Fish with Whiskey

I mean… this is just some sort of confirmation bias right?

Right????

We are currently trying to navigate our way around the German genders- male, female, and neutral- which, for those of you playing at home, have to be applied to every single noun. A chair is male, a cat is female, luck is neutral.

It is quite painful: lots of rote learning, and even for the situations where there is a rule (e.g. most words starting with ‘Ge’ are neutral), there are, of course, many exceptions.

And of course, the four prepositions: der (masc.), die (fem.) das (neutral), or die (plural), (which all mean ‘the’, for those of you still playing), change (although of course not consistently), depending on the case (Nominativ- for subjects, Akkusativ- for objects, Dativ- for the word ‘where’, several verbs etc., and Genetiv- possessive).

This Tuesday, we started on Dativ, and learnt to our dismay that ‘die’ (which is the feminine singular if the noun is the subject) becomes ‘der’ (still feminine singular, but now Dativ). Of course, ‘der’ is also the Nominativ masculine singular, but not in this case*.

So when the teacher asks us how to say a sentence, for example, ‘the glass is on the table’ in German, we try to remember what the words are, then what gender they are (the hardest part by far), then what case they are (glass= Nominativ, table= Dativ), then we try to change them into the right case and realise that we’ve forgotten the original gender, and then, three minutes after the teacher has driven to the store to buy a mug, ground some beans, and made herself a cup of coffee, we come up with the answer.

Which is my long, rambling way of saying: I like the word ‘Beer’ in German.

Most alcoholic drinks are Maskulin (I don’t like alcohol, Andy, who happens to be a boy, does- remembered!), but Bier is an exception. It’s das Bier.

I like this because das, which is used among other things, for diminutive (kittens as opposed to cats, and anything you want to cute-ify), is the preposition for water (das Wasser). I remember this by thinking that water doesn’t need a male or female identity- it just is. It always has been and it always will be here, it’s everywhere, and it’s entirely necessary for life. And that’s why, in my head at least, it’s das.

I like to think that to Germany, the same argument would apply to beer.

It’s ubiquitous!

Which might explain the Shampoo.

* Did you pick up the pun? Points for you!

Having woken up about 4am, reached the airport just after 5 and finally jetted off well past our 7 am scheduling (they had to de-ice the plane, seemingly removing the last 3 months of weather from it), we arrived in Amsterdam after 9.

Like every capital city that is not Perth, Amsterdam is pretty simple to get to (from the airport) and around. On arrival, we bustled around the tourist information area near the (very beautiful) Amsterdam Central Station, before committing to buying the ‘I amsterdam’ city card.

The card includes travel on public transport, and free access into most of the major museums and art galleries. You also get 25 % off at various restaurants and theatres, and similarly cheaper rates for things like bike and scooter hire. Finally, they throw in a river cruise, and a couple of free giveaways at selected shops (we didn’t bother with this, as we assumed it would be cheap tourist tack, but I guess you could turn the whole thing into a bit of a treasure hunt).

We bought the card because we figured it would push us to do as much as possible in the small amount of time we had.  I would recommend it, but will note that the problem for us was that most of the major cultural events that we wanted to see were only open from 10:00-17:00, so you can hit 2 of at best 3 in a day…. this narrows the 24 hour period down somewhat, and means having to chose just a few of the 50 or so offerings.

We headed to our ‘Hotel’ and dumped our bags (too early to check in), then had a wander around the area, heading generally towards the middle of town. Due to very late-minute booking, our hotel was right on the edge of the canal systems that make up Amsterdam’s city centre:

Ultimately, I don’t thing this was a problem. The area was still safe, and there are trams running continuously past. Plus, we were pretty close to Museumplein!

Our wander, which was accompanied by many oohs and ahhs and pictures of flowers, bikes, and canals, ultimately had a purpose: Andy’s blood sugar had become dangerously low, and the poor boy was near death.

Food!

Mine had blue cheese and mushrooms inside, plus I nabbed a blue cheese dipping sauce for the chips.

It was all very delicious (and necessary by that time), and I’m very glad that we didn’t end up eating here instead:

This looks, to me, to be possibly one of the few things in the world less appetising than McDs. Of course, if Andy became some sort of President, I suspect we would quickly see these becoming a legal requisite of every street corner.

