Night out on the town...in Berlin

When we were thinking about a place to go for dinner our second night in Berlin, our group leader Hilary persuaded a group of us to head to East Berlin.  Hilary told us we were headed for the "artsy" part of town.  There was a distinctive culture shift as soon as we stepped out onto the street.  This was a neighborhood of young people.  There was a seediness to the storefronts, but also a vibrancy.  We saw a number of Stopelsteine, but also empty bottles of beer.

We strolled down a number of streets before we settled down at an Indian Restaurant.  I was heartened because I saw a sign promoting my favorite beer, Flensburger.  It was during the World Cup, so there were flat screen TVs everywhere you looked.

We sat outside at a picnic table similar to those pictured here. 

Our host gave us some festive napkins which gave us a chuckle.

I think I have a pack of these cute little numbers tucked away in a cupboard.

The food was ...ok.  The beer was pretty good.  The people watching was...terrific.

After supper, we had a little "explore-a-thon".  We found ourselves in a warehouse district sporting some interesting grafitti.

This image of young Michael Jackson was a bit odd, but we weren't prepared for some of the other images just down the way.

We took to calling this one, "Weird, Creepy Baby."

Charles Manson is bad enough, but the Yves St. Laurent tattoo was bizarre.

This was the end of the road.  These images seemed to be produced by the same artist who made the "Creepy Baby".  The globular lamp to the right of the window suggested the building might have been a club.  We did see another decorated building/warehouse which was probably a nightclub, but we weren't the right audience.

I call this one "Mutant Panda".  It was past 10 p.m. at this point, and getting dark, so we started heading for the train station.

The last wall we reviewed before climbing up to the street level feature this set of figures.  The woman looks like Susan Sarandon, and my friends agreed the man was Ronald Reagan.  The hooded figure, the saxophonist and the female figure weren't ones I recognized.  The language by the female figure at the bottom of the wall says "The angry girl always think [sic] she can do more than she can."

By the time we got back to our hotel, it was pitch black night.

Berlin's Bear greeted us with uplifted arms outside the hotel entrance, but flipped upside down in a handstand by the bar.

Clearly, it was time to pack it in for the night.