(Note: Just to explain what the hell I was doing in
the International Herald Tribune newsroom during
deadline; Gina wanted me to see the early morning
training so I met her at work around 10 p.m. and then
crashed on her couch so we could be at the horse training at 6 a.m.
While I waited I was looking over some dummy pages and
an editor said in passing that if I see any errors that I should
point them out. So, there was an error and I told her and impressed a few people in the room. It was really just dumb luck.)
BERLIN, April 10, 2004 - Packed into back of the dining car
on the Paris to Berlin train, some Canadian travelers
and me drank cheap beer and talked about where we had
been.
I was spending the night in a compartment with only
seats for me and my companions - three other Eastern
European guys who looked mad - so I needed some beer.
Then the vibe shifted noticeably after we got word
that the Paris train station was evacuated shortly
after we departed because of a bomb threat.
Just another reminder of the times we live in.
Compared to Paris, this city and the weather are
uncreative, bland and cold. I can see why the Nazis
were pissed off.
But the history makes up for the plain, industrial
buildings that were built to replace the ones that
were bombed during the war.
I took a tour today of a complex that was a detention
and torture center for the years when the Russians ran
East Germany.
The tour guide made a point of calling me out for
being an American and a citizen of a country that is
holding people in Cuba. He told the group that the
U.S. is using the same types of strategies in
Guantanamo Bay that were used by the East German
police, or the Stasi, back in the day.
I replied that I am certain that history is not going
to look kindly on the behavior of America during the
past few years. That seemed to satisfy the group and
our guide.
I am headed to a concentration camp in the next few
days and tonight I am going to one of those huge,
Medieval Restaurants that have jousting. One should be
much more uplifting and raucous than the other.
Oh, and at Checkpoint Charlie - the place where the
troops from the Russia and the U.S. almost turned the
Cold War into a Hot War in 1961 - I found my favorite
picture so far; me with a German dressed as a Russian
general in a Mexican restaurant.
Happy Easter to everyone.
Take care,
Brett