Can you believe that when we came out of the burger shop it had started snowing?
Disgusting!
Although it serves us right for leaving our easter-booking until the very last minute and not being able to travel anywhere properly warm. Thankfully, the Amsterdam snow had the decency to melt before it hit the ground, and not cover everything in a giant warmth-and-happiness dampening blanket as in Deutschland.

This winter has apparently been one of the longest and darkest on records, although I have to say that it’s been fairly mild. I like the snow, but the start of spring this year was a terrible series of jokes, in which a sunny day was rapidly followed by a massive onslaught of snow, which echoed with the mocking laughter of the weather gods. Thus every third day seemed to be ‘finally, the start of spring’, and every snowfall ‘the last’.. but.. it never was!

The crescendo of this farce was that, while Christmas day was snow-free, Easter (in which one has the desire and the right to see little flowers blossoming and rabbits happily frolicking and the like), saw snowfall.

As I write this, it’s been fairly sunny for over a week, with the temperature predicted to zip past 20 in the next few days, but I’m still not 100% certain that it’s not just another trick.

I often find, that in moments of infinite winter, one needs to stock up on sugary, starchy goodness. Luckily, we were in Amsterdam, where such goodies are present in multiple incarnations: poffertjes (little mini pancakes), waffles, and, my personal poison, Olliebollen:

These  are like German Quarkballchen, which I guess are distantly related to doughnut balls, but they are so, so much better. The inside is a yeasty dough, without excess sugar, and with juicy raisins. The ball is fried, and then, to combat this internal deficit, heavily powdered with icing sugar.

Growing up, our next door neighbours were Dutch, so my sister and I were able to develop a healthy interest in Olliebollen from a young age.

Sometimes I think that people who are anti multiculturalism not only have no soul, they also have no tastebuds.

After several hours, we headed back to the Hotel to check in. The man at admin was very nice- spoke fairly good German and English (and obviously Dutch).. but everything else about the Hotel was abysmal.

*I originally had a paragraph here about why it was so crap, but I don’t really want to poison my blog with too much whining, so I’ll just say this: Ultimately, we went at a busy and expensive time, so I understand that the cost of the room was very much out of proportion for the rest of the year. Nonetheless, even for 1/3 of the price, I would not chose to stay at Hotel Marnix again.

At this point in the journey, I’m embarrassed to say, I then had a little nap.
I think in the future, it’s probably worth the extra night’s accommodation cost in order to maximize the weekend.

We headed back out into the nearly-night, and after more walking had some dinner. I also managed to lure Andy into Albert Heijn (Aldi/Woolies) to find Stroopwafels. For some shocking reason (are they connected to Easter?), they were all sold out, except for the fancy Bio ones. Parenthetically (because the amount of actual parentheses in this paragraph is getting out of control..heh..), I know the phrase ‘I don’t believe in Bio’ is ridiculous, but I refuse to buy their overpriced product- especially when, at least in Australia, the use of labels like ‘organic’ and ‘bio’ is poorly regulated, and thus can be thrown around somewhat willy-nillily.

Luckily, I was allowed to buy almond bunnies instead. My heart belongs to anything that contains almond meal. And seriously, how adorably shifty does this little fellow look?:

 Also shifty:

So we roamed, and enjoyed the pretties of Amsterdam, before making our way to the Hotel and bed.

There are so many lovely, beautiful things in this world!

In an attempt to snuffle out that rare and valuable thing in this city: a good Asian restaurant, Jerry from work has been organising for the past couple of years ‘group hits’ on promising-sounding locales. The idea being that if you have 10 or 20 people choosing one or two dishes each, you can cover a large portion of the menu, and thus fairly conclusively decide the value of the place, with a single visit.

This time, the group, including two Australians who have been whining non-stop about missing proper Asian food for the last several months, headed to Ming Dynastie, which is rather promisingly situated right next to the Chinese embassy in the centre of Berlin. 

Our party consisted of two Chileans (or one Chilean and one Columbian):

Plus a French man, a German:

Another German and another French lady. Plus our Chinese leader:

 Two more Germans, two Japanese, and two Aussies:

(I should apologise here about the quality of the photos- the settings were totally off and my autofocus was spazzing, but for the most part I was too busy stuffing my face with food to notice at the time).

Anyway, the menu at this place is extensive, with well over a hundred different dishes, including lots of dim-sum delicacies.. I was very happy to be involved in the eating of various sweet and savoury bao, and someone even managed to order those amazing deep fried sesame balls that my sister and I have been addicted to since birth.

Despite all the options, with Jerry’s help, and under the watchful eye of the Emperor, we managed to navigate our way through!

