerks somehow hacked my account and used it to spam. Well yes, I did chose that name cause Germany was one of my favourite country in the world. It all started because of World Cup. In 2002, I watched my first world cup and fell in love instantly with that team. There were still Oliver Kahn, Oliver Neuville, Schneider, Ballack, and my favourite one, KLOSE! That good ol team. It's not that I dont like the recent team, in fact I looove them but somehow I love the previous one more hehe.
Since I applied for 2 week visa in Europe and I had 4 days left to hang around, I decided to go to Germany in a hope to meet Miroslav Klose!!! --kampung banget I know. Hahaha. Thus I flew from Oslo to Munich, since Klose was still at Bayern Munchen at that time. When I arrived I took the train alone to city center of Munich, walked around alone under the snow in the middle of the night to look for WOMBATS Hostels where I already booked a bed there. It was a pretty cheap but a very decent accommodation, I would definitely recommend it to you if you intent to surf around in Bavarians, they have one in Munich, Berlin, and Vienna. The hostel was very clean, sleek, and it seemed very friendly for young backpackers, and although I was in a shared dorm (6-beds in one room) but it was very save. The caretakers were very helpful and friendly indeed, they knew how to get to A from B with C. Plus they also provide the backpackers free internet and some lousy couches. Besides rooms, they also have a bar where all the fellow travelers meet up, share, or just hang around drinking. You can check their website
here.
(I took both of these photos from the internet since I didnt take any when I was there)
After checking in, I decided to take a nightwalk around my hostel and the central station or in German, "Hauptbahnhof". After walking around for 1-2hours, bought some toilettries, got some Turkish blokes staring at me, stopped in front of 'adult-store', stuck in the middle of 2 fighting drunk men, I decided to go back to the hostel. Hmm I wont recommend any girl to walk around that city alone at night. When I got back to my room, I joined two of my roommates to the bar since we got 3 free beers coupons, yay. After sharing some interesting stories about our journeys, acting out SNSD and other korean's girlbands moves, and finding out that even the korean boys hate their own boybands (my roommates were 2 young south-korean boys), we went back to our room.
The city of Munich is best explored by metro railway (S-Bahn), subway (U-Bahn), Tram, bus, and on foot. You can buy daily pass for train, which you can use to go anywhere anytime as many as you want for one day, and it's not expensive, 10euro per diem, rather than buying one way ticket for 2.3euro each time you go. As long as you take the metro&subway map with you, it's as easy as a-b-c to travel around.
As I have stated before, Why I chose Munich out of other German cities, is because of Bayern Munchen, to be exact, it's because of Klose huahahaha. Sick, I know. But I was really eager to meet him! On that day, I planned to go to Allianz Arena, the home stadium of Bayern Munchen. The stadium is located on the outskirt north of Munich, in a district called Fröttmaning. Pretty quite, seemed that not many people go there, apparently it looked like a dead city. But anyway, I kept walking along from the train station to the stadium, which was around 3km away.
Once I got there, I found difficulties in finding the entrance since it was HUMONGOUS. But since my ability in orientation is pretty good, I manage to made my way to the ticket booth of stadium tour. The tourguide took us to the spectators seats, press-conference room, to the player's lounge, even the locker room and their bathrooms! Ich mag B-)
In case you ask, no I didnt meet Miroslav Klose or anyone there. Bollocks.
Leaving AllianzArena and Frotmanning, I took the train to the famous Marienplatz! It's the city of center of Munich, the pedestrian shopping square, and the center of the old-town Munich. The architectures were very gothic, many of them were originally built in 19th century, you can also see dozens of Bavarian rulers miniature statues.
One of the famous site in Marienplatz or Odeonplatz is the old glockenspiel or giant bells, consisting of 43 bells accompanied by performing little cute mechanical marionettes. That was a very classical place, it made you thinking about those glorious bavarian rulers in their ages..........
Having explored Marienplatz for couple of hours and having enough of the cold, I went back to Wombats and asked the receptionist about the best way to go to Berlin, the capital city of Germany. The guy recommended me 'mitfahren', i don't know whats the proper word in English but you can say that its a more proper way of 'hitchhiking'.
