So today I decided to try out biking to the train in a dress, given how many locals seem to do that. We are having a heat wave, and my last suitcase finally made its appearance at our front door yesterday (sans two handles & a cute orange butterfly luggage tag), so I had more options. It was certainly breezy, and felt a little odd– but the thin shorts underneath seemed to keep the whole operation rated PG. I also felt a little more Euro dressed up rather than wearing hiking shorts.

It is also curious how we are foreigners, and yet we seem to largely blend in with our fair skin. The language issue is of course notable, and we have a lot of work to do on that front, but so far we’ve been a-okay with English. It is striking how our whiteness allows us to ease into life here after less than a week, even with a global context in which anti-immigrant sentiments are ubiquitous. The lack of racial diversity here is pretty startling for a bay area girl– there are certainly more Turkish people, but otherwise, the trains are largely full of white people. I’m sure redlining has played a role here too, and our neighborhood is definitely in the ‘burbs. We also received the roster for Julian’s new class at school, and the mix of names suggests that his classmates will be largely Russian and Israeli, which is quite a change from home.

Other items of note include the tiny packages of food items in the grocery store. I think the bag of mini bell peppers I bought at Aldi has roughly 5 peppers in it, as opposed to the dozen or so in the ones at TJs. From slices of cheese to bags of granola, everything seems miniature. Our kitchen sink is also teeny tiny, even though the kitchen itself is quite large. The fridge and freezer are about a quarter of the size of ours at home, so grocery shopping is going to be happening a lot more often. And while Amazon.de works here, the city only picks up recycling once per month (!) so I’ll be using the grocery bags I brought and bringing a few little packages home from the local grocery stores in Forest’s nifty basket. But apart from the mundane…

It was funny that our first reaction to the scenery here was that it reminded us of Rock Creek Park and the greenery of the DC area. Wouldn’t you know that the next couple we met here in town at the local biergarten literally moved back to Kleinmachnow from the DC area last week! They grew up around here and have two young kids, and happen to work for the German embassy– certainly good people to know! The dad initially approached us as he overheard our American English from the next table over, and then his wife came over with their kids and gushed about how everyone in Bethesda, MD had been so kind to them when they moved at the height of the pandemic in the summer of 2020, and they would love to help us adjust to the area in any way they can. We traded phone numbers (although we had to look up what our new German ones were!) and look forward to having them over for dinner soon. My serving spoons arrived from IKEA today, so we’ll be ready to entertain in no time.

Yesterday we biked to Potsdam, which was incredibly beautiful– so many historic buildings, charming streets and even a brand-new synagogue in the center of town that recently opened on the 4th of July this year. It was about 14 miles roundtrip on mostly flat roads, with one hill in the mix and several stunning lakes along the way. Having been pretty sedentary this summer in recovering from elective foot surgery, it was a bit of a push, but Forest is a dream and it’s been delightful to travel everywhere by bike. There is also a bus to Potsdam, or a train – so we can get there any number of ways in about a half hour.

Another Brick in the Wall

More notably, today we went back downtown to check out the Berlin Wall, which was even more incredible than we expected. I came here back in the early ’90s but they’ve taken the memorial game up several notches. Even in the S-Bahn station, there was an in-depth exhibit about all of the disappeared East Berlin stations (with entrances covered up and dismantled, only to be reinstated after 1989) and East German border guards who were essentially treated like prisoners while on duty after several used their posts to escape to West Berlin through the underground subway tunnels. They had photos of old & new stations printed side-by-side (generally 1960s vs 1990s), in addition to photographs of the stations when they were first re-discovered after being hidden from 1961-1989. But the wall itself is so impeccably preserved in just enough places to remind visitors of the stark division and recent tumultuous past. It was quite moving just to reach up and touch it. And all day long, Pink Floyd’s “Another Brick in the Wall” was playing on repeat in my head. Intermittent stretches of the wall with graffiti have been preserved, and the rest of the wall is marked with rusted bronze-type pillars that are deliberately narrow with little openings every so often to walk through. There are exhibits all around with placards and photos of many who lost their lives trying to escape from East to West Berlin. And there were some holes in the wall– see Julian pictured below!

We also paid a visit to Brandenburg Gate and the nearby sites, but it was really hot– like 90 degrees hot, so we decided to hop on a train back home to cool off and make some lunch. We’ll hit the other major sites on a cooler day this fall.

Incidentally, we also saw a random piece of the wall this morning along the bike path between our house and the nearby train station.

And tomorrow, we’re headed to nearby Wannsee Lake to rent a boat and go for a swim… summer is still in the air!