Here are the first two items that arrived. I have to admit that after them it became much more of a scrum, and I had to lay down my camera in order to commit to the ruthless battles for control over the Lazy Susan.

Fish! It’s been a while since I had proper fish. Possibly not at all while I’ve been in Deutschland. This was well cooked, but I think the ‘soupy’ part could have been more heavily flavoured. Also, it was riddled with whole peppercorns. I’m not fond of pepper, and crunching down on a peppercorn is one of my least favourite culinary experiences. However, I’ve noticed that Europeans (?) seem to embrace pepper as a spice, and, much to my disappointment, many of the foods labeled as ‘spicy’ here, are simply ‘peppery’. Interestingly, several of the group found this dish ‘spicy’, although I am pretty sure that no chili had even been waved in its vicinity.

These ones are tofu skins- deep fried.

And the scrum begins!

(As an aside- I love this photo, despite how terribly it turned out. I am particularly fond of Dirk’s facial expression- and the fact that he was pulling this face in several of the other photos from the night).

(I am worried about Andy’s attempt to out-Japanaese Hiro here. This could be a slippery slope).

Overall the food was nice, but I think what dominated for me was how enjoyable the whole situation was: there’s not too many things in life that are better than sitting with a group of friends in a private room, listening to looping Chinese elevator music and scoffing your face with a massive assortment and volume of food. 

A couple of weeks ago, my dear friend Ashlee posted an episode of QI from the G season on my facebook wall: G is for Germany. (You can see it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6CldlRZ9Xew)

I was amused by the discussions about ‘Nasty Germans stealing all the deck chairs from the lovely Brits when on holiday’.

Apparently, one of the biggest stereotypes about Germans from the English point of view is that they wake up early, and, while the Brits are still gorging on the Breakfast Buffet (and the Aussies have presumably not yet rolled out of bed), they lay out their towel on the sunbeds, thus reserving them for the day.

How DARE they be more organised than us!?

I’m going to be honest: hearing about this did more to ram home the ‘winging pom’ stereotype than any about the Germans.

But looking into it, I’m actually a little worried.

Here (http://metro.co.uk/2007/05/29/brits-cheer-as-german-towels-burn-403192/), is a story of a Welsh coach driver who first dumped all the towels into the pool, and then, when those Germans didn’t learn their lesson the first time.. SET THE TOWELS ON FIRE.

And because the hotel, who actually owned the towels, decided not to press charges, this idiot became some sort of hero, triumphing the rights of the ‘underdog’ (I mean, when did Brits become the underdog??!!).

I give you the last line:
According to reports, no further towels have been left on the sunbeds since Mr Bowden started burning things, marking a heroic victory for the good, old-fashioned British sense of decency, justice and fair play.

I hope your parents are proud.

Anyway.
A couple of weeks ago we came home to see this:

We can only hope it escalates.

Look, I know I’ve been crying wolf a bit lately.. but I think it really might be happening this time.

We went for a walk today, and for the first time since my I arrival, I didn’t have to wear my ‘winter’ jacket!
It was NINE degrees.
I only had a thin jumper on.
I actually rolled up the sleeves at one point!

People! I think this may actually be it:

(of Winter).

Behold! The (fingers crossed) last remnants of snow:

We went for a nice walk in the sun, and it was really exciting to see all the bulbs emerging, and the flowers frolicking.

Take that, last of the snow!

(Look! the joy of actual snow being replaced with little snowdroppy flowers)

I mean! Really! I know you doubt my (ab)use of the English language sometimes, but that is most definitely what I would call ‘A Frolick of Flowers’.

Hangin’ with my Pony. Ever since watching Veronica Mars (probably the second best show ever), I have had a slight obsession with the idea of asking people to buy me ponies (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sBu_mkcpSU).

Who’s a pretty Mandarin Duck then?

 I’m disappointed that male humans don’t do this. Seriously, that ridiculous macho posturing to get our attention would be SO much better if you added some colour and a bit of body glitter. Also, I want to know that your display is actually reducing your fitness in some way (like the negative impact on camouflage seen above).

I think because my parents took my sister and I to lots of school fetes when we were young I have this really positive reminiscence anytime I venture near this sort of thing (providing there are not too many people)… I really love the environment of being outdoors in the sun with the smell of food and the sound of music and voices over the loudspeaker. Oddly enough, as we walked up to the Ferris wheel they were playing Johnny Cash’s Ring of Fire.. which I had spent the morning singing loudly and on repeat (I only know the two chorus lines). Lucky Andy!

