So I was having a couple of drinks about two weeks ago in Utrecht when Giorgio asked me if I felt like to joining him the weekend after to Berlin to have a party or two and see the city. I had never been in Berlin before so why not.
Fortunately, the week after we had Ascension Day on Thursday, which is a national holiday in the Netherlands (and large parts of Europe for that matter) so that left us with a pretty long weekend. We left Thursday morning and because there was no traffic at all, we drove to our hotel in Berlin in under 5 hours.
Berlin really is an awesome city. I didn’t expect it, but it was amazing. We arrived on Thursday and immediately had a look at a lot of places everybody tells you to go and see like Checkpoint Charlie (not that interesting actually), Oranienburgerstrasse (reminded me of the Damrak in Amsterdam–which is not so good 
), the Brandenburger Tor (which was way smaller than I thought), the Reichstag (nope, I left the climbing of the roof for a later visit, didn’t want to spend hours in line). We also visited the newly built Holocaust monument. This was really impressive! It’s a monument architected by Peter Eisenman and while ‘inside’, it should give you the idea of being lonely and separated from the world. Well, he’s certainly done a good job; the monument is really impressive.
After having a couple of drinks, we went for dinner in a Tapas place we accidentally stumbled upon in the Auguststrasse. A great place to have some spanish food. Good atmosphere and the Tempranillo Toro they have is great!
Later on that night we had a drink in bar Zapato which is a trendy place just below the Tacheless squatter building. Actually spend a couple of hours in Tacheless as well, which is really worth it. It’s Berlin’s oldest squatter building and occupied by artists. There’s also a bar, a cinema and there should be parties there from time to time as well. The bar on the top floor offers some great views.
The next day we did some shopping in the Kreuzberg areas. We mainly looked for vinyl. This always takes too long in my opinion, but well, Sjors thinks he’s a DJ, so let’s just leave him to it shall we 
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The evening we thought about taking it a bit easier but we ended, but after we had dinner and a few drinks here and there Giorgio and I still felt like partying a bit. Margriet actually didn’t so we left her at the hotel (Hotel Greifswald on the Greifswalderstrasse–they have the best breakfast ever, don’t bring a car bigger than mine though, you’ll have trouble parking it in the back of the hotel).
Giorgio and I went to the Panoramabar in Friedrichshain near Ostbanhof. As I learnt later on, the Panoramabar (together with Berghain) is the reincarnation of the Ostgut club which had been closed for a couple of years. The club is the best club I’ve ever seen. It’s home a abandoned coal power plant from the 50s and the guys that built the club did their utmost best to preserve the atmosphere. They succeeded quite well, while adding a bit of comfort and of course, the best lighting and sound systems one could afford. The music in the Panoramabar was great this night with Luciano putting a good set and some other DJs there as well (can’t remember who they were). They place is out in the open and faces East, so if daylight comes (and this happen pretty early towards the end of May, especially in the Eastern part of the Central European Timezone), you’re kind of happy they’ve installed blinds in fron the huge windows in the club. Of course the party doesn’t finish when daylight first starts to arrive and just to get a feel for what the weather is like, they remove the blinds once every now and then for a couple of seconds . Great place!
After we were kind of done with the music and the people there (no, we weren’t done really; if we would’ve spent more time there, we wouldn’t have been able to get out of bed anymore the next day) we went back to the hotel where breakfast was just being served.
At the Panoramabar by the way, be sure to dress nice and be nice at the entrance. The bouncer is is kind of random about who he lets in and if you’re cocky, arrogant or just plain drunk, the (pretty impressive bouncer) won’t let you in. We were standing right behind a group of Americans who were acting stupid and didn’t get in. Fortunately my German was good enough to explain the bouncer that we didn’t belong with these guys, otherwise we wouldn’t have gotten in either…
The day after we did some shopping again, had dinner in a place called Strandbat Mitte (close to the Tapas place we had dinner earlier) and left for the hotel early, to catch some sleep. I picked up my really nicelooking belt I had bought the day before at a place called J.R. (I believe it’s on the Auguststrasse as well, but I’m not sure). We also had a drink in place called 3 (can’t recall where it is, but it’s close to the Volksbuhne). 3 is a great place, black-and-white only, playing jazzy music with a quiet kind of coolish atmosphere to it. We asked the owner whether or not is always that quiet. No he said, it’s still early, it usually doesn’t get crowded before 4am. Wow, and that a simple bar .
After having slept for two hours, we went to the Berghain/Panoramabar again where we spent a couple of hours. We didn’t spent too much time there since we still had a to do a trip back to Holland the day after. Leaving this place didn’t feel good however; it really is the best club I’ve ever been to.
The drive home took a bit longer than expected. Due to a couple of traffic jams we ended up back in Utrecht about 8 hours after we left Berlin. Well, a spontaneous weekend full of fun.
p.s. It’s Giorgio birthday soon; he’s actually thinking about celebrating this year’s in Berlin… Well, why not, I would say
p.p.s. I’ll try to post some more pictures later on.
