A Trip to Berlin

Last Wednesday I boarded a flight to Berlin, Germany -- perhaps the most historically significant city in the last hundred years. I was asked by the German teacher at St. James, a fella named Stuart Bridge, to accompany him on the trip and help look after the 12 students that were going. We arrived in Berlin at about 1 p.m. local time and promptly proceeded to a walking tour of the city. It was incredible to see Berlin and how the city had been affected by WWII and the Cold War. The first structure we saw was the Cathedral of Berlin ...

Next we saw the famous Brandenburg Gate, which was built in 1791 to serve as the symbolic end of the city of Berlin and the beginning of the German countryside. The German royalty would ride through these gates on their way to hunting excursions in the Tiergarten ...

Next we walked down Karl Marx Alley and ended up at Bebelplatz, which is quite a beautiful square in the city center but is probably most famous for being the location of many of the Nazi book burnings that were held in Berlin. The Nazi party wanted to have them here because the square is adjacent to Humboldt University, one of the best schools in Germany ...

We then spent some time at an untitled memorial for the deceased Jewish people from the Nazi era. The artist who was commissioned for the project did not leave a plaque explaining the design -- the goal being to leave it open for individual interpretation ...

We finished our tour at a still-standing portion of the Berlin Wall and learned about the many attempts made to cross it. The wall was 3.6 meters tall (or about 12 feet) ...

The following days were filled with museums and visits to other historical sites. Including the Victory Column, which was constructed in 1873 to commemorate the thrashings of the French, Danish, and Austrian armies in the many campaigns of the Prussian empire ...

 

A few of the St. James lads and I climbed the many stairs to the top of the 67-meter tower and were able to capture some amazing views of the city ...

 Of course I took a selfie at the top of this scenic monument ...

We exited the Victory Column and walked through some of the Tiergarten, which has been converted over the centuries from a royal hunting ground to a beautiful park. One of the kids I was chaperoning wanted to sneak into the picture -- so that's James below.

Later that night the St. James legion went bowling. The bowling alley was interesting -- almost like a nightclub. The manager hopped on some DJ decks and started mixing some pretty solid jams. I was impressed.

On our way back to the hotel I found a fairly blunt sign outside of a local pub ...

 

On our final night in Berlin we took the crew to a traditional German restaurant and fed them pork schnitzel, which was incredible ...

On the first day in Berlin I made a deal with one of the students, Caellum, to get a pretzel at every street shop we could find. Here we are at the airport with our last pretzels of the trip ...

I had some time to kill between seeing the boys off on their flight back to London and hopping on my train to Munich, so I stopped for dinner near the station. There was no room inside, so I was offered a seat outside with a blanket. Having experienced the cold winters of St. Louis, I happily obliged and took my blanket out into the elements and enjoyed a nice pizza ...

I am currently in Max's apartment in Munich, waiting for him to finish class for the day so he can show me around. We were able to share a meal last night and catch up. He's doing great. Many more adventures wait in the coming week with Max and the city of Munich...

Flyer Faithful

I basically know one person in London from back home: Mark Barron. He went to the University of Dayton with my brother Drew, so a couple weeks before I left my brother gave me Mark's email. I have gone out with Mark a couple of times since I've been here and I have sort of been adopted into his circle of friends in London because many of them also went to Dayton. It is amazing to me that the UD network of alumni stretches so far around the world. How crazy is it that a medium-size school in Ohio can bring people together on another continent?

So last night Mark invited me out to dinner with he and the Dayton crew. We went to an Italian restaurant in Kensington and I had the best pasta I have ever tasted ...

 

After dinner Mark and his roommate Joe were pretty tired (and had to work in the morning) so they headed home. One of the guys at dinner, Matt McNamara, shared my desire to night let the night end. Matt was actually pretty good friends with Drew at Dayton so we hit it off. He is living in San Francisco and has been backpacking around Europe for the last month. It was his last night in London so I suggested we go to a club ... he obliged. We decided on an establishment called TigerTiger right in Piccadilly Circus. We had a great time.

Matt's flight didn't leave until 8 p.m. the next day so we did a bit of sight seeing together. I took him to the places I knew. The weather was incredible which made the day even better. This was my favorite part of the day, Hyde Park ...

My next post will hopefully be from Germany. I am leaving Wednesday morning for Berlin and taking a train to Munich on Sunday to stay with my friend Max for a week.

An Eventful Weekend

I was feeling a bit sad heading into this past weekend, knowing that the Cardinals would be doing battle with the Dodgers in the NLDS and I would probably not be able to watch any of the games because of the time difference and the lack of enthusiasm for baseball in London. I sort of put it in the back of my mind because Friday was the St. James Staff Night Out and I was excited to hang out with some of the other people who work at the school. I kicked off Friday evening at my favorite burger spot Dub Jam, where I consumed this masterpiece ...