He managed to distract himself from my beautiful song with a half-metre long sausage.

I love how many ‘big kids’ were riding this thing.

Crepe with Tofiffee. I have probably blogged about them before but if not, google image it. They are little cups of solid toffee filled with a hazelnut, some nutella, and topped with milk chocolate. One of the most addictive inventions ever created. Add that to the gloriousness of a crepe and you have what can only described as ‘Melty Deliciousness’

… because after all the Olliebollen of Amsterdam, I couldn’t remember what Quarkballchen tasted like. This one was supposed to be Mandel, but was a bit disappointing because it wasn’t super almondy, and was also cold.
Booo.

Yeah that’s right Andy.. Back. Away. From. My Crepe.

  This is more towards the centre of Potsdam. We also took a stroll down the main street.

 And had Icecream!

More Posing in the Sun:

There were bikes:

There were flowers:

There were pretty little houses all in a row:

and there were canals:

But, apart from the very touristy visit to the sex museum and a tour in the red light district, no sex (*ok, I just re-read that and realised that sounds sad for me and sounds ‘too much information-y’ for you. What I mean to say is ‘no public/financially facilitated engagement in sex’.)

Also no drugs.

And very little rock and roll.

Going to Amsterdam for the weekend had the weird quality of making me feel both more aligned with Germany, and less German at the same time.

I remember when I went to Holland in ’09 with Ashlee and Lauren, we felt (admittedly at least partially because of the amazing hospitality of Lauren’s extended family), that Holland was more ‘homey’ or ‘Australia-y’ than London, Paris and various German and Italian cities that we had visited in the previous 2 months.

This time, I felt that again to a certain degree, but now it was in very sharp juxtaposition with all the Germannesses of German society that are gradually becoming the norm for us here.

It was really obvious to me that a lot of the ‘culture-shock’ (that is standard in any foreign visit), especially in the first few hours after arrival, was coming from differences between Holland and my newly adopted culture, as opposed to between Holland and Australia. I became more aware of being a Germany-living Aussie, whereas of course here in Germany my cultural identity is very much defined (in a group of international students and Germans) as purely Australian. (Of course in Australian, within a group of Australians, this identity melts away and other factors intrude). Meeting other Australians on the tours, it felt necessary to mention that we live in Germany… making us maybe less proper Ausssie tourists and more…. ‘semi-Europeans travelling in Europe’?

Maybe that’s just me being pretentious.

The language was another aspect. I’m going to totally offend Lauren, but I spent half the weekend laughing at the fact that Dutch really sounds quite odd. German, the beautiful language of the world’s most famous dictator, simply sounds more ‘dignified’ and beautiful to me. And I felt happy when I heard the tourist announcements in German, and pleased that I could make out some of the words.

On the other hand, the trip made me much more aware of some of the things that I’m missing in Deutschland. One of the really obvious things was the amount of non-Caucasians, not just as tourists but (I’m assuming a lot here) as proper Dutch-speaking second of third generation immigrants. And this of course was reflected in the shops and the food and the atmosphere and the culture and…. I miss it!

Australians! Multiculturalism is literally The. Best. Go out now and rub yourself all over in its glory!

Hullo!

It’s been a while since a blog, mostly because Andy and I ‘jetted’ off to the Netherlands for the long weekend.
This statement makes our life seem more glamorous than it really is. Please try to imagine me saying it in the poshest, toffiest accent possible.
Is it still classed as ‘jetting’ when one is in a vehicle not much larger than a biplane?

It was a really nice trip, and we got to see many amazing things (although only about 1/63rd of what Amsterdam has to offer, and thus probably about 1/3478900 of the Nederlands). *Sigh*.. now we just have to go back.

One of the fun things was remembering all the times from when I eurotripped with the lovely Ashlee and Lauren.

Here’s a quick visual:

Lauren and Tegan in Shoe, ’09. I think Ash refused to get in…

I feel I can still pull off the shoe.

More furious blogging during the week.

 … have decided to accessorise Hair with Car.

Spring has Sprung!

Alas, only in the confines of our centrally heated apartment.
I’ve been buying lots of flowers, not only to brighten up the place and because they’re so bloomin’ (why yes!) cheap here, but because I imagine that their timely death acts as a sacrifice, which pleases the weather spirits,  who will ultimately grant us The Warmth.

