Greetings from Berlin, Germany - Day 1

Well, we finally made it... and what the trip it was!! We left at 7 pm on Monday from San Francisco International Airport, and had a 10 hour flight straight to Frankfurt Germany. It was a nice flight I was able to watch 2 movies, Coraline and the Uninvited. They were both stupid, but they helped me pass the time. I particularly hated teh second because I spent the whole movie hating a certain character, and then in the last 90 seconds, the tables turned, and I found out she was the good guy, and the main character (who I was mentally defending the entire movie) was the villian. RETARDED!! I dont' even know if that made sense... whatever.... We were fed wonderful airplane food, that was who knows how old, and then made it to FRANKFURT!! The landing was rough, which scared me, but not too bad.... Then comes the fun part...

We travel through the maze, which they erroneously call 'The Frankfurt International Airport' , and finally found our gate after passing through customs, and settle down. Our plane departed at 4:25, and at 4:15 when they still weren't boarding, I decided to brave the counter, and try out my german (of which i know.... nothing). I was able to woo the 40-something year old women into speaking English (I got skills... ya!), and was able to find out that our plane was CANCELLED!! AAHHH!!! So, I got us transferred to a different plane, that was leaving for Berlin only 4 hours later, so that wasn't too bad. Luckily they gave us a 10 euro voucher for dinner, and we were able to get some nice expensive airport food for free! YAY!!

We landed in Berlin, got a quick tour of the the area, but Uncle David's personal driver/body guard in their nice little Mercedez S-Class... wow... we got a nice tour, grabbed some grub and hit the sack!!

We woke up the next morning... SO TIRED!! Jet lag caught up with us....and I coudl barely keep my eyes open. It turns out when you fast forward 9 hours ahead of your time zone, it kinda throws you off... a LOT!! We then Mike piked us up... (ok... can I tell you.... I LOVE HAVING A DRIVER!!! I will basiaclly never have one again in my entirel ife....so I'm soaking up

the joy and luxury right now...) we heade and did a drivign tour. We saw tons of things.... our first stop was...



The Olympic Stadium - It was built for the 1936 Olympics, were Hitler was the 'Supreme' Guest... it was very cool....

This is an inside view of the stadium... it was HUGE....
We got to go inside, and all around.... we even got to see the pools....I wanted to go swimming in them so bad... they looked so fun... and they had some REALLY high hi dives too...
After we pulled ourselves away from the pools we got to go around to teh other side, and see the olympic torch. This stadium is HUGE and hosted the final 2006 World Cup Game, Germany VS Spain... which was huge.... this stadium is for serious sports people.... people who play.....

VARSITY!!!!! (shout out for Brittney... hahahah)

After we went to the Olympic Stadium we found that they were having a TAXI STRIKE... RIGHT outside the Stadium. Evidently the Airport is now charging teh taxi's to wait for people, so all 600 taxi drivers parked their taxis today, and then had a huge taxi parade in protest, and we got to witness it....

Then we headed to visit Dave, and go to lunch, which was great, and then Mike took us to a Walking Tour, which was a great 4 hour tour of Berlin, and all the big spots to see... My favorite was the Brandenburg Gate
The Hotel Adlon (where Michael Jackson danged his newborn son a few years back, and sections fothe Berlin Wall with Checkpoint Charlie), and then we headed to the Holocaust Memorial, which was really cool. It's hard to explain but, it was a memorial you experience rather than look at, and it was really cool...
We then headed to the second largest standing portion of the Berlin Wall....
Then we headed to the infamous 'Checkpoint Charlie' which divided East and West Berlin during the Cold War...
Then we headed to Humboldt University, which has had students and teachers such as Albert Einstein and Karl Marx, just to name a few....
And those are the real highlights from today.... WHOA!!! I sure hope your day was as productive!! Haha... hopefully... this was awesome. I LOVE BERLIN!! It's a little wierd with so many people speaking German, i'm not gonna lie. But, it is a really fun city, with SO MUCH HISTORY!! This city has been burned to teh ground like 6 times, captured and recaptured, had multiple rebellions, and since the reunification in the early 1990's, Berlin has been bankrupted 3 times... this city has quite the history!!! I miss you tons, and can't wait to let you know what tomorrow brings.... meanwhile, enjoy my view as I log out tonight....
Love, James