The Berliner Morgenpost

We have already visited the Cultural Bureau, the Deutscher Bundestag (their parliament), the German Federal Foreign Office, the representative of one of the other federal states that we will visit, Thuringia, the Federal Ministry for the Environmnet, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety, their teachers' college, the Goethe-Institut in Berlin, a private charity, the office of the mayor of Berlin, the Berlin Wall, Checkpoint Charley, the bridge where spies exchanged information during the Cold War, the Brandenburg Gates, a Holocaust memorial that took up the space of about half a block, tripping stones, several museums, and one of the daily local newspapers, the Berliner Morgenpost. We have been constantly on the go and are always expected to take notes and ask questions. We have had several lectures already and it is always hard to find time to write, but I will do my best to let you know what new and interesting things I see and learn about every day. I know that I am already behind, but I will touch on only one visit of the three we had today.

The Berliner Morgenpost is a daily local newspaper in a beautiful skyscraper with a gold frame and glass walls. It was founded in 1898. Obviouslý, it is not the original building. There is so much to tell about this important institution, but I will have to give you an earful when I return. To enter the building we had to show our passports, have our backpacks go through a security screen, and we had to go through a metal detector just like the airport. Only this time they gave us visitors' badges with our names and other informaton on them. We had to return the badges at the end of our visit, but I politely asked if I could have the paper insert with my name and the girl at the desk said "Ja" and smiled as she handed it to me.

The heads of the newspaper visited New York and Washington, D.C. before deciding to model their building after the Washington Post. They have 400 reporters, some who work exclusively on line where they keep track of the type of news that their Internet readers like to read. The entire paper is published on the Internet and can be viewed FREE. They still have 155,000 subscribers of the hard copy. Alex Springer, the head of the newspaper in 1965, chose the site for the current building because of its proximity to what use to be East Berlin with the Berlin Wall dividing the two sides. He placed a huge sign (smaller than the one found in Times Square in New York) to give news to the East Berliners. The Soviets responded by building skyscraper apartments to block the view of his messages. He always said that he did it because he knew that one day East and West Berliners would be one again. Many laughed at his dream of reunification. Sadly, he died four years before the two parts of Berlin became one again in 1990 after the wall came down in 1989.

The Berliner Morgenpost is awesome! It has your standard elavators but also an open, constantly moving elevator, just as the one we saw at the German Federal Foreign Service. We were told at the foreign service office that it was so their agents could get on and off from one floor to the next in a hurry. I could see where that type of elevator could be an important part of a newspaper. We were not allowed to ride the perpetually moving elevator at the foreign service office, but the newspaper allowed us to ride that particular elevator down when our visit was over.

Better go. Blog at you later! (I'm getting better at memorizing where buttons are so I can get more out of my minutes.)

Rappelling

As we were getting ready to take a bus to our first guided tour after we arrived on Sunday, we paused outside our hotel to view the plaza. A crowd of people had suddenly gathered near us, and began looking up and speaking in German . So we all turned to look in their direction. Our eyes discovered what all the commotion was about. Two men were scaling the glass walls of our hotel. Welcome to the antics of the young!

Some of us actually spoke with the two men who were in their twenties. They had a table in our hotel lobby. I asked them what the purpose was of their feat, thinking it was a marketing ploy. They smiled and answered that they do it on an almost daily basis because it is FUN. I inquired further about the hotel's attitude toward what they do. They answered that the hotel didn't mind. It was then that I knew that this had to be part of a marketing plan.

I would have liked to post a photo of the rappelling but these German computers will not accept my cables so I will have to wait until I get home to post photographs. Sorry! I should have known I was in trouble when I couldn't find certain keys and the letters on the keyboard were in different places.

Scenes From My Hotel Windows

This is my first opportunity to use the Internet Cafe here in Berlin. The keyboard is slightly different so I have wasted precious minutes trying to navigate through this computer in an attempt to get everything to come up in English. At this rate, I will be lucky to write an entry before my minutes are up.

My colleagues and I have corner rooms at our hotel. That means that we have two different views of the city. From one of my windows, the gigantic globe-like radio tower looms over the city. The tower is a reminder that this part of Berlin was once known as East Berlin during the Cold War. From my other window I see the old Town Hall with its beautiful clocks on all four sides. The Domed Cathedral's cupola can be found to the right of the Town Hall. This exquisite Lutheran Church is no longer used for church services but is used for musical recitals throughout the year, instead.

We went for lunch to a German restaurant that served sandwiches so we could eat and run. We were going on our first of many walking tours after a quick bite. Getting wornout is the quickest way to get your body adjusted to the new time. It is wet and dreadry, but that won't dampen our spirits. We're ready to visit the Cultural Bureau!

An Afternoon and Evening in D.C.

My airplane out of Columbus was two hours late. That made it risky to make my connection at O'Hare in Chicago for my flight into Washington, D.C. When we finally landed in Chicago I noted the departure time of my connecting flight on the kiosk and realized that I had two minutes to get to the gate to my connecting flight on the opposite side of the terminal. I quickly ran with my two bags, camera, and purse to catch two escalators down and then go across the bridge to reach my gate (without knocking anyone down). I arrived at my gate just as the plane was boarding. Once I got on board I took a much needed restroom break as other passengers were filing in.

Getting on the Metro was an experience! It's not that I haven't been on one before, it's that I've always had my husband to rely upon and I wasn't toting two bags, a camera, and a purse. But a Metro employee came to my rescue. He helped me get on the correct train so that I was able to emerge in the middle of Chinatown in Washington, D.C. as per the institute's instructions.

I came across some interesting "Walk" and "Do Not Walk" signs here in D.C. Some of the streets were so wide that seconds counted down to let you know how much time you had left to cross the street safely. You can see the image above.

After finding my way to the Hampton Inn, I freshened up and went to the Goethe-Institut branch in D.C. There the staff introduced themselves and the German consul came to welcome us. An ice breaker activity ensued before we were refreshed on German courtesies and institute guidelines.

Our airline tickets to Germany were distributed and then we previewed a film on contemporary Berlin. What a progressive city! We also viewed the premier of a new Goethe-Institut film which we were asked to critique. The film noted that the current mayor of Berlin was schooled in Ohio! It didn't say exactly where in Ohio. I will try to find out tomorrow.

The evening ended with a sumptious Mediterranean meal consisting of some foods that I would classify as Middle Eastern, such as the stuffed grape leaves. We had German beer and wine to compliment our meal. I "hooked up" with another second grade teacher from Kansas. It's amazing how much Vickie O'Neal and I are alike.

No pictures yet. Must get to bed to get up early for our morning meeting and an intensive German language lesson. Then it's off to Berlin by way of Frankfurt.

Weighing the Pros and Cons

It has finally come down to the wire. I have to decide whether or not to take my laptop with me. On the plus side, everything is ready to go and I know exactly how to navigate this laptop to get the results I want. It will only take me a few minutes to upload the photographs and a little longer to write the commentary. On the down side, this is an expensive piece of equipment and I will have to carry it with me wherever I go. I would hate to come back to my hotel room and find it missing. But carrying this laptop all day can become a real burden. I know because I have transported it back and forth from school on a daily basis. And that was only a few minutes worth!

I've tried walking up and down the stairs with my luggage as was recommended by members of the Goethe-Institut. This is to prepare me for the lugging of baggage at the older train stations where escalators do not exist. Sometimes this has to be accomplished at a fast pace.

After several trips of going up and down our flight of stairs here at home (15 steps to be exact), I realized that it wasn't as facile as I thought it would be. This trial test was without my laptop! It was at that moment that I decided not to bring my laptop. I will use the Internet cafes that are available in big cities instead. That means that I may not be able to post every day, but I will do it as often as I can. As far as the photographs go, I will see how much time I have to upload them after my journal entry into the blog. My thinking is that I can always load those photos onto my blog once I return from Germany if I don't have a chance to do it while I am overseas. I'll keep you posted.

Independence Day

As the day nears to my departure for Germany, I am learning to use a technology that has been around for a while ... blogging. This morning I am learning to upload photographs in preparation for my blogging overseas.

Today is Independence Day 2008 and family will be visiting this weekend. It is wet and dreary outside, but pride in this country's birthday swells, even in the heart of this Croatian. I am thankful that my parents came to this country many years ago when I was just a child ready to enter first grade. I didn't speak English at that time, but by the end of first grade I was speaking three languages: Croatian, Italian, as well as English. Once we arrived in America, my parents were eager to become U.S. citizens. But according to U.S. law they had to wait five years before they could apply for U.S. citizenship. They used those first five years to go to school to learn to speak English and were schooled on the history and laws of this great country. Given that my younger sister and I were of school age and had attended school in the United States since first grade, we, along with our parents, became naturalized citizens five years after we had arrived in America. On the contrary, my older brother and sister who were teens when we had arrived, were required to go through the same process as our parents. Today is a great day to be an American ... native born or naturalized!

Anticipation

Each year the Goethe-Institut's Transatlantic Outreach Program (TOP) awards scholarships to social studies educators throughout the U. S. to study in Germany. This year I was one of those lucky educators. I am a second grade teacher for the Diocese of Columbus at Notre Dame Elementary in Portsmouth, Ohio.

The anticipation of the orientation in Washington, D.C. and the travel throughout Germany to meet with German educators, government officials, the business community, the media, and the Germans themselves has made it difficult to fall asleep at night. I can't wait for the adventure to begin!