One of my favourite ‘floral bunches’ is the cherry blossoms, which you buy as a heap of boring-looking sticks with tiny buds, but which gradually bloom into very lovely delicate flowers.

Not merely pretty, but also makes me think of an episode of M*A*S*H in which the team are all huddled around outside, on a clearly freezing cold day, whilst Radar unveils a cherry blossom twig to ceremoniously mark the first of spring (which has been raised in a hot-house).

Much like Frühling in Deutschland.

We’ve seen the first of spring by the calender definition, and also by the more scientific ‘somewhere near the 20th of the month’ definition, and, I have to say, that at minus 6, it’s still not entirely Sprung-y.

So the flower shops and I are desperately trying to cultivate the feeling.

And now, the Easter brigade has joined in:

The hauptbahnhof is filled with oversized terrifying mechanical rabbits employed in menial tasks. Their brightly coloured floral sweat-shops are enough to make anyone want to go outside.

Because outside is away from the rabbits.

Of course, there are also rabbit-themed baked goods, but they were, as it so often turns out when you buy food based merely on it’s novelty value, somewhat disappointing. Anyone who has bought a dinosaur doughnut past the age of 6 will understand this tragedy.

But I digress.
Despite the cold (and the nasty biting wind, did I tell you yet about the wind?), last weekend die Sonne Scheint!
Or it did shine. Now is Monday. And night. But we haven’t got round to past tense in german lessons yet.

So to celebrate both this, and the slightly greater ease with which I can now breathe due to a belated triumph of my immune system, we went a-wandering

These are all from around Kreuzberg. We had a pretty nice-albeit-freezing walk around the river, along with the 3,000 other Kreuzbergians who had taken to the streets in the hope of getting enough Vitamin D in their system to last through the next patch of ‘weather’. We also managed to find this amazing store that was a combination art/material/sculpture/furniture/modern design/architectural/stationary store.

As a kid, my mother only bought me the 50 for 1 dollar types of pencils  (let’s be honest, I couldn’t be trusted not to lose or break them).. so now I have a unhealthy obsession with all types of stationary. I think it also helps that I’m a naturally chaotic person, and the beautiful folders and pencil trays and cardboard boxes feed into an unrealistic belief that if I had all the pretties, I would suddenly be capable of remembering where I put my passport, or which letter needs posting…

After a short period of wandering, gazing, and lusting, Andy re-discovered me in the ‘crafts’ section lovingly fondling some dried moss and dreaming of terrariums:

As he had only eaten a single egg and two pieces of bread for breakfast (having snootted his nose at my bunny cake), he was well into the ‘starving’ part of his day, so we hurried over to ‘Kreuzberg Proper’ (the place with the food) and scarffed massive amounts of food at Knoffi.

Sabine took me to Knoffi when I dropped by for the IMPRS interview last April, and I was pretty keen to go back and re-visit their ‘Knoffi teller’- a massive vegetarian tasting plate with Dolmadis, stuffed aubergines, sheeps cheese, various dips and turkishbread and salad and many other hidden delights.

I had tried to drag Andy in previously, but he found the environment a little heavy.

Personally, I’m a little in love with it! I like to imagine that this is how any of the members my extended (particularly Marriot) family would stock a shop if they ever took to the trade.

Luckily I was able to dull his senses by imposition of prolonged fasting and force spicy chicken on him in his moment of weakness!

By the time we had gorged, evening was well on its way, so after a bit more wandering and a look in a few shops, we headed back to the homestead.

I’ve been ‘visited’ by a nasty cold which has seen me miss the majority of work this week in favour of fevered fetal huddling. Luckily for you, this post does not revolve around disgustingness that has been fermenting in my poor  lung… instead: Physical human guests of an invited type.

James came to stay with us at the start of Feb., which was perfectly timed, as Andy was becoming increasingly bored of being a Hausmann. Possibly not as great for James, who’s kindness we abused by getting him to carry a washing machine from our friend’s cellar to the brand new apartment (to add insult to injury, we then couldn’t work out how to use the thing in time for him to do a wash before moving on). Similar enforced roles included hefting a footstool that we found on the side of the road all the way back home, cooking several Jamie Oliver style feasts, and even putting together the Ikea pots and pans needed to make the meals.

Yeah, we’re pretty much the worst hosts ever.

I had to work everyday, so James and Andy spent the week together going on exciting adventures, roaming through wildernesses, doing architectural tours of Berlin and the surroundings, and becoming BFFs.

