But you know how it is when you drink too much or eat too much: your reaction is "Thats it, I'm never eating or drinking again." But the coffee is weak, the beer is almost as cheap as water and you feel like less of a schmuck ordering one at a café when you need a place to sit after walking around so much. So the cycle continues.
I hear Potsdam is worth a visit. It's the main city of brandenberg, the next region outside of Berlin. But because it's so close, you can get a three-zone ticket for only about 2 euro more that covers all transportation within Berlin and Potsdam. I'm not so into the idea, even. More castles, and regal buildings and a big park, and it's cute, yadda yadda, but I think I'm actually done with castles after Latvia. I need a break from being tourist, but the hotel room is hot, and what am I going to do, sit on my ass all day? I wanted to go back to the fancy French mall we stopped into yesterday to check out again the Spanish mallorquín sandals with LADY AFRICAN DANCERS PAINTED ON THEM which I was in love with, but then justin reminded me that maybe I don't want to be that asshole white chick wearing African ladies... On her feet.
He's right. I am not going to be a cultural appropriator on this trip. Even though I was in love with those sandals. The only way to stop me from going back to that store was a trip to Potsdam.
Well, Potsdam was goddamn lovely. And it turned out to be a beautiful day. Old, beautiful buildings. A windmill. A farmers market that was hardly populated and a picnic on a bench. a UNESCO heritage site Alexandrowka of a gorgeous log cabins compound that was a gift from the German chancellor to the Russian aristocracy back in the day. A row of pristine Dutch style homes. And a walk through sans souci park, which may have been one of the prettiest I've ever seen. Stadium seated gates, and in each pair of gates was a nook filled with green vines. As far as the eye could see. And the at the top, the sans souci palace. A shade of yellow invoking the feel of Tuscany, covered with naked lady stone carvings seemingly washing themselves with grape vines. Spectacularly beautiful. And very few tourists, so you get to actually SEE the thing, unobstructed from throngs of people.
Justin had to make sure to go home early, about 4pm, to get his stuff to work with Heather. I decided to check Wannsee, a little town that I could see the sea from riding down to Potsdam on the train station. I'd look at the sea, walk around, go home. It was only 4, the sun doesn't set until 9:30, and the weather turned out out to be spectacular. I didn't have a map or a guide book or a plan, really, I wouldn't stray too far.
I waked around the sea a little bit. It had a walking path, and every couple of meters there was a strategically placed bench with the grass carved out so you could look at the sea. I decided not to sit there, because as serene as it was, i was alone, and as safe as I've felt in Germany, I didn't want to risk it.
I walk some more and stumble into an AMAZING beer garden. My first beer garden! A ton of tables, chairs, umbrellas, and benches, and perched up a hill so you could see the sea peeking out from under all of the green.
Everyone is speaking German. This is the first menu I've encountered that had nothing in English. So like a complete moron, I go to the guy and say, "it's my last day in Germany, I'm supposed to drink green beer." Heather told me that Berlin makes a special green beer. I feel like a tourist idiot, ordering green beer and asking for it in english, But he says ok and pours some green soda or syrup of some kind into glass that is shaped more like a flat-bottomed glass cereal bowl, and without judgement, points out the name on the glass and reads it to me. "Berliner kindle weisse" he says, and tells me I can get a straw over there.
A straw? For beer? What did I just do? I have a green beer in a bowl and no one else does and upon further inspection I notice that on the logo there's a little kid jumping out of the beer stein.
I ordered a fucking children's beer. Like, I think they give it to children. Like a Shirley temple, BUT WITH BEER. It tastes like light beer mixed with midori. Like apple flavored airheads with bubbles in it. Not bad, but not beer. I now feel like a total moron. Fuck it. Shake it off. Drink your kiddie beer with pride as you sit here in this beer garden by yourself, reading your iPad.
(Took me a day to learn that it's not a kid beer, it's more of a shandy. They put the syrup in the beer to offset the sourness of the particular brand. But it's important to note that I drink that shit with panache even when I thought it was for kids.)
You know what's great? Being alone in a beer garden. I found so much peace there. It finally felt some sun on my face and the air was clean and cool and I was reading my boring ass educational theory book and not one person tried to talk to me or fuck with me. Maybe I didn't look so cute that day. Maybe it was the green beer. But I think it's just normal for Germans to not talk to people they don't know. All that time on public transportation in Berlin and everyone is silent. It's spectacular.
I wanted to eat at the beer garden too, but I wasn't hungry. So I took the train to the next stop, got off, peeked around. It was the university of Potsdam. Then I took it another stop and walked around. A tiny suburb of Potsdam called *NAME*. A cute Rathaus (town hall?), cafés, a yoga studio. You could peek into the studio from the outside. German is such a harsh sounding language. How anyone is able to relax doing yoga with someone talking to in German... I don't even understand the point.
It got late enough for dinner, so I hop back on the train to the beer garden. I don't speak German, but I do know food, so I was able to figure out what most things were from the listing. Currywurst. Salat. Pommes. Weisswurst. Bretzel. I know these things.
You take a tray and order what you like. I just wanted a couple of weisswurt (hoping that I remembered correctly that the meat was veal and not some kind of liver, a mistake I made many years ago in Switzerland), a pretzel and some mustard.
But I'm watching everyone order before me. A couple of people ordered a baked potato slathered completely with the largest scoop of white sauce I'd ever seen. Nasty. Currywurst with fries. No thanks. But then the guy right before me orders some roast meat with a vat of mayonnaise-drenched potato salad on the side, with a piece of bread, presumably to soak up the mayo for a greater mayo experience. But that meat looked amazing. I said to the server, "what did HE just get?" It's pork. "Ok I only want pork, mustard, and a pretzel." No problem. He pauses at the potato salad station, like he can't understand why I wouldn't want potato salad. He puts the scoop back and apologizes. No bread? No. Just the pretzel. And a normal grown up beer this time.
The pretzel was the size of a dinner plate, soft, fluffy on the inside, chewy on the outside, buttery and salty. Our pretzels in New York are DISGUSTING compared to this. Dry and dense, even if you get it fresh. The pork was delicious, like pernil but smoked first. Mi gente dominicano, cuiden-Se. The Germans are riding your coat tails. Watch the fuck out. He included a mix of dark and white meat, and a large hunk of whatever they call chicharrón in German. A lot of meat. Including the beer, €10. I told myself to not eat all of it, but it was inevitable that that was going to happen anyway. You can't stop fate. So I just ate my meat, drank my beer, practically made love to that pretzel dipping it in spicy mustard, and smiled as I watched the sunset, enjoying German conversation and laughter all around me.
I don't know when I became this person who liked to do things alone. Often, I prefer it. Maybe it was in my late 20's. I'm not sure. But I'm so glad that that's the person I am. To be not just able to eat alone, drink alone, walk alone, but to embrace it.
What a perfect, gorgeous, phenomenal day.
Now I feel like there's so much more to see and do before I leave Berlin tomorrow. Now I'm in love. Now I don't want to go.
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