Click here to go the official site of mitfahren. In that website, you only have to insert which city you wanna go to, and the date of your departure. Then the website will give you a list of people with their cars, who are willing to share a ride with you, you can see what time they're leaving, from where, and how much you should pay (ofcourse WAAY cheaper than any other transportation). I think it's a very efficient way for low-budget travelers to move from one city to another, you can save money and you do something to reduce Co2. Alas, I found someone who was going the same direction with me tomorrow to Berlin and we made appointment to meet up at the eastern-station at 8AM.
Note that my cellphone didnt work in Europe. Next morning, I did what he told me to meet up at 8AM in the eastern station. But I didnt where exactly in the station, I walked around with my heavy luggage (I didnt use carrier cause it didnt fit all of my thick winter clothes and coats), up and down the stairs, in and out of the station but I couldnt find that guy. I used the public phone to call him, buuuut it didnt rang. I even desperately asked people if i could borrow their cellphones -_- And people kept on saying "no, sorry""uhm no i dont have cellphone." what the flock. Hopelessly, I looked for a place where I could just sit down and calm my self down, and WARM my self up. But McDonald's wasnt even opened yet at that time....... Though I did manage to find a place. I think that was the gloomiest moment of my trip.
I went back to the train station and found that a train to Berlin could cost me 150euro. That's quite much. So without further ado, spontaneously i took the train to the airport and found last-minute ticket deal to Berlin for 130euro, and yes obviously I took it. Phew, finally.
Arriving in Berlin, I was picked up by a friend of mine who's studying in that city, Ichan. Glad to finally met someone from Indonesia hahaha. He lent me his dorm for me to stay for 2 days. Berlin in fact WAS WARM. I was so happy that I didnt have to wear layers and layers of clothes. Not warm as in literally warm, but at least it was less colder than any other cities I've been to.
One word, oh hangon 3 words actually: I LOVE BERLIN!! I didnt regret even for a second choosing that city to visit. The weather, the places, the people, the buildings, are like the mixture of old-age majesty, knowledge, and avant-gardism. It was indeed the city of museums, they even had this small island called "Museum-insel" or museum islands, small island filled with museums hahaha. We visited Pergamon museum, filled with middle-eastern antiques and Islamic art, Altes Museum of classical antiques and Greek's art, and Neues Museum of pre-historic antiques and Egyptian art,
Deutsche Demokratische Republik (DDR) Museum one of world's most interactive museum! Aaand Madame Tussaud Berlin hehe. Isnt it odd for it was Ichan's first time to do a museum tour after living in Berlin for 3 years -_-
Oh, I also met some celebrities and world figures in Berlin!
Nah they're all wax figures in Madame Tussaud museum.
For you guys who know the history of Germany, they were partly divided by allied occupation into two nations after 1945, West Germany and East Germany until in 1990 they were finally reunified. Berlin as the capital city was the checkpoint to go to one another. The places I told you before were mostly located in the west part of Berlin, more developed, modern, and packed out . While the next day when I walked around in the eastern part of Berlin looking for a good used-bookstore, it was pretty dark, melancholic, hollow, cloak-and-dagger kind of city.
Enough with the emo stuff. What I don't get about Berlin is that you have to pay for peeing, I know it's common in Indonesia as well but it only cost you about 500-1000perak right? I mean, I wouldn't have to be that neurotic after I peed if it didnt cost me 1euro!!! Yes that was the most expensive toilet I've ever been into. 1 euro = 12.000ribu rupiah. Since it was expensive and gue gamau rugi, i stayed longer than I have to inside the toilet box muahahaha.
But another thing I love about Berlin is the kebab! One of the most delicious kebab I;ve ever eaten!!! And also the biggest one. I didnt even know where to start eating, aber ich mag B-)
On the last day, I successfully took the mitfahren to Frankfurt airport, with a guy's top-notch VW-Golf muahahaha. It was pretty weird and I was bit worried as well, hitchhiking a stranger's car, on a stranger's country, alone ._. Haha but we did manage to break the ice though, and he was a very nice guy, and he drove his car 150-200km/hour. Talking about stoked!
Well that was my recent trip to Germany, last February. Although no I didnt meet Miroslav Klose, at least I met Jurgen Klinsmann........wax figure. Vieeeelen dank Ichan for being a really good host, and not-so good museum tour-guide buahahaha, kiddin. Definitely coming back again somewhen I dont know but will do!! Bis bald Deutschlaand! Ich mag B-)
Auf wiedersehen Deutschland!
Stay cool,
TAMI
