On Friday, I hopped on a plane for a week-long work trip, 3 days in Berlin, Germany and 3 days in Basel, Switzerland.
SATURDAY (9/19)
I landed in Berlin on Saturday afternoon to gorgeous weather. My first adventure started when my non-English speaking taxi driver kicked me out the cab around a mile from my hotel because many of the downtown core was shut down for the Berlin Marathon the next day. So, I dragged all my stuff to my hotel, through throngs of families and hot weather, I was very happy to get to the Radisson Blu finally.
The hotel was pretty cool, there is a massive aquarium in the center of the hotel, and my room had a great view of it:
I met up with my counterpart from work and we did some wandering, some pics below:
Apparently, the day before the Berlin Marathon, there is an inline skating marathon on the same course:
That evening for dinner, I joined some co-workers for dinner at a restaurant called Remake, which was a great recommendation from the hotel concierge.
To start, I had the veal tartare, which was pretty amazing with a wasabi glaze.
For dinner, I had an updated version of a German classic, veal and local country mushrooms.
For dessert, a trio of sorbet (pineapple, peach and cassis).
SUNDAY (9/20)
I met up with my counterpart from work and we did some wandering, some pics below:
Apparently, the day before the Berlin Marathon, there is an inline skating marathon on the same course:
That evening for dinner, I joined some co-workers for dinner at a restaurant called Remake, which was a great recommendation from the hotel concierge.
To start, I had the veal tartare, which was pretty amazing with a wasabi glaze.
For dinner, I had an updated version of a German classic, veal and local country mushrooms.
For dessert, a trio of sorbet (pineapple, peach and cassis).SUNDAY (9/20)
On Sunday, I had all day meetings. And then I had dinner with my co-workers at the restaurant, HEat, in the Radisson Blu hotel.
To start, I had the rocket salad with flambeed figs and Serrano ham, very yummy. 
And for dinner, I had the classic German dish "Wienerschnitzel", which was tasty, but way too big to finish. After dinner, I went for a great two-hour walk with some of my co-workers, to help the digestion and to see some of the sights at night. I took some mediocre pics below..
The trend for every day traveling was meetings all day, squeezing in sight-seeing when possible, tackling my evening every evening until absurd o'clock, and then catching a few zzz's before getting up and doing it all again.MONDAY (9/21)
On Monday morning, I got up early to join two team members at 7 am for a great run. We did a fantastic 6-mile run from our hotel and through the Tiergarten, a wonderful way to see a new city.
Check out the diver cleaning the massive aquarium:
After more meetings, I had a window that I could squeeze in lunch and some sight-seeing before my next cluster of meetings.
After more meetings, I had a window that I could squeeze in lunch and some sight-seeing before my next cluster of meetings. A famous symbol of the past East Berlin is the "Ampelmann", which distinguishes itself from it's western neighbor by the hat it wears. It has now been commercialized and you can buy lots of fun souvenirs to take home with you featuring the Ampelmann.
For lunch, we stopped at an authentic German "bierstube" called Gasthaus Mutter Hoppe.
I had a dish that features roasted beef with a classic German horseradish sauce, which was quite good.
My co-worker Jenny, braved a very classic German dish called Schweinshaxe, which is pork knuckle.
We went over to Checkpoint Charlie, the name given by Western allies to a crossing wall at the Berlin Wall between East and West Germany during the Cold War. It is now an open-air exhibit with only the guard house remaining.
Close to Checkpoint Charlie and on the way to Postdamer Platz, there is a section of the Berlin Wall that is still standing:
From there, we headed to Potsdamer Platz, a famous square that is a busy intersection for traffic and close to many other famous landmarks.
There is a section of the Berlin Wall (with all its graffiti-ed glory) on display in Potsdamer Platz:
A few blocks from Potsdamer Platz is a riveting Holocaust Memorial (which I had taken some pics of during night, much better during the day). It is a Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, which consists of 2,711 concrete slabs over 4.7 acres arranged in a grid pattern on a sloping field, representing the known Jewish victims of the Holocaust.
A block away is the famous Brandenburg Gate, the former city gate and a major symbol of Berlin.
After my meetings, I had a team dinner at Bocca di Bacco, a nice italian restaurant.
There were a series of shared "Mixed Tuscan appetizers" for the group:
For dinner, I had the sliced entrecote of beef with ricola and radicchio.
For dessert, we had tiramisu.
For lunch, we stopped at an authentic German "bierstube" called Gasthaus Mutter Hoppe.
I had a dish that features roasted beef with a classic German horseradish sauce, which was quite good.
My co-worker Jenny, braved a very classic German dish called Schweinshaxe, which is pork knuckle.
We went over to Checkpoint Charlie, the name given by Western allies to a crossing wall at the Berlin Wall between East and West Germany during the Cold War. It is now an open-air exhibit with only the guard house remaining.
Close to Checkpoint Charlie and on the way to Postdamer Platz, there is a section of the Berlin Wall that is still standing:
From there, we headed to Potsdamer Platz, a famous square that is a busy intersection for traffic and close to many other famous landmarks.
There is a section of the Berlin Wall (with all its graffiti-ed glory) on display in Potsdamer Platz:
A few blocks from Potsdamer Platz is a riveting Holocaust Memorial (which I had taken some pics of during night, much better during the day). It is a Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, which consists of 2,711 concrete slabs over 4.7 acres arranged in a grid pattern on a sloping field, representing the known Jewish victims of the Holocaust.
A block away is the famous Brandenburg Gate, the former city gate and a major symbol of Berlin.
After my meetings, I had a team dinner at Bocca di Bacco, a nice italian restaurant.
There were a series of shared "Mixed Tuscan appetizers" for the group:
For dinner, I had the sliced entrecote of beef with ricola and radicchio.
For dessert, we had tiramisu. After dinner, our team lead peer pressured us to go to a Berlin club called Felix to do some "team bonding", also known as dancing.
It was a pretty hot place, with the rest of the clientele guaranteed to be half our ages, but it was really fun. More and more folks from work showed up and it was starting to look like quite the crazy night of clubbing in Berlin...
I did about 3 hours of sweaty dancing and then luckily got out of that place intact. I had to tackle more e-mail back at the hotel, but it was worth the fun.
It was a pretty hot place, with the rest of the clientele guaranteed to be half our ages, but it was really fun. More and more folks from work showed up and it was starting to look like quite the crazy night of clubbing in Berlin...
I did about 3 hours of sweaty dancing and then luckily got out of that place intact. I had to tackle more e-mail back at the hotel, but it was worth the fun. I was off to Basel the next morning, so I also had some packing to do. Berlin is a beautiful city and I wished I had more time there...
Auf wiedersen!
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