Last Wednesday was May 1st, international labor day. Little did I know, the whole city would erupt into celebrations and demonstrations and picnicking and dancing.
I spent most of my day between Kottbusser Tor (“Kotti”) and Görlitzer Bahnhof (“Görli”). First thing that surprised me was the fact that when I was heading over there at around 1pm, the bahn was so full that I had to wait for the third train that came before managing to get on. And when I got off at my stop, the streets were packed with people and there were “cocktail stations” every 100 meters. Kotti and Görli are places famous for nightlife as almost every street corner here is either a bar or a club. But the crowd of people was so overwhelming that they had to open up additional stands outside the bars to meet the demand. There was music blasting everywhere, and the atmosphere was just electric.
I was also told that there was a big dance party on the Tempelhofer field, one of my favorite places in Berlin that I wrote about in my previous blog post. Unfortunately (or fortunately), I was having so much fun at Görli that I ended up spending my whole day there.
After sitting in a park and having some delicious (if overpriced) beer, we strolled around the streets and stumbled upon something that resembled a fair where we ate some delicious food. We also listened to a politician give a speech. Apparently, there were big protests and demonstrations going on that day too, but we decided to avoid those areas. From what I read in the newspapers, though, it seems that everything went without any major problems this year.
As if my day hadn’t been wonderful enough at that point, I topped it off with a visit to the Berliner Ensemble to see Brecht’s The Threepenny Opera. Exactly what I needed to wind down after a long day strolling along the crowded streets.
Marta Misiulaityte
<p><span style="color: rgb(29, 29, 29); font-family: Arial, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 12px; line-height: normal; background-color: rgb(237, 237, 237);">Marta is a Sociology and German double major at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, but has a hard time staying within the boundaries of these two disciplines just the way she cannot stay in any one place for a long time. The thirst for knowledge and adventures is her biggest drive; over the course of her college career she has taken classes ranging from film studies to psychology, and she just spent a semester studying Arabic in Jordan. Originally from Lithuania, Marta has been fortunate enough to call many places her home. When she is not devouring books, she coordinates and leads campus tours, serves as a proctor in a first-year student dorm, works at the Admissions office as well as helping out at the Registrar’s office at Bowdoin. In her free time, she can be found either taking photographs or swing dancing. She can’t wait to check out the Berlin lindy hop scene!</span></p>
