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Meep! I guess blogging regularly while on holiday is not as easy as it sounded. I suppose I try to make up for it with detailed captions on my photos... which themselves take a few days to get done.

Let's do this real fast:

Thursday, June 14: Jillianne and I went to Hambuger Bahnhof, a contemporary art gallery. It was mostly crap, and I knew it would be, but I went in with the attitude ''know your enemy.'' Fortunately, my enemy seems pretty wimpy, so we'll be okay. There was an exhibit of the works of one guy who just does canvases with one or two or three colours. There was a video of him talking about his work and what the colours mean to him. It's all bullshit. There was also an exhibit entitled ''Shmerz'' (Pain). It was more of a museum, rather than art. Lots of examples of crucified Christs, old medical equipment, and photos of masturbation machines that had killed their owners.
Later that night, we watched the movie ''Liegen Lernen,'' which was about a man learning how to commit - one of my favourite topics for media, right behind ethnic gay men coming out to their families.

Friday, June 15: In the evening there was a Kneipetour, i.e., a bar hop. We went to two bars, and then got caught in a downpour. It was kind of nice.

Saturday, June 16: I spent the day on Museuminsel, as documented in my photos. I hit up the Bode-Museum, Pergamonmuseum, Lustgarten and Nikolaiviertel. I also did some shopping at a little market that local artists had set up near the Museuminsel. I got a really cute painting that I look forward to showing off.

Sunday, June 17: We went on a day-trip to Spreewald, i.e., to the forest on the Spree. We went canoeing, and it was really great. ^_^ I've developed a fondness for canoeing, and this place was particularly lovely. We were surrounded by trees, birds and dragonflies. At one point we took a shortcut right through a little town that had all these canals - the lawns and gardens of people's houses went right up to the water! We also made friends with some guys form the US Airforce Academy, with whom we hung out a lot the following week.

Monday, June 18: I woke up in a bad mood. Didn't do anything. I eventually recovered form my mood and took pictures of myself to commemorate that fact, but was unable to find anyone to do anything with. Boo.

Tuesday, June 19: I went to the Gemäldegalerie, which I enjoyed immensely. Had Indian food for dinner with Airforce guys.

Wednesday, June 20: Went to the Neue Nationalgalerie. I managed to sucker Jillianne and a few Airforce guys into coming with me. She, two of the guys and I wandered around Nikolaiviertel afterwards, and had dinner at a very old, traditional German restaurant. I had wild boar. It was pretty good. Not boring at all.

Thursday, June 21: Solstice! I returned to Museuminsel, to kick ass. I finished the Pergamonmusem, as well as the Altesmuseum, Berliner Dom, and Alte Nationalgalerie. It rained like it had something to prove.

Friday, June 22: After class, Jillianne and I met with a girl who is in Jillianne's class, Rosio. Rosio lives in Berlin and is married to a German. She took us on a ride around town in her convertible! We also stopped for coffee and cake, and it was a wonderful afternoon. We then met the Airforce boys for dinner, and went dancing at a place called Kaffe Burger. I think this was the best day I've had so far in Berlin.

Man, if that was real fast, I don't want to know what it's like when I take my time.

I do need to take a moment to say how amazing the club was. It was the sort of thing you can only get in Goth clubs in Toronto: people were just dancing, free, relaxed, not looking to impress anyone, just dancing for the love of the music. And, I hear that most of the clubs in Berlin are like that. I think that Berlin and I are going to get along very well.