With Adam having cancer again I felt very much surprised to find I’d still be going to Berlin despite all the horrors from the Birmingham hospital, but, that’s another story. So it was decied I should go to the Berlin with my younger brother Paul, although neither of us knew where anything was as most of my earlier trips had disappered of the web.
Paul arrived at my house just before we were supposed to set off from his house and we toddled off to his house to meet his wife for the lift to East Midlands airport. We had a slight disagreement about being ready in time and set off to Berlin like a cat out of hell. Beverley got us there in about 45 minutes (recomended time is around the 90mins) and off we went. There we found a huge quque to wait in and were just about ready to get booked in when some dud in front of us with two huge suitcases told us “we would be alright as we only had small casses” and so we took him at his word and went to find out if we could get a drink. Annette will tell you we did, as she found the receipt for the “fresh” water at about £1:56 to prove it.
Having checked out the cheap booze we went and joined the quque to get on board the plane. It was a horrendous delay as they had only just unloded the flight before we started loading and some Ryanair woman decide we were likely to be done for luggage charges. It seems that the bloke with the two huge suitcases knew sod all about the charges for the smaller case and we had to pay up or dump it. After a few harsh words we decided to cough up and continue to Berlin, after they knew it would not be forgotten.
Pretty soon we were comfortably abourd the plane and on our way to Berlin after the usual delays. That was twice we had paid for our luggage but, we intended to have agood time.
It was a pleasantish flight and we landed safely and went to await our luggage (small on plane travell bag) only to be informed by another passanger, that there would be about 90 minutes delay for some reason. Well as Paul wanted a smoke I got to wait until the skies went dark and picked up the “luggage”. We got our one day ticket for the tram and got on the right train, but were unable to find out where the hell the hotel was.
We then found ourselves on a “Hauptbarnhof” train bound for some god forsaken land in the far east. 🙁 We quickly found out that the next stop was about an hour away and we found a English speaking woman who told us we were on the wrong train. We decided to inform the ticket collector we were on the wrong train. Thank goodnes she spoke English and told us that the train would not stop for about an hour and we need to get back to Berlin. She did inform us that if we caught her trian back at about 9:50 we would be straight back to Berlin Hauptbahnhof before we new it. However, she did tell us if we cuaght the earlier train back we would have to pay the full fare.
Well that was like telling us we could go back for free our have a two hour wait. We found it was a pleasant place and got ourselves a nice little Chinese meal with two beers for about 15 euros each and we drifted back to the station just in time to meet the express to Berlin. We settled down and I went to find our ticket lady, gave her some chocolates we managed to find and you would have thought we had given her the keys to the world. It was plain sailing then back to the hotel at Ostkreuz in East Berlin and follow the map.
Adam’s map was a bit of a daydream to me but, it was originally done for him to follow. Well as it was about half past nine we went up the road from the station looking for the hotel. It was a straight road and fairly easy to follow but, as it turned out it was the wrong road. Nobody had a clue what we were looking for and despirte the helpfull Germans (they spoke English) we couldn’t find it. After about an hour we had some currywurst and chips and headed back to the station.
We had a good look round to see if we had gone the wrong way, but could not find anything. Then looking upwards we saw the hotel logo above some buildings to the West of the station and went to have a look. Well my German was of the worst kind and Paul had non but, once again we bumped into a couple of Germans that spoke English and the woman was determined we should find somewhere to sleep for the night. It took her about half an hour talking to the taxi people and when they turned up she left us – how nice. Now as it happens the damn sign stuck on the roof of the shops had nothing to do with our hotel but , the bloke took us off to the left and down this old cobbled road for about 20 minutes and we were left outside the hotel we were looking for.
It must have been about half past eleven by then and we couldn’t get into register for love nor money. However, there was a call to the owners house to book in. Ha! No chance of a German answering his phone at this time of night. So we gave up and went to sleep on a couple of benches until the morning as it was still a hot night. Well we were just getting settled in when Paul gave me a shout as somebody had gone into the main building and we could see about registering. We went inside and despite the registration machine it was quite deserted place, apart from the bog, but despite all I could do it would not register us in.
So we went down stairs and found a seat to kip on. I crashed out on the floor and started to sleep but, as I moved my feet the damn light switched on. This must have gone on for most of the night but, at about 0630hrs I managed to get registered and received our keys. Still not sure if the machine worked all night or it was an early morning switch, but it turned out we were in the damn room next door to the office and got it nice an early. We dumped all the stuff then went back to the shops to buy some milk and stuff for breakfast.
Back in the room we found an electric cooker hob and microwave and started on tea, bacon, eggs and toast before we went anywhere. Of course I managed to set off the fire alarm device and despite calling the damn owner and speaking to his German “schnell maschine” I gave up and waited with the fire alarm going off. About 15 minutes later up rolled the owners in a big car to put things right. Took them about 5 minutes to realise we were not dead and they turned it all off.
As the sun was shining it was time to find someplace to go.