So Andy will have to do a guest blog to fill you in on the meaty part of their adventures… meanwhile, here’s some stuff from the weekend, when they let me out of the lab.

On the Saturday, we went for a general wander, hoping to see some of the cultural and architectural wonders hidden throughout Berlin.

(Guests are also good for taking couple photos!)

For the ‘slightly less cold, more indoorsy’ part of the wandering program, we headed into the Museum für  Naturkunde.

A representative from the museum had come to the Institute several weeks earlier to give us a spiel about the wonders contained within. Honestly, it was a little ‘pitchy’ to me, aimed at investors and not scientists-I felt like he was expecting me to be so overwhelmed by the marvels of which he spoke that I would pull out a novelty sized checkbook or start throwing money at him. He would reel off a whole lot of ‘key performance indicator’ numbers, for example how many children per month were involved in their fabulous interactive science experience workshops, without ever telling me what was so fabulous about these workshops, and how they were bringing the science.
So a little dull, but good enough that I, the choir to which he preached, thought ‘yes, I like science, I shall go see me some science’.

And I must say, there were some definite WOWs about it.
For example: Dinosaurs!

This is pretty much the entrance of the museum, and seriously, kudos to them- if you’ve got yourself some dinosaur skeletons, you want to show them off.
This exhibit was made even better by the fact that, from the side of the room, you could look through binoculars at the skeletons and ALL THE DINOSAURS WOULD COME TO (virtual) LIFE… and prance around the room. Magical! (Scientifical!)

Of course, the kids totally hogged the CGI coolness.

What I did realise is that, apart from learning about Filbert the Dinosaur’s runny nose, knowing that Dinosaurs Didn’t Wear Sandshoes (they couldn’t even if they tried), and wanting desperately to know where the Diprotodon got its pouch from (these are all Conway Brother songs- I have yet to find someone who has shared this childhood moment with my sister and I)… Ariel and I didn’t really go through a dinosaur stage.. and my knowlege is pretty limited.

For example, this is not a Stegasaurus.

  (It’s his cousin, a Kentrosaurus)

And real Pterodactyls (the Pterodactylus genus of Pterosaur) are ridiculously small:

(He also has various cousins, which ranged in size from ‘Tegan’s idea of what a Pterodactyl is’ to ‘actual Pterodactylus/large butterfly’)

As is Archeopteryx:

 I’ve left my reflection in so you can get an idea of the height.

 I have to admit that I did find the Archeopteryx pretty amazing. You know how sometimes you see famous art and you just feel ‘ok, I’ve seen that then.. next’, and other times you’re just blown away and really Get It (the Pieta is one example for me)? Well anyway, Archeopteryx is the star of the Natural History Museum and, I can see why- tiny but magnificent.

The rest of the museum was also pretty cool, although the volume of stuffed animals gave me a sense of exhaustion after a while. They even had an exhibit displaying the winners of a recent Taxonomy competition.

This one won some sort of ‘best in show’. He’s a Kea (*edited- not a Kakapo as previously written), and according to our resident Kiwi, Adam, they are mountain birds that form terrifying gangs, which trash the cars of skiing holidaymakers  (According to the Kiwi film we saw at the Berlinale, which featured a gang instead of small Kiwi children, car-trashing might actually be the national sport of New Zealand).

Of course they also had a Kangaroo:

Overall, the museum is super visual.

Although it’s possible that some of those ‘visuals’ are a little creepy:

Check out all the specimen jars!

It’s slightly hard to tell from the photos, but rather than being a single wall, this exhibit actually encloses a lab area, and the museum is particularly dedicated towards analyzing their billions of specimens,

Although sadly many of the specimens were originally fixed in a manner that does not preserve the actual integrity  of the DNA…

Nonetheless, very shiny.

I think it’s worth a visit just for the ‘art’ value of the place.

Anyway, after the glow of the museum, we headed back outside for some more hiking and climbing and frolicking.

Which also involved some posing near the Wall.

 And some more architecture. I thought this was called the Reunification of Unification Church, but I can’t seem to find it on Google. Alas, we weren’t able to go inside.. but it reminds me of somebody (possibly wise, but I think most likely Homer Simpson) talking about ‘building cages for God’.

The surrounding area contains statues and memorials and information of the happenings around that part of the wall.

 Nearby is a graveyard, a large part of which was removed during the divide to create a No Mans’ Land at the wall.

Quite a cool city to walk around!