After dinner I proceeded to "Revolution Bar" in Richmond, West London, to meet up with the St. James staff. They were all great, very inviting. I had met some of them previously through PE and History lessons, but it was nice to converse outside of the academic setting.

Later in the night the younger teachers decided to move to another pub where a local band was playing. I was planning to catch a train home around that time, so I told one of the PE teachers, Stewart Willis, that I was going to take off. I've spent most of my time at school helping him and his class, and he instead insisted that I would be staying at his house for the night. I did not really have a chance to say no.

We got back to Stewart's flat at about 2 a.m. after meeting up with his roommate for one last pint. We sit down in his living room and he tunes his television to BT Sport, basically England's answer to ESPN. Low and behold my Cardinals were being broadcast on this channel. Ecstatic, I explain to "Stew" and his roommate James that this is my team, in the biggest game of the year thus far.

They were intrigued.

The game was in the fourth inning and the Dodgers were up 4-1 at this point. I explained to the boys that Clayton Kershaw is the best pitcher in Major League Baseball but then told them about last year's NLCS, when my Cardinals picked him apart. They were skeptical about my optimism, and rightly so after the LA nine tacked on two more runs in the next inning to go up 6-1.

Amid all of this I was explaining the cultural importance of the St. Louis Cardinals and the passion St. Louisans have for their baseball club. So they understood -- I think -- when I began screaming at the top of my lungs while I watched the Cardinals put up eight runs on the outright favorite for the NL Cy Young Award and MVP in the top of the seventh. We watched them finish it out, and I think it's safe to say Cardinal Nation has grown by two. Here is a look inside their living room during the game, around 3:00 a.m. local time ...

I woke up Sunday feeling like doing some touristy things. I wanted to see some of the famous attractions in London. A few weeks ago I purchased a skateboard to get around the city a little quicker. So I went to see Picadilly Circus, skated a bit around Trafalgar Square, Oxford Circus, Regent Street, and Leicester Square ...

Regent Street ...

Oxford Circus ...

Picadilly Circus ...

Luke's London Eats

As an avid food lover I was excited to experience London's culinary offerings. When I learned St. James School provided a vegetarian-only menu I was a bit discouraged, but that feeling was lost when I began to actually try the stuff. The meals here are nothing short of phenomenal. I have also found amazing places to eat in my trips to the city. While I've caught a couple weird looks trying to get a good angle on my meals for these photos, here are some of my favorite things so far ...

I'll start with one of my favorite meals from St. James, a stuffed baked potato filled with cheese and various veggies ...

One of the desserts from St. James really had me feeling like I was at home, an apple crumble. It was delicious ...

Now for some of the meals I've had in central London. I found this Italian restaurant that looked quite good called Strada. Here is a penne pasta with white sauce and salsa verde ...

Before I left St. Louis I filled up on Qdoba burritos believing Mexican food would be hard to come by in London and the stuff I could find would not be very good. I was wrong. This place is called Lupita and I can easily say it is the best Mexican food I have ever had. The plate on the left contains two arrachera quesadillas, which is basically steak and onions. The plate on the right contains two campechano tacos, which consist of arrachera steak, pork chicarron, and salsa guajillo ...

I found another great Italian restaurant right near Waterloo station called Bella Italia. This dish is called Pollo Formaggi al Forno. It contains chicken and crispy pancetta in a rich four cheese sauce with giant shell pasta and a cheesy crumb topping ...

Another meal that really reminded me of home was this fried chicken plate from one of my favorite places called Joe's Southern Kitchen. They do a pretty good job of capturing the southern U.S. vibe, playing bluegrass music and serving American whiskeys like Knob Creek and Jim Beam. Beam is surprisingly hard to find here ...

I have tried not to go to the same place twice, but Lupita is just amazing. This meal was a bit smaller in proportion than the one above, but I just wasn't as hungry. The classicos nachos were light and incredibly delicious, and of course I had to have a mojito ...

I found this peculiar place off one of the main roads in London -- an area called The Strand. It's a bit of a hole in the wall, but their food is flat out delicious. It's a burger joint called Dub Jam and they serve tropical style burgers and play reggae music, giving you a beach cabana feel. I had never really thought about avocado on a burger but it turned a skeptic into a believer. My phone was actually low on battery when I was there so I had to grab this picture from the web ...

This is only the first month, so I'm sure I will find some more restaurants to rave about.