Heading to Checkpoint Charlie

On the twenty-fourth of March I noted that we left CK and took the tram to Alexander Platz.  There we walked past the Rathhaus Passage and the radio tower.  We had to navigate some crazy roadway to get to the U2 which we took to Freidrichstrasse.  Once there we stopped by the pharmacy and bank before heading to Checkpoint Charlie.

I took a picture there and noted that my friend was rapt in her attention to the place and I was surprised at her interest.  Eventually though she decided there were too many tourists for her taste.  We walked Muerstrasse and after a few blocks we ended up on CharlottenStrasse and eventually went into The Q and sat looking at Google Maps.

We then went to the Gallerie Lafayette, had chocolate and climbed to the top floor.  We didn’t find anything that we wanted though so we returned to the ground floor and eventually visited Newton on TaubenStrasse.  We looked at social media and had a couple of drinks.

We took the U2 back to the room.  I noted that the train was at the same level as The Q.  We got off at Wittensburg Platz and walked.  I left my friend to her thing and she took a nap.  Later we got ready for dinner.  We had identified a nice Osteria nearby but quickly learned that we needed to come back in about 45 minutes.

We returned to the room and packed then.  That took a while.  We thought we still had time so were about to go for some drinks but the waiters said they had a small table for us.  We split the burrata, a salad and the sausage pasta dish. There was tiramisu and I had the grappa.  They really liked us.  We returned to the room and went straight to sleep when we were done.

I got up at around 430 and tidied my things.  I ran off to Wittensburg Platz then with my friend but we were too late so we ended up waiting for the next train.  We went to Zoologischer Garten then and transferred to a bus which proved easier to find than I had anticipated.  We had 45 minutes but I knew that that was not enough.  My trip through security ended up eating a lot of that time.

I got me a cup of coffee and I posted our departure to Twitter.  The flight to Paris was easy.  We had coffee and a croissant and that was it.  In fact the taxiing actually took up about one eighth of the trip.  We got off the plane and rushed to the next.  In the process we passed through a couple of security checks.

We found a seat next to a large group.  Plenty of the people in our lounge were sleeping.  One set of people was waiting for another flight altogether.  I got coffee with the rest of the cash in my pocket.  At the last minute I wanted macarons so I returned to the shops to do that.  We were screened a second time as we boarded and we tried to make sense of why.  I decided it was because we had been on a connecting flight.

My friend went through several movies on the flight and I went between napping and looking at the view of the clouds.  Eventually I started writing.  When I had stopped doing that I started typing.  I tried the computer but it started to die.  I ended up spending the rest of the trip typing on my phone.  I noted that that had turned out better than I had anticipated.  In the meantime my friend’s movies kept distracting me.  I also took a bunch of naps.

We got up a few times but at that point I was no longer entirely coherent.  The plane started its long descent then and we got to know our neighbor.  That continued all the way to customs.  There was a second passport check on the way.  In the end we went through the door together and the officer was all smiles.

We went to BART and repacked.  Then we walked from 16th to Four Barrel and laughed at other peoples’ over heard conversations.

This is an occasional series chronicling my life. This Notebook Analysis series is meant to be contemporaneous piece developed as an agglomeration of my notebook pages. In each of these posts I used my notes to develop my recent thoughts.