She leaned over to me and said that we would detrain at the Magdalennestrasse and take the steps up to Frankfurterallee, which is the main drag past the Stasi complex. As we left the train, I glanced at the great rectangles of public art that lined the opposite walls of the platform, highlighted by the […]

(Abandoned US SIGINT Site at Teuflesberg, British Sector, West Berlin)   They whisked me out of Tegel without complication yesterday morning to Munich, and four movies later the AB-330-300 touched down at IAD.   Apparently the particulate matter from the plume tops out at FL28, and we cruised directly over it at Flight Level 36, […]

(Zentrallufthaven Templehof. Photo Socotra)   I got back to the room at the Armony before four, and collapsed on the bed. My attempt at a Rave was over. I was happy I had seen some of the night-life, and that the lives of the new generation are not demonstrably different than that of their elders, […]

(Caberet, Berlin Style. Photography by Jim Ferreira) I suddenly realized what a pathetic dependent creature I am. The Internet is down at the Hotel Armony and I am suddenly in Germany. Without it I cannot contact my associate in the building next door, and may actually have to deal with the German people and their […]

The plan was to dine in the Turkische fashion,but we didn’t. It was the desire of my guide to have me dine on the most famous Döner in Berlin, which is the Dönerkapital of the known universe. I was humbled. I had to ask what a “Döner” might be, since everyone except me in this […]

(At the East Mauer Gallery, with attitude. All the pics are at my Facebook Page) Part of this trip to Berlin is an exercise in bringing down the Wall that exists in the middle ground of my-more-than-middle-aged brain. I think we succeeded yesterday, though there is much more to come. First, an important correction.   […]

(One of Berlin’s ubiquitous cabs)     I am little impatient this morning and want to get at it. I seem to have developed a craving for speed. The State Special Security Headquarters (Stasi) tour was like hours ago, and the Soviet War Cemetery at Treptower Park is so like- I dunno. Before lunch.   […]

(In West Kreuzberg. Photo Socotra)   It was an awful flight from Dulles. You know the drill by now. We were delayed, sardine-can packed in the back of the Lufthansa B-747 for much longer than planned.   It was the damned plume out of that unpronounceable volcano in Iceland, of course. The First Officer told […]

(Lufthansa B747-400 (D-ABTB), originally uploaded by jonsey737.) I think they are really going to kill Jack. Everyone else is getting killed, some by Jack himself. So I presume last night’s episode is getting to the end of the television show “24,” which has run the distance of the War on Terror so far.   We […]

  (Colorful remaining section of the Berlin Wall)   “Die Mauer wird in 50 und auch in 100 Jahren noch bestehen bleiben, wenn die dazu vorhandenen Gründe noch nicht beseitigt sind”   “The Wall will be standing in 50 and even in 100 years, if the reasons for it are not yet removed.” – Erich […]