Last night we (the 10 of us students on the trip) decided to make a trek to Kreuzberg to check out the Berliner nightlife. So we met up in the hotel around 10pm and Keith, who had been to the area and knows German, led us to the U-Bahn (the subway) and we took it down a few stops to head to a bar that he read about in a travel guide. We walked for quite some time and when we figured out where it should've been, it pretty much just looked like an abandoned crack house, so we moved along. We stopped at a bar and got a few drinks before taking the U-Bahn again to where the club was. We got on the train to a guy singing "Wonderwall" and playing guitar, and next thing we know, a drunk guy gets on the max and some guys start arguing in German (I was later told they were arguing about iPhones or something and then one guy said something rude about the other's mother--good to know that insults are similar in all cultures) and one chokes the other, and the other pulls a knife on him. A few of the people from our trip were right there and got out of the way, while the rest of us watched from afar. Another guy broke up the fight and the two guys got off at the next stop, so I'll never know what happened, but what an experience! So we finally got to the stop for the club, and took a while to find the club because it wasn't well-marked (or at all that I could tell) and we paid to get in. Mind you, by this time it was a little after midnight-- a time when most clubs in Portland would be busy-- but not here, we were about 50% of the population of the club. Well we had a few more drinks and attempted to dance to the eclectic techno music, and by about 2am we were ready to leave even though that's finally when it was getting crowded. We stopped for Currywurst on the way home-- I just got fries, and by 4am I was snug in my bed.
Skip ahead to 10:30am this morning, when we had class to go over some chemistry of brewing and off-flavors in beer. I surprisingly was able to figure out a lot of the chemistry-- probably something in the back of my brain from nutrition and physiology classes. It was also was interesting to learn about how off-flavors can get into beer-- mostly from craziness going on with the yeast-- but more interesting to find out that people sometimes purposely create those things in the beer to "spike" the beer for tasting, or in the case of Belgian Lambics, some "off-flavors" are a sign of that beer style.
After class, we trekked to the Deutsches Technikmuseum, which kind of seemed like a German OMSI. It had sections about boats, trains, jewelry making, and of course a brewery. The brewery was in a separate building but it was a good start for us before we visit actual breweries, because we were able to learn all the basics of breweries without having to think about that particular brewery. The brewery/museum that we were visiting was in business from about 1910 to 1990 and was 4 levels high. The process started at the top floor with the milling process, and then proceeds downwards with fermentation and bottling on the bottom floor. We then had a bit of time to look around the rest of the museum before we left for lunch.
Lunch was at a place that served Berliner Weisse, because Emma was giving her presentation on it. First the U train we were taking stopped for repairs or something (I'm not sure, the announcement was in German) so we had to walk the rest of the way. We got a little turned around and sidetracked, passed the restaurant, and looped around to find it. The hostess/waitress then wouldn't seat the 12 of us until our German professor talked to her. We finally sat down and I had a Berliner Weisse with raspberry syrup, which is the same thing I got the first day at the Thai restaurant, except this time was a lot better. You could tell that it was actually beer with syrup in it rather than just some beer/juice mix. At the place we went, you could order it without syrup, but it's really sour so it is usually mixed with either Woodruff or raspberry syrup to balance it out. They also served it in the proper glass-- a chalice of sorts-- as well as with a straw. The whole experience was better than the super juicy one in a plastic cup with a bendy straw that the Thai restaurant gave us. I also ordered Weiner Schnitzel-- which I wasn't aware was the same thing I had the other day, but it was much different. Yesterday it was served with a mushroom gravy and potatoes, and today it was just breaded and served with fries. It was good, but I think I preferred the way it was served yesterday. I always thought Weiner Schnitzel was a type of sausage, but that might just be because it has the word weiner in it.
Anyway, sorry for the super long post today, just had a lot of adventuring to fill everyone in on. I haven't gotten around to add more pictures to my computer--especially considering I left it in my jacket when we checked it and only took pictures on my ipod in the museum today, so I won't have as many from today. Tomorrow we have class and a few presentations, and then a lunch and tour at Brauhaus Spandau.
Bis morgen!
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