Kreuzberg, finally!

Yesterday, I went into Kreuzberg with Geoffrey and we had dinner at Knofi, a Mediterranean place.  Kreuzberg is much younger than Wilmersdorf/Charlottenburg, and also much poorer, which means there's a ton of delicious, cheap places to eat and fun places to shop.  I'll post more about it after this weekend, but here's stuff from the adventures yesterday!  The food was SO good, oh my goodness.  I ate way, way more than I should have.  For 6.50E, I got hummus, black olive spread, and baba ghanoush; artichoke and olive salad, mushroom and carrot salad; three grape leaves, and gobs of bread.

After we ate, we bought a couple beers and walked over to a bridge where all the locals congregate.  It was sunny and warm and there was a guy playing guitar, and we sat and drank our beers while watching the swans in the river and talking about politics and gay rights and tropical fruits.  


Today I went to Kant Straße and wandered around there.  I found a fantastic place called Back-Factory, which is a bakery with super cheap and delicious bakery-type items and sandwiches.  I got a croissant, which I think must have been brushed with salt water or something because it tasted exactly like a pretzel, a Pfannkuchen (known everywhere else as a Berliner, hence the hilarity than ensued when JFK included the article "ein" in his statement "Ich bin ein Berliner", lending the meaning "I am a jelly donut") which wasn't actually that tasty, but was decorated to look like a soccer ball in keeping with soccer fever, a weird sausage-pastry thing, and a fantastic Nutella-esque croissant which, of course, I ate first.

I also made a startling discovery: TJ Maxx is in Berlin!  The weirdest part: It's called TK Maxx.  What the what?!  I have no idea why the name is different.  I went in to see if they had any sandals I liked, but sadly, they did not.  My search continues!


Class is going well, though I find my lack of vocabulary frustrating.  I have 3 pages of vocab words to learn (mostly for my own benefit), but my brain seems to think that since I'm not at Swat, it doesn't actually have to retain any information.  WRONG, brain.  Get it together.


I think that's all for now!  You can look forward to further pictures of Kreuzberg and tales from the weekend in my next post